Electricity: how operator hierarchies change after auctions. Arera opens up to new interventions

The Gradual Protection Service (Stg) for electricity, in which Italians who have not chosen an operator on the free market in July will end up, currently costs 20% less than protection. This was confirmed by the Arera energy authority in a memorandum presented this week to the Chamber’s Productive Activities Committee. As already anticipated by Republic, from July it will not be vulnerable customers – the only ones who will remain in protection – who will enjoy the most convenient prices. And this was a surprise to everyone, so much so Arera herself wonders if this was “the configuration that the legislator intended to pursue” and if “further and different interventions should not be considered in relation to vulnerable customers”. In other words, the authority is asking politicians to adjust their aim, to protect a little more all those elderly consumers and above all low-income families: the vulnerable precisely.

Hierarchies change

The auctions to assign consumers destined for the Stg, in addition to producing a super-convenient tariff, have also redesigned the geography of operators at a national level, diluting (slightly) the concentration. If it is true that Enel and Eni remain in the first two places, Enel however loses almost three million customers, going from 56 to 48% of the total domestic meters served.

The big leap is made by Hera and Edison, who respectively triple and double their customers, while Illumia sees them increase fivefold: while before it was out of the top 10, it is now in seventh place.

Why so many discounts?

Arera explains why, during the auction, the companies offered such large discounts on the fixed component (expressed in euros/year per meter) which in some cases even reach 200 euros and at a national level translate into an annual discount of -73 euros on the bill compared to the 56 euros that are paid today in protection. The authority’s hypothesis is that the companies still considered the maxi-discount more convenient, given the possibility of saving costs to acquire customers through marketing campaigns. In fact, the gradual protections will last three years, at the end of which you will end up in the free market through the silent consent mechanism: it will therefore be rather simple to hold on to them in the future.

The other logic that may have guided the energy companies is that of territorial rooting: there are stronger companies in some territories than others, and in order to maintain that hard core they went “all in” with a mega-discount so as to secure the lot.

Differences between gradual protections and guardianship

Arera then recalls the main difference between the tariff for the gradual protection service and the protection of vulnerability. Both are variable prices associated with the Pun index (the single national price) but while the price of protection is the result of a quarterly average, that of the Stg is instead a monthly average. What changes? In normal times, nothing. But if the wholesale price were to undergo sudden increases (as happened in 2022), for the vulnerable the impact of these increases would be diluted over time, while the others would immediately find themselves on their bills.

Finally, the authority refreshes everyone’s memory of some rules of the game: protection operators will not be able to use that channel to propose free market tariffs, nor use data or information acquired during the service for different purposes; “they will not even be able to use the same brand with which they carry out activities outside the service itself”. This does not mean that vulnerable people will still be able to receive offers from other operators on the free market.