Free power 9pm-midnight every night, seems much better than 1 hour free.
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Free Power at Night Time @ Contact Energy
340
Lwoyeye on 13/08/2021 - 10:28 contact.co.nz (1712 clicks)
Last edited 13/08/2021 - 10:42 by 1 other user
Last edited 13/08/2021 - 10:42 by 1 other user
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It would be helpful if you also posted this here for other people who are curious as well.
looks like its 1 year
That really was a weird edit
Yeah sorry thought id found it, got busy doing stuff, just came back (i ddnt actually find it)
I was about to post it. Bear in mind the rates are bit higher than other plans.
Contract is till 30 Nov 2022
Can they put prices up during this time? I recall reading something previously about a power company putting up some fees, even though it was a contract. Not sure if they were the daily feesm or the other addon unit fee they seem to charge on top of the unit fee.
Rates are fixed and they can't increase. What they can increase is authority levy or daily charge.
mining Ethereum?
I was thinking the same thing, I have a small one which turns on during my Electric Kiwi free hour - makes 50c a day, I can triple it :)
How much would a Ethereum mining rig cost these days?
$10k+
Making more than a $1 a day with Algorand staking for less than half that and no power needed. Plus mining in Ethereum is going to end most likely by next year.
I use an alienware r12 with a 10700kf and 3080 (~4000) and a ryzen 5600 with a 2060($1750). They are drawing around 280watts, and profiting around $10 a day after power has been calculated. The 2060 system is 2 years old and has paid for itself, the 3080 system will have paid for itself by June next year. It also provides a good amount of heating. ETH mining will end but there will be plenty of alternatives springing up to take its place
Hey I have a Alienware Aurora R10 that I just got. Want to get into mining until it ends. Can you link me with what I need to do to make money from my machine? Would really appreciate some start up tips as I have no idea.
Can’t find the contract term anywhere on the website. Someone direct me where to go please
https://contact.co.nz/residential/all-plans
Check details for Good nights plan
—> Fixed energy rates until 30 November 2022
That is fixed energy rates, isn’t that like the price won’t increase till 30/11/22? Not the same as contract ??
Wordings a bit confusing, but fixed rates date is what they consider as fixed term date as well.
The $150 credit plan has fixed rates until 30/11/2023 and the contract term date is as well the same. I did confirm this with the service rep.
Means you'll miss out if prices go down though too
How likrly is that though in times of increased inflation?
Thanks, I did the calculations using hourly data and turns out I save $48/year switching from EOL to Contact if i use this plan without changing my current habits…
Also, consider $100 referral credit for Contact.
Weird that it stops at midnight. Off peak plans seem to be 9.30pm-6.30am or similar. I'd definitely sign up if it went to 4 or 5 am.
I wonder if you can sign up to the 'Basic Plan' and receive the $200 sign up bonus, and then change to this plan.
Details on the $200 credit here- https://www.cheapies.nz/node/28962
Give it a shot and let us know if it works
Done- signed up for the basic plan and now I'll wait for the $200 credit before changing. Will let you know, but I can't see any reason it won't in the T's and C's.
Weird, Contact says "Your property doesn’t have a smart meter that will work on the Good Nights plan."
My smart meter works with everyone else, I wonder what's so special about this plan.Same here. Z electric also won't let me sign up. But my current provider lets me view my usage in half hourly intervals - so smart meter definitely working.
Contact have changed their mind and apparently my smart meter is OK now. So I signed up yesterday.
Stupid question probably, but when I check the rates it shows electricity Authority Levy at the bottom. Does that mean that you have to pay the extra 0.13 cents/kWh on top of the 25.9 cents/kWh?
Yes, Per Kwh charge is (25.9+0.13) Ex. Gst.
You also need to pay the Authority Levy for any usage from 9pm-12am too…
Yes, that would be 26.03 cents/kWh for the usage and 30 cents for daily rate - both exclude GST.
Yes it seems so . So its not really totally free power as in the Electric Kiwi model - it is .13c a KWH for even the free hours. Obviously thats 1 /10th of a cent a KWH so a trivial amount but it is added on to the rate and charged for the "free usage as well"
From the site:
Please note that:
the Electricity Authority Levy will still apply to usage during 9pm and midnight and that the daily charge will still apply for the full day, and
Free power? This is an expensive plan when you consider the rates.
People fall for the buzzwords.
