The National Commission for Markets and Competition (CNMC) is reluctant to put an end to special surveillance of large companies in the natural gas sector. The organism opened an investigation last October and controls the customer service they provide to ensure fluidity in the massive transfer of users who jump to the regulated gas tariffs in search of the aid that the Government distributes to make them cheaper.
The millionaire aid package announced by the Executive caused a flood of requests for contract changes towards the regulated tariffs, called fares of last resort (TUR), which still exists. In just six months, a million homes have changed their gas contract, but in the first moments there were enormous bottlenecks for the energy companies to manage all the requests, with complaints from many consumers due to the very long initial waits, due to the lack of information and the difficulties in achieving the contract.
Competition then opened an information file to the four large companies obliged to offer these regulated rates (Naturgy, Iberdrola, Endesa and Totalenergies). The agency began to request information that the four large gas companies have sent every month on the technical and staff resources used to attend to the flood of requests, the number of calls answered and those that have remained unanswered, waiting times and the number of discharges executed.
The initial plan of the organization led by Cani Fernández was to request periodic information from the groups until April. Competition is now studying to maintain vigilance during the coming months, while the massive transfer of clients lasts and will adopt a final decision on the matter in a matter of weeks. “Follow-up is likely to be extended in subsequent months, although simplifying the information to be sent to the CNMC”, according to official sources from the Commission.
there will be no sanctions
While waiting to decide whether to keep the information file open, the CNMC does rule out taking the step of opening a disciplinary file against the large energy companies, as EL PERIÓDICO DE ESPAÑA already announced last February. The initiation of a disciplinary file would entail having found sufficient evidence that infractions had been committed and that would open the possibility of applying sanctions to the groups.
He information file It is the first step in the supervision processes that the CNMC can carry out in the regulated sectors. In many cases it works as a notice to sailors with the aim of companies correcting their actions before initiating a disciplinary file. And in this case, the organism considers that it has worked.
“The priority of the CNMC when opening the information file is to ensure proper attention to the consumer who wishes to contract the regulated rate,” they point out from the agency. “The result of the supervision shows that consumer care services returned to normal as of the second half of November due to the reinforcements in said channels carried out by the companies, mainly the incorporation of new telemarketer positions”.
The CNMC is also evaluating the possibility of imposing on companies permanent “preventive measures” to avoid further collapses in the future. In this sense, the agency plans to establish that regulated rate marketers have an automated online contracting channel that is easy to find on the company’s websites, and not just telephone channels or in face-to-face commercial offices as up to now.
Flurry of customer changes
The large energy companies continue to register a massive transfer of customers to the regulated rates of natural gas. Government aid to lower the natural gas bill to millions of homes have shaken up and broken the market. The subsidies are serving to reduce the receipt by 40% of customers with regulated gas rates and have generated a historic commercial turnaround in recent months with almost a million customers changing their contract. However, they are still in the minority and less than a third of all customers have already opted for regulated rates.
In the heat of the Government aid, the large energy groups have gone from the 1.58 million TUR clients that there were last September up to 2.5 million users, according to government data. Despite the massive transfer, the number of customers receiving gas rates from the free market is still much higher, despite being more expensive and having registered strong increases in recent winter months. Currently, some 5.7 million users maintain their contracts with free market rates.
cheaper gas rate
Barely 30% of all users have the tariff protected against strong increases and that is currently cheaper than all the free market tariffs, as confirmed by the price comparator of the National Markets and Competition Commission ( CNMC). The combined action of the specific government aid to gas rates and the VAT reduction have meant that the bill of households with a regulated rate is around 40% lower than the amount they would have paid in the absence of these measures.
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The last quarterly price review applied to regulated gas rates, applicable from April 1, led to an average reduction of 29.9% for the next three months. A cut caused by the sharp decrease in gas prices in the TUR calculation formula and the Government’s decision that the General State Budgets (PGE) assume the debt accumulated with the sector by the establishment of extraordinary measures to limit the impact of the war in Ukraine.
The energy companies themselves recognize that the lack of knowledge on the part of customers about the different market options is the fundamental reason why many maintain their rate despite market fluctuations. More than one 62% of customers admit that they do not know what gas rate they have contracted in their home and more than 67% acknowledge not knowing the differences between regulated rates and those on the free market, according to data from the latest CNMC Household Panel, corresponding to mid-2022, when the energy crisis had already been going on for almost a year.