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Consumer NZ has long campaigned for a fairer, simpler and more affordable electricity market, one that puts people before power company profits.
Below, we meet some of those people. Their stories, drawn from the energy report we released last month, reveal the hardship, complexity and difficult trade-offs many New Zealanders face as they try to keep their homes warm and their power bills under control.
Diane: “It’s all getting trickier”
“Anything you can think of, I probably do it,” says Aucklander Diane*, 60+. “I shorten the washing machine cycle, I don’t have a dryer, I don’t heat. I turn everything off at the socket if I’m not using it. Basically, I just have the fridge and the washing machine going.
“I use an electric blanket, and I go to bed very early in winter and stay warm in bed until some sun hits the house. I only shower every two days. I’m conscious of water usage.”
Paying the rent is Diane’s main financial priority. She’s part of her community and doesn’t want to move house. While there are faults with the house – insufficient insulation, a broken gas connection and a noisy heat pump – she doesn’t want to tell her landlord in case he fixes them and then puts the rent up.
Diane does look online for cheaper power plans. But some rely on a ripple-control water cylinder, which she doesn’t have, and she doesn’t want to sign up for a two-year deal – as a renter, she can’t be sure she’ll be in the same house in two years. She thinks the only other thing she could do to reduce her power usage even more is to turn off her hot water cylinder in summer, which comes with health risks.
“My food has gone to absolute basics. I don’t go out for coffee or dinner. I don’t go to lunch. I eat the most basic cheese. I just buy milk, flour, cheap pasta and vegetables.
“If the bill goes higher, it has to come off somewhere, and I’m on a low fixed income due to health issues. I used to eat more interesting food … it’s all getting trickier.”
In winter, Diane spends a lot of time in her car, which is parked outside her house. “It’s really warm, because it sits in the sun. I take something to read or to sew or whatever and sit in my car, and its toasty.”
*Name changed for privacy.
Jane: “I became slightly obsessed”
Jane, 45+, is a business analyst, so she’s more equipped than most to navigate the complex electricity market. “I’m a details person, I like spreadsheets and stuff, and I work from home, and I’m just interested in the power usage.”
When her two children were younger, she even hired a plug-in meter from the library so she could see how much electricity each appliance used. And, years later, she asked her retailer to install a controlled and uncontrolled meter at her property, so she could monitor hot water usage.
“It means I can see how much of an impact the hot water portion of the bill is, how much it changes winter to summer, which is massive, actually.”
It’s no surprise that Jane has been proactive when it comes to shopping around and trying different plans. In the past, she opted for a plan that included a free hour of power each day. “I became slightly obsessed with looking at how to maximise putting as much power as possible in the day into one hour,” she admits.
However, she’s since switched to a new plan, after crunching the numbers and realising it was going to be cheaper and less hassle. “It was really doing my head in having to do this free hour every day. I was like, ‘Oh, God, the dishwasher needs to go through, but the hour of power isn’t until later!’ It took a lot of mental energy.”
Sarah: “Two hoodies and no heating”
Sarah, 20, lives in a Wellington flat with four other students. Their plan gives them three free hours of power a day, from 9pm to midnight, and they’ve organised a roster, so each flatmate has a set day to do their laundry on.
“We definitely try and use the dryer and everything during those hours, so it’s a lot cheaper. But no power bill is really cheap.”
Winter is particularly challenging, she says. “You don’t want to be so cold that you get sick, but then you don’t want to turn the heater on, because then you can’t afford to buy groceries and other necessities. In the winter, as a student, it’s pretty common to be wearing two hoodies and not have heating on.”
Her previous flat had central heating, which saw Sarah’s quarter of the bill climb to $120 per month – about $30 more than she could afford. She suggested changing providers to save money, but her flatmates didn’t want to risk losing their connection during the transition. “They wanted to be secure, I guess.”
Instead, Sarah paid her portion by cutting back in other areas – toiletries, social activities and even bus fares, meaning she couldn’t go to campus every day. She also cut back her meals to two a day. “Taking away a meal, to live and be warm, doesn’t feel like an okay thing.”
Steve: “The more prices go up, the more we save”
Steve, 65+, lives in rural Waikato with his wife. Their home was built in 2019. When he retired and withdrew his KiwiSaver, he used the money to put solar on the roof.
“I was prepared to put that substantial chunk of capital into the solar system on the basis that when we were no longer working and our income was substantially reduced, our outgoings on energy would be very low indeed. So that’s working well for us.
“I’ve paid off around 30% of the capital cost over three years. I’ve always expected a 10- or 11-year payback, and that’s what I’m seeing.”
Steve has a home automation system that turns everything on at 6am, when his plan gives him a free hour of power. The system tops up the solar battery, charges the EV, powers up the hot water and runs the heat pumps. At 7am, everything non-essential turns off automatically.
He also discharges power to the grid from the solar unit and gets a payback from his small electricity retailer. “Ironically, the more power prices go up, the more we save and the sooner we pay off the solar system.”
However, he can only discharge to the grid if he knows the solar battery will charge up again during the day. “It’s a bit of a balancing act. If it’s a fine, sunny day, no problems. If it’s a foul, wet day, then I don’t do the discharge and I just keep the energy stored locally.”
Gecko: “Solar would be nice, but I can’t afford it”
While Steve was able to pay the upfront cost for his solar system, many New Zealanders feel stuck with their current power set-ups.
Take Gecko, 37, who co-owns a home in Lower Hutt with a friend. They have a gas connection for their hot water, but they want to transition to fully electric – for the good of the planet and because having gas is a hassle. “It’s another bill, another thing to maintain, another thing to shop around for.”
Yet the costs of transitioning away from gas are prohibitive. “I want to get a hot-water heat pump for my hot-water cylinder, because that’s dramatically cheaper in terms of the running, but the upfront costs are between $7,000 and $10,000, not including the labour. I don’t feel like I can afford to do that now.”
The same problem applies to other electrification options. “I’d also love to have an electric car, but obviously the upfront costs are prohibitive, especially now with road user charges and the clean car rebate gone.
“I’d like to have solar panels, but obviously there’s a lot of costs. I’m looking at it like, ‘That would be nice, but I can’t afford it, so I guess that’s not an option.’”
Gecko thinks the government should lead the way but doubts that any significant change will happen.
“Governments, not just nationally but internationally as well, have quite short-term thinking. It’s like, ‘This could be a benefit, but it will be a benefit 10 years down the track, and in order to get re-elected, I need something that’s a benefit now.’”
Help us fight for lower power bills
This month, we presented our petition to end high power prices to parliament. It was our most signed petition ever, with an incredible 82,085 signatures. We can’t afford to take the pressure off now.
With your support, we can keep pushing decision-makers for meaningful reform, continue exposing the impact of high power prices on everyday New Zealanders and advocate for an energy system that works for everyone.
Your donation will help us keep fighting for households like Diane’s, Jane’s, Sarah’s, Steve’s and Gecko’s, and for every New Zealander struggling with the cost of keeping warm.