Actually it depends on where are you living. I compare my bill in Jul on electric kiwis with the rate I get on Contact energy and it is saving me $10 a month without discount. Btw I'm living in Auckland so it could be the reason.
its cheaper for me, plus free stuff
Nice find. Price is more or less the same as EK for us, maybe a little more than their stay ahead with the 10% extra account credit, but the 3 hours free more than makes up for that. Thanks.
Any payment discounts like the EK stay ahead 200?
Appears not - and they charge credit card fees
Saying that - my rate with EK is 27.71 and 32c a day
Contact is about 24c incl the levy and 30c a day - so when you take off that 10% pay ahead disc its about the same and obviously 3hrs free vs 1 - so seems a better deal to run my pool heater and air con etc longer at night. If you had an EV car it would be pretty good as well
and $100 referral sign up off - so probably worth the change, which is a shame as I like EK a lot more the Contact - wonder if they will up their offer?
I get similar EK rates. They're including GST.
When I check Contact the charge and daily rate are higher. 30c a day and 25.2c+0.13 levy. These are excluding GST to higher than EK.
My rates above are excluding GST. There is a tick box in the app to show including and excluding so its apples for apples in my case.
Weird how everyone seems to have similar but different rates even not that far apart geographically
I actually messaged EK after seeing this deal to see if they will come out with a competitive deal but they say they have no plans to do so, because they trust their customers will still prefer them. Such a shame, now I have to try and use up my remaining free credit so I can jump ship lol
Thats a shame. What they are saying is , they hope most customers dont notice or are to lazy to swap. Hardly the innovator they used to be. This deal seems to be about a year ish - that will probably be the time they need to figure out if thats right or wrong.
@Meridian: i was with EK for years and have never hear about this stay ahead discount before reading it here, kinda pissed at EK now
@quote: Yeah I heard about it a while back via here as well. They were a little reluctant to move me but did when I pushed. Saying that, the rates are higher than not on it (you can check that on the website) , so you do question a bit if its really a discount at all.
Im more annoyed they just increased my rate at the same time when others are offering better - which calls into question if I was actually funding my hour of power myself with worse overall rates.
In my opinion if your hour of power is not 30% or something, I think they are probably not a good deal.
This contact deal is better rate over all, 3x the hours and a cheaper daily rate. Not to mention the referral scheme. I look forward to those hot summers nights running all my aircons till midnight for free.
@nzmax: I haven't actually been asked now you mention it.
I guess when my bill comes there will be options@nzmax: weird i thought i was answering a diff q. i paid weekly through auto visa payment. I now see that its an option where you pay 200 ahead but i was never made aware of it and would have used it
Could someone confirm what's the rates for this plan? At the moment iam with electric kiwi paying $0.2755 per kwh and daily cost $.32. This is $200 stay ahead plan means I get 10% top up discount as well.
This contact energy prices seems to be cheaper than ek and instead 1 hour its 3 hour free power as well. Please clear me if I wrong?
Not sure about your area, but I am in west Auckland. I get 24.6c/kwh for night plan but get 23.5c/kwh for normal simple plan(no contract).
So I feel overall for me i think simple with $200 credit is better and than sign up for $150 2yr contract.
See other thread for more details.
Strange. My fixed plan is just the current basic rates fixed for 2 years, discounted by 2%. If prices fall later and I want to get out I'll just need to pay back the $150 incentive, which is quite fair anyway.
You'll need to enter your address to compare what your pricing will be, it varies by region.
My daily rate with EK is $1.30 ish per day, while with contact is is about 90 cents. The KW rates are similar. I don't know why there would be such a difference with daily rates, unless Contact are going to put that rate up in the near future? Not sure if they can do that if there is a fixed term contract?
I like EK and think they are a good company that has probably led to this free 3 hour deal. So not sure if I will stay with them or not, because it is still the same power and is just a commodity.
South Auckland Rates (Low User) 23.7c /kWh
I'm really confused at how their price comparison works. On EK my usage in the month of July was only $40 (I have gotten up to 70% saved on the hour of power, but save 50% on average) but on Contact they estimate that I would have to pay $221? That can't be right can it??
50% on average! That's amazing!! Best I have done is 40% and I average like 18%
Any tips?
I have similar stats although in winter it drops to around the mid 30s to 40s.
We just do the drying and dishwasher and turn on the heating. We have ducted heat to each room and it's a newer house so it warms the house up and it stays warm. Also we are not home much during the day so that time is very low in comparison.
Just basic stuff really. An EV with a fast charger would also be a good deal especially with 3hrs
Well to be fair I'm at work until 9 or 10pm and when I get home I run multiple heaters, take a quick shower, cook or heat food, run a mini dishwasher (30mins) and maybe laundry (1 hour). After the hour I watch TV or play games, I don't run anything high powered. My fridge/freezer has like a 4 star energy rating and my lightbulbs are led and maybe like 5W each. Living alone makes a big difference too.
I work from home so it makes it difficult to keep my general power usage down. I do the same things, all the heating, showers, drier and dishwasher. Thanks for the info anyway!
Anyone having trouble signing up on their website? It asks for your drivers license. I tried both mine and my partners, both saying the drivers license number doesn’t match the name.
NZTA Api was down so It was not abe to get drivers license details.
Should be working fine nowThanks. Yep, it's working now
Just in case - if you have any EV or plug-in hybrid registered in your name you can get half price power 9pm-7am with very reasonable rates outside these hours. Meridian ($300 joining credit) and Genesis seem best, not so much Mercury, but that might differ depending on your location. 1 year fixed but that gives you free smart meter if yours is outdated.
Curious if I use a lot of power during the 3 hours that it puts me in the standard user bracket, when I'm normally a low user? Or if it even matters on the Good Nights plan
The three hours don't count so you are still a low user.
anyone who signed up got their account working? I don't see any usage data and I signed up Monday.
I signed up but they somehow got my address wrong, so it's an interesting situation. Still with the old retailer for now though. You can check on the EA website: https://www.ea.govt.nz/consumers/your-power-data-in-your-han…
I also signed up on Monday, but still waiting to be switched.
Same with me. Had activation date on Tuesday, but nothing yet. Also, I can see activity in old provider. EA link tells me switch is in progress. Wonder how long it will take.
signed up last friday, been checking the app, today it suddenly shows last few days of usage (pretty cool, can see hourly use so can see all my free power)
I signed up but wasn't aware that you can only be a standard user and not low user. Bit annoying during summer as I generally use a small amount of electricity but still have to pay the daily charge of 1 dollar something.
So keep that in mind when signing up!We signed up as low users on this plan, did they contact you to tell you that or did the website now allow you to choose low user with this plan at all?
When I signed up I had to fill out our address manually (the address didn’t show up in the drop-down menu). When we did that we didn't had a choice between low or standard user. I contacted contact today and they told me that I'm a standard user because low user isn't possible for this type of a plan.. I guess that's a lie (and I can't find anything about that in the T&C's either).
I’ll contact them again, thanks!I am on this plan and on low user rates
So that is not correct
I chose Low User when I signed up, but just got my confirmation email and they've put me on Standard. I've never encountered any systems as buggy as Contact's.
I just did my comparison against Powershop for the last year of transaction data. If I moved to Contact I would be $100 worse off and I don't know if I would make that up by changing my power usage patterns. Although I could turn my hot water off during the day and then turn it on at 9pm because my controlled meter cost me $540 last year so that in theory would save $440 just a hassle to do it every day.
Get a smart plug if you can
Has any tried signing up with the basic fixed rate plan to get the 150 off then switch to the 3-hour free plan?
You can't as 150 off plan is fixed term(contract) till end of Oct 2023. You will have to pay $150 to terminate the contract.
I have a spreadsheet and compared these rates with my current mercury plan. Mercury Low user rates - 27.07c variable, 33.33c fixed and 0.12c levy. Contact offered 23.9c variable, 30c fixed and 0.13c levy. Contact is still more expensive after the 3 free hours of power once I apply mercury discounts and airpoints. Did an average of how much power I use between 9-12pm for a month from the mercury app and only a $5 saving during the month if I switch. Unless i do all my washing etc during the eve. Mercury has me on a 12% prompt discount and I have 10x airpoints for this year when i resigned my contract last year, plus mercury offers some discounts every year when you re-sign a contract. So all in all mercury still cheaper for our household. Would pay for anyone to do a good check before changing.
Any idea if Mercury does referrals?
Yeah they do, let me know if you need the code. I think its $50 discount. Plus they got $200 discount at signing at the moment and the rates are cheaper than the contact energy rates with 12% discