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Will changing your supplier be advantageous for you?
Before you change your supplier it is advisable to decide whether or not the supplier switch is advantageous for you. In this respect, it helps to single out specific suppliers and compare their quotations and other commercial conditions.
Poll the selected supplier’s customers for their satisfaction. The lowest price should not be the only indicator for selecting a new supplier.
Selecting a suitable supplier
If you then decide to actually change your supplier, beware of focusing on a single supplier with the best quotation when you are selecting a new supplier. Its customers’ satisfaction, the amount of the contractual penalty, the option to enter into a contract for an indefinite term, but also whether the supplier has contact centres and a customer service line or user-friendly website – all of these aspects are important too. The important metrics for comparing suppliers also include the business terms and conditions that form an integral part of the contract and must be posted on suppliers’ websites. Business terms and conditions must contain primarily the following provisions:
- Rights and obligations of the contracting parties;
- Conditions for energy supply;
- Conditions for energy supply billing and the payment terms;
- Conditions for unilateral changes of business terms and conditions;
- Options and conditions for ‘non-compliance complaints’ [= reklamace in Czech];
- Mutual communication and service of documents;
- Dispute resolution and jurisdiction of courts;
- Methods and options for contract termination or supply interruption; charges for non-standard services.
The supplier switching process
To facilitate the supplier switching process, when the contract is being signed you can provide the selected new supplier with a power of attorney to represent you. The supplier can then take certain steps instead of you, which may accelerate the whole supplier switching process, not least thanks to the supplier’s greater experience.
The supplier switching process takes one to three months, depending on the periods of notice in the case of contracts signed for an indefinite term, and also longer intervals of time in the case of terminating fixed-term contracts.
If you elect not to grant a power of attorney for representation in the supplier switching process, you will have to handle the entire process all by yourself.
Contract signing
Once you have selected your new supplier you must sign a contract for bundled supply services with the supplier. Before the definitive signing of the contract, ask the supplier to provide you with the draft contract well in advance, the applicable price list, and the applicable business terms and conditions (we strongly recommend that you read these documents again and thoroughly). The price list and the business terms and conditions must be part of the contract.
Supply from the new supplier
Your new supplier starts energy supply once all the steps required for supplier switching have been taken. The supplier should notify you of this fact and also of the date on which it actually started to supply you.
It is then advisable that you take your own meter read as at the supplier change date and report it to the relevant distribution system operator (within five business days from the supplier change). Thereupon you will receive the final billing of your consumption, whereby your obligations with the old supplier are settled once the relevant payment is made.
Whenever you receive an energy supply bill from your supplier do check the whole bill, primarily to see whether the agreed business terms and prices have been kept.
Your bank payments for energy must be redirected to the new supplier’s bank account.
