The regulated tariffs for the sale of gas (TRVG) live their last hours. As provided for in the Energy and Climate Law of November 8, 2019, these TRVG will disappear on June 30, 2023. Starting next Saturday, therefore, the approximately two and a half million customers affected by this pricing will have to choose . Or you can continue with your historical supplier benefiting from its offer called “tipping” or opt for one of its market offers or approach the competition.
While various gas providers come up with new offers, BFM Business helps you see things more clearly.
• How are providers reacting?
According to UFC-Que Choisir, players in the sector seem to be playing the game although you have to wait until the end of June to find out about all the new offerings that will hit the market.
“Many providers have announced indexations on the reference price established by the Energy Regulatory Commission (CRE), which is becoming a commercial argument, says Lucile Buisson, manager of energy projects for the consumer association. We can also expect promotional offers from some to attract customers who leave the TRVG.”
This is particularly the case with TotalEnergies, which this week announced a 10% discount for one year for all its new individual customers. For its part, the historical supplier Engie does not foresee this type of promotional operations in the short term.
As for the reference price of the CRE, it works as a reference income and aims to avoid excessively high offers by serving as a “compass for consumers”. Updated every month, it is a variable price that incorporates both supply costs (energy cost in the wholesale market) and non-supply costs such as commercial, transport or even storage costs, as well as the remuneration of the supplier. Specifically, the CRE simulates the costs of an average operator to which it adds a “reasonable” commercial margin.
Although this reference price effectively replaces the TRVG, it differs in that it is not imposed on Engie. In the same way, no other provider is obliged to index their offer, although several do, according to Lucile Buisson, who cites EDF or even local distribution companies (ELD) that have local monopolies such as in Bordeaux, Grenoble and Strasbourg. In addition, providers will have to offer variable price offers in the off-peak/peak hour model next January.
• What happens with the offers indexed to the TRVG?
In addition to the 2.55 million customers affected by the regulated gas sales tariff, three million benefited from an offer indexed to this TRVG, most of the time downward to compete with Engie, which alone supplies 2.3 million customers through this price (the others are provided by ELDs). From now on, the providers of offers indexed to the TRVG will index these offers to other elements such as the PEG index or the CRE reference price. “We see that they prefer the latter”, confirms Lucile Buisson.
• What is Engie’s Passerelle offer?
On Wednesday, the incumbent gas supplier presented its “rocking” offer called “Passerelle”, the price of which can be consulted for each zip code on a dedicated site. Applicable from July 1, the Gateway rate includes, as before, an annual subscription price that depends on expected annual consumption and a price per kWh that in turn depends on consumption and the municipality of residence. “There are differences for the gas distributor regarding the effort to provide depending on the location of the municipality and the cost of routing and transporting the gas can vary”, recalls Céline Regnault, General Director Public France. Similarly, the cost is not the same. depending on the level of customer consumption, its uses. A heating customer will have a different consumption throughout the year, for example.”
During a press conference, the Engie representative indicated that the price was falling particularly for customers who consume the most. A Douai inhabitant in a house that would consume 14,000 kWh for heating and showering would register a drop of more than 1,700 euros compared to April estimates, or 19%. This annual decrease would exceed 500 euros, or -15%, for a Parisian in an apartment that consumes 3,000 kWh for cooking and hot water.
On the other hand, the director of Engie’s General Public France specifies that “these prices per kilowatt hour will change each month up or down according to the evolution of market prices”, taking into account the reference cost index for gas supply defined by the CRE, which should not be confused with the reference price.
Customers will default to the Gateway offer starting July 1 if they have not chosen another offer by then, from Engie or a competitor. Offer can be canceled at no cost at any time for those after July 1. Its duration is unlimited, as long as there are subscribers, but those who decide to leave it will not be able to return to it.
• What do local gas providers offer?
Although it supplies a large majority of French customers at a regulated rate, Engie is not the only supplier of gas through this rate. A few hundred thousand consumers benefit from the TRVG from local providers. Gaz de Bordeaux is one of them and is the result of the split of the local distributor of the same name into two separate entities more than fifteen years ago. On the one hand, Régaz now assumes the role of distributor, on the other hand, Gaz de Bordeaux is in charge of supplying some 270,000 customers, including 200,000 domestic ones, even for a few years in cities that are not in the Gironde such as Nantes or Saint – Etienne.
In the provider’s historic area, Bordeaux and 46 surrounding municipalities, some 100,000 customers have the regulated sale price. “It will go through our exchange offer, which will be indexed to the CRE benchmark, says Cyril Vincent, CEO of Gaz de Bordeaux. We are below the CRE benchmark by around 5% and most of our concerned consumers are choosing the switch because it is an attractive offer that is the same as that offered to new customers.”
For now, Gaz de Bordeaux is concentrating, therefore, on this market offer at an indexed price, but it should not delay in proposing again offers at a fixed price that have been ruled out due to the complex management with the tariff shield. “When the situation returns to normal with fairly low prices, fixed price offers will return, assures Cyril Vincent. We are not far from the moment when we are going to relaunch them, we had already doubted for the month of July. In an uncertain energy context , the head of the provider has also chosen to reject any “aggressive” commercial strategy even though he subscribes to a growing number of clients in the GRDF distribution area: “2-3 years ago, we told ourselves that the end of TRVG could have been a opportunity to deploy strongly, but the crisis means that each provider is focusing on its own client portfolio.
• Why should market offers be compared?
Since no offer has significantly distinguished itself from Passerelle in recent weeks, Lucile Buisson advises concerned consumers to switch to it first and then compare the different offers. “Consumers don’t want to take chances with volatile market offerings,” she explains. Céline Regnault has observed a “wait-and-see logic” in recent months: “During this period of price increases, customers tended to stay on the offer they had subscribed to so far. We observed slightly fewer changes in offers within our portfolio or in the form of competitive outlets”.
In general, consumers are invited to use the various tools at their disposal, such as the price comparator of the National Energy Ombudsman. “The best thing is to subscribe and see the reality of the offers because they are not at all the same between 5,000 and 20,000 kWh of annual consumption”, adds Lucile Buisson who recalls that termination is possible at any time. This comparison work is even more relevant as significant discrepancies in invoices can occur throughout an entire year.
The person in charge of the UFC-Que Choisir mission also highlights the instability of the advantages presented by the offers: “According to the indexing formula, the advantageous offer in January is no longer necessarily that of March and must be taken into account.”
However, fixed-price market offers that “freeze” the rate for a period of one to four years do not consistently protect against rate fluctuations. “They can look attractive when gas prices are low, but even with a fixed contract, the provisions can change, warns Lucile Buisson.
However, the provider has a notice period of one month, so the customer has time to see a possible upward price change coming when a market offer will change every month without the customer necessarily being notified.
• What is the risk of bills skyrocketing?
While the expiration of regulated gas sales rates should not have a major impact on consumer bills, the end of the gas rate shield due to a return to normal wholesale prices raises more concerns.
“We will not relive the crisis that we have been experiencing since the end of 2021, but there is always a consumption cycle with a period that can be critical during autumn and winter, insists Lucile Buisson. However, it happened during this crisis that several providers did not take the opportunity to significantly change their offerings.”
“Should prices ever rise sharply, the government and public authorities have indicated that they may have to establish a new price shield and, in this case, we and the other providers will apply the measures requested by the government,” Céline stresses. . Engie reign. An extension of the system in 2024 can only be decided on the occasion of the next finance law at the end of the year.
Source: BFM TV
