Cost-of-living pressures

At its last meeting, the Energy Charter CEO Council elevated support for customers and communities facing cost-of-living pressures as a priority area for collaborative action, with Energy Charter Signatories now scoping up options for #BetterTogether initiatives to support those in vulnerable circumstances under Principle 5 of the Energy Charter. 

When thinking about how to best support communities, Anthony offers some sage advice for designing and delivering services for small businesses.

One size doesn’t fit all

Just like every person, every business is different. It’s important to take the time to really understand a business, its relationship with energy, motivation and capacity to implement change. When designing small business solutions, it’s critical to build-in flexibility to ensure there’s room for customisation. 

Consider the full customer journey

Considering the full customer journey is fundamental to good design for any program, product or service, and not just for small business. From a small business standpoint, addressing energy affordability can include much more than, for example, an initial assessment and options analysis. It can also mean navigating the procurement process, including finding trusted suppliers and financing options, as well developing new operational processes. It’s critical to stand in shoes of the customer and consider what the entire process looks like for them. 

It’s a matter of value

When it comes to juggling competing priorities, small business owners are the ultimate masters. Often, we think about small businesses as being ‘time poor’, but that’s not entirely accurate. Businesses will prioritise activities that offer value, however, they simply can’t afford to put time and attention towards activities where the return to the business is not clear and understandable. When working with small businesses it’s important to reflect this at every touch point. Take time to think about how you’re articulating value and if the level of engagement you’re asking for is propitiate to the end value of the product or service.  

The intention of the Customer Code was to address some of the concerns about third party intermediaries’ selling practices raised in the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) Retail Electricity Pricing Inquiry Report 2018 (the REPI Report) with a view to pragmatic industry-led solutions.  

Initial discussions were held with ACCC, Australian Energy Market Commission and Australian Energy Regulator to share the plan for the Customer Code development. To gauge support and build momentum, an initial stakeholder forum was held in August 2021, facilitated by design-thinking expert, Dewang Bhargav of Energy Queensland. The focus of the workshop was to build an understanding of the energy comparator and moving service market experience for customers: what was working, what wasn’t and areas for industry-led improvements.

From here, a representative Code Builders group was formed who met fortnightly until November 2021 to develop the Customer Code. Participants included customer representatives, third-party comparators and moving services and energy retailers. These were stimulating discussions as the Code Builders challenged themselves to look at ways to meet some of the matters in the REPI Report with a human-centred design approach. This meant developing solutions to customer problems by involving the human perspective in all steps of the problem-solving process. The strong commitment to delivering tangible customer outcomes was evident throughout.

Once the Customer Code draft was finalised, it was circulated stakeholders for their feedback. An open-invitation forum was also held in April 2022. Thoughtful responses from ACCC, the Consumer Policy Research Centre and Public Interest Advocacy Centre helped to strengthen the Customer Code.

The Customer Code has a strong governance framework, including a Customer Code Council (CCC) to provide strategic direction and support to the Code Administrator, Anne Whitehouse. The CCC was an open application process and many of the Code Builders joined the CCC under Independent Chair, John Smith.

The Customer Code for Energy Comparators & Moving Services launched in June 2022. Its success will depend on the level of industry participation and the commitment of the signatories to the Customer Code principles. It is importantly backed by energy retailers and other suppliers who choose to join as Supporters.

A special thanks to the people who made this happen: