Cost-of-living and more complex power plans blamed for surging utility complaints
Sunday, 25 January 2026
The organisation empowered by the Government to help settle disputes about electricity, gas and water services and broadband installations says the number of complaints it receives is on track to total 14,000 in the year to April.
That would be up from 8356 last year and would represent a quadrupling of complaints over the past four years.
Last year 90% of the complaints it received were about electricity or gas. Most telco disputes are dealt with separately through the Telecommunications Disputes Resolution Scheme which experienced no increase in the number of complaints it fielded in the year to June.
Utilities Disputes Limited (UDL) commissioner Neil Mallon said the increase in complaints it had received had been mirrored in Australia and was not necessarily an indication of a declining level of performance by suppliers.
Instead, he attributed the rise to a greater awareness of the disputes service, whose responsibilities include managing the mandatory Energy Complaint Scheme, as well as to the growing complexity of power bills and the rising cost of living.
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“There’s a lot more complexity, with the introduction of time-of-use plans and as cost of living goes up and power bills go up, people naturally put a bit more scrutiny on what they’re paying.
“You’ve seen also a deterioration in trust… amongst consumers. They’re much more willing — which I think is a good thing — to go to an independent party and ask, ‘look, is this right?’”
Electricity prices jumped by an average of 12.2% in the year to December, according to Stats NZ figures released last week, while gas prices leapt 17.5%.
Bridget Abernethy, chief executive of the Electricity Retailers’ and Generators’ Association, said about 17% of electricity-related complaints progressed to mediation or a commissioner’s ruling, with “the vast majority” resolved directly between the customer and the retailer.
“The trend in complaints related to electricity retailers has been tracking downwards overall since July,” she noted.
“We’ve seen a consistent pattern over recent years where complaints often rise after April, which aligns with the period when many retailers set annual prices. That timing can create pressure for customers, and retailers try their hardest to communicate clearly and handle issues quickly.”
Mallon said UDL had had a low profile among consumers, but said awareness of its service increased in 2021 when the Electricity Authority ordered power firms to make the existence of the disputes scheme more prominent on their bills.
UDL has broad powers, when it looks into complaints, to require utilities to abide by what it deems a fair resolution, though its rulings can be challenged by suppliers in the courts.
The fact a customer had made a complaint did not necessarily mean a supplier had done anything wrong, he made clear.
Of the complaints UDL received last year, it went on to consider about 900 that could not be resolved by agreement and 300 of those were referred to Mallon for a decision.
“I would say it’s a small number where they’ve done something absolutely wrong. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t things that could have been improved along the way, in the way they treated the customer or the information they gave.”
The Wellington-based organisation is confident it is about to help reduce one source of more troublesome complaints.
Following encouragement from UDL, the Electricity Authority is considering limiting the time that electricity companies have to rectify mistakes that have led them to under-charge customers for the power they used.
Such billing errors are commonly caused by “smart meters” failing to communicate readings back to the retailer, or the ownership of meters getting mixed up between neighbours, Mallon said.
Over the past 12 months, UDL has been called on to consider 183 “deadlocked” disputes between power retailers and electricity customers over such back-bills.
UDL was aware of one case where a retailer attempted to direct-debit more than $76,000 from a business customer “without any warning or discussion” after such a mistake going back many years, and another where a consumer was billed $2700 after an address mix-up resulted in them being under-charged for a year.
Some power firms would apply current electricity rates that weren’t applicable when the electricity was used by the consumer “adding to the stress of a sudden large bill”, it said.
Limiting the time power firms had to fix mistakes would bring New Zealand into line with the UK and Australia and would be a good discipline for those utilities, Mallon said.
“Some retailers may say this is going to add difficulty to their job, but being more efficient in how you bill is good for everyone involved.”
Abernethy said the association supported a six-month or 'reasonable” limit on back-billing.
“At the same time, back-billing regulations should allow for legitimate instances where consumption cannot be measured, so retailers aren’t penalised for genuine errors,” she said.
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