Energy Made Easy is the Australian government’s primary tool to provide reliable and trusted information on a range of comparable energy offers to customers.
Australia’s energy market is in transition, and the AER’s work is taking place in the context of significant technological, behavioural and systemic change. Energy affordability is also a pressing issue for many consumers.
Within this context, we received government funding of $8 million for a major redevelopment project to enhance the Energy Made Easy website by 30 June 2020 so that it incorporates the broader range of products and services now available – and those likely to be developed in the foreseeable future – and continues to help consumers make informed energy choices.
The Energy Made Easy changes released in August 2018 were part of this larger redevelopment project. Those changes included a redesigned site with a range of improvements to make the process of searching and comparing simpler.
The improved Energy Made Easy website was launched in April 2020.
Background
The AER first launched the free and independent Energy Made Easy tool in 2012. It provides a retail price comparator and other information for energy consumers, and operates in states and territories that have adopted the National Energy Retail Law – South Australia, Queensland, New South Wales, the ACT and Tasmania.
Our external Delivery Partner for this redevelopment project was Mantel Group.
Changes to Energy Made Easy
Following the changes released in August 2018, we continued to develop further improvements during the redevelopment project. The current version of the improved website released in April 2020 introduces a number of new features including:
- two additional pathways when searching for an energy plan for more personalised results, so households and small businesses can also search by asking us to collect their metering data from the Australian Energy Market Operator or by uploading a PDF bill
- a dynamic language translation feature, so if users need energy information in another language, they can choose to translate the website’s content, including the energy plan search function, into 33 languages
- retailer solar feed-in credits, so if users have solar panels and provide their solar generation data when searching for a plan, they can see those credits in the estimated plan costs
- a revised, more helpful search experience, including suburb and postcode look-up
- enhancements to the website’s design, accessibility and general operation.
Engagement forums
To understand how we might best enhance Energy Made Easy, we engaged with a broad range of external stakeholders throughout the duration of the project. This was done via three reference groups which included consumer, small business and industry representatives, as well as retailers and governments.
Stakeholder Engagement Forum
The purpose of this forum was to enable us to engage with consumer, small business and industry advocates in relation to this project.
The members of this forum were:
- Australian Energy Council
- Australian Small Business & Family Enterprise Ombudsman
- Consumer Policy Research Centre
- COTA (Council of the Ageing) Australia
- Energy Consumers Australia
- Federation of Ethnic Communities' Council of Australia
- Financial & Consumer Rights Council
-
Financial Rights Legal Centre
- Public Interest Advocacy Centre
- Queensland Council of Social Service.
Stakeholder Technical Engagement Forum
The purpose of this forum was to enable us to engage with energy retailer and service provider teams with a focus on technology and operational processes related to Energy Made Easy, in relation to this project.
The members of this forum were:
- AGL
- Alinta Energy
- EnergyAustralia
- Momentum Energy
- Origin
- Powershop
- Red Energy / Lumo Energy
- Simply Energy.
Government Engagement Forum
The purpose of this forum was to enable us to engage with government stakeholders at the federal and state level in relation to this project, including energy market bodies, energy authorities and departments, and service delivery agencies providing services to energy consumers.
The members of this forum were:
- Australian Energy Market Commission
- Australian Energy Market Operator
- Department of the Environment & Energy
- NSW Department of Planning & Environment
- QLD Department of Natural Resources, Mines & Energy
- SA Department for Energy & Mining
- Victorian Energy Compare.
Public consultation
All members of the public – be they consumers, small businesses, retailers or other interested parties – had an opportunity to preview and test a selection of Energy Made Easy’s new features when a Beta version of the website was publicly accessible from 2–20 December 2019. We also asked for feedback via a short survey. This feedback was incorporated into the refinement of the new website’s features.