The Australian Energy Regulator (AER) has published a Customer Service Incentive Scheme to encourage electricity distributors to engage with their customers to inform the services they provide.
The Scheme helps electricity distributors to meaningfully engage with their customers, understand their needs, and propose incentives to respond to those needs.
The Scheme also allows the AER to set targets for customer service performance in our electricity distribution revenue determinations. Under the Scheme electricity distributors may be rewarded or penalised depending on how they perform against their customer service targets. The AER may first apply the scheme to the upcoming revenue determinations for Victorian electricity distributors. These determinations will come into effect in July 2021.
The development of a scheme was commenced in response to a request from AusNet Services and its customer forum as part of the trial of the New Reg process. The New Reg process was developed jointly with Energy Consumers Australia, Energy Networks Australia and the AER, and it aims to empower consumers by enabling them to negotiate elements of an energy networks regulatory proposal prior to lodgement for the AER’s formal assessment.