How to make complaints to the energy ombudsman
If you’re having trouble with your electricity, gas or water provider you can make a complaint to the energy ombudsman or electricity ombudsman scheme in your state or territory. Follow these easy steps to raise a complaint with the relevant energy ombudsman if you’re not able to resolve your complaint with your electricity, gas or water provider.
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Energy complaints can be hard to resolve
Having reliable service from our electricity, water and gas suppliers is one of the most important things for everyone in our community. But given how many consumers use these services it’s not surprising that things go wrong from time to time. When issues come up customers can usually resolve them by talking to their energy provider directly, or try using Ajust’s helpful tool to resolve your complaint with your provider. For more info on the best way to register a complaint with your energy provider check out our article on electricity complaints and energy complaints process. But in some cases it’s not possible to resolve your complaint with your supplier, and that’s where the energy Ombudsman comes in.
What is the energy Ombudsman for?
The energy Ombudsman is designed to provide consumers and businesses with a way to mediate or arbitrate their electricity complaints. They are required to work to get fair and reasonable outcomes for both sides. This means that they will help each side to try to reach an agreement, but if that doesn’t happen they can give a decision that will be binding on both parties. There are separate electricity, water and gas Ombudsman services in NSW, Qld, SA, Tasmania, WA and Victoria, as well as ACAT in the ACT.
No resolution? Get in touch with the Ombudsman
If you’ve tried to resolve the issue directly with your provider and you haven’t been able to get anywhere, then it may be time to complain directly to the Ombudsman in your state or territory. To find out more about the Ombudsman that is responsible for electricity and energy complaints check out this article on the Australian energy regulator’s website. We’ve also provided a table of your local energy Ombudsman below.
The Ombudsman is free for consumers and small businesses to use, so they can be a great resource when you have an electricity complaint that you need to deal with.
If you haven’t contacted your energy retailer first…
Start by contacting them first to have your complaint resolved. You should always approach them first to see if you can get a resolution, because the energy Ombudsman generally won’t be allowed to help you until you’ve tried to resolve the issue with your provider. Remember to make a point of telling them:
- What the problem is - why you’re making a complaint.
- What evidence you have about the problem.
- What impact the problem has made on you.
- What you want your energy provider to do about it.
Your energy provider’s customer service team should hopefully be able to help you with your problem and give you the resolution that you want. If they haven’t been able to help, or if you aren’t satisfied with the resolution then you can contact the energy Ombudsman to resolve the issue.
Most customer issues that come up will relate to issues with your energy retailer. You will need to talk to your energy retailer for most issues relating to things like:
- electricity bills
- getting connected to the network
- cancelling your service.
In some cases you may also need to talk to your energy distributor. This will usually happen if there’s a problem with a physical part of the network that is impacting your energy supply, eg) if something has affected your electricity wires this is a distributor issue. You won’t have a direct contract with your energy distributor like you do with your retailer, because in most cases there is only one energy distributor in an area.
Your energy retailer and distributor will both have customer service teams that are able to help you if you have a problem.
Find your local energy Ombudsman
ACT: ACT Civil and Administrative Tribunal
NSW: Energy & Water Ombudsman NSW
QLD: Energy and Water Ombudsman Queensland
SA: Energy and Water Ombudsman South Australia
TAS: Energy Ombudsman Tasmania
www.energyOmbudsman.tas.gov.au
VIC: Energy and Water Ombudsman (Victoria)
WA: Energy and Water Ombudsman Western Australia
https://energyandwater.ombudsman.wa.gov.au/
Steps for resolving your energy complaint with the Ombudsman
Make sure you follow these steps when dealing with the Ombudsman:
- Check that you’re talking to the right Ombudsman for your state or territory. Each state and territory has a different way for resolving electricity complaints, and only your local Ombudsman will be able to help you. See above table for energy complaints.
- Review the Ombudsman’s list of complaints that they’re able to help with. There are some things that they won’t be able to assist you with, especially if the complaint is very old, or if you’ve started a court case about it.
- Tell the Ombudsman that you’ve already tried to resolve the complaint with your provider, but that you weren’t happy with the result.
- Give the Ombudsman all the information you have about your electricity complaint or energy complaint, including information on what your complaint is about, what happened when you contacted your provider, and what you think should happen to resolve the complaint. If you have any correspondence with your provider you should provide that.
- If the Ombudsman arranges a time for you and the provider to talk, make sure you show up to the meeting! If you don’t engage with the process you are much less likely to get the result you are after.
- If the Ombudsman makes a decision that you’re not happy with, you can contact the case office who was assigned to your complaint to discuss the issue. In some cases you may be able to have it escalated for further review.
If you have an issue with your energy provider consider submitting your complaint through Ajust. Our platform makes it easier to resolve complaints directly with your provider, so we can help you resolve your complaint first time, without needing to get the energy Ombudsman involved.
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