2023-05-19 16:42:07
The Spanish suffered the worst moments last year to face the payment of the electricity and gas bill as a result of prices shot up to historical records, especially due to the war in Ukraine. Each family sought the most viable alternative to reduce the amount of these receipts. And among the most agile options, a good part of the citizens chose to change their energy company.
The electricity and gas market experienced a real change of suppliers during 2022, the year in which 14.2% of households opted for a different supplier to the one they had contracted until then; and 11.2% of natural gas users did the same, according to the latest data from the National Commission for Markets and Competition (CNMC).
Specifically, almost 6.5 million customers changed their electricity company, which is 27% more than the previous year. Between 2020 and 2022, changes from the regulated market (PVPC rate) to the free market multiplied by three. Although most of that dance of customers was registered among the free market marketers themselves.
In the case of gas, 1.5 million changes were recorded, which is 46% more than in 2021. This exponential increase is explained by the rise in the gas tariff, which was multiplied by four, which prompted many households to take advantage of the regulated rate (TUR) at the gates of winter, after the price freeze approved by the Government and the regulations that enabled these transfers without so many impediments, including the neighboring communities.
With these data, the energy market recovers the level of company changes that it had lost when the pandemic began, in 2020. At that time, the prices of electricity and gas fell sharply due to the bolt to daily activity, and there was no concern both the invoice amount. However, the transfer to other companies has become a common practice among the more than 27 million consumers throughout Spain. In the case of electricity company customers, the change has grown by almost 5 percentage points in two years, which represents a relative increase of 51%. If we look at the changes in gas company, the relative growth compared to 2020 has been 61%.
In this first part of 2023, gas and electricity prices remain much more stable than last year. In the case of electricity, May is at an average of 72 euros/MWh, and natural gas is trading below 30 euros/MWh compared to 300 euros/MWh last summer.
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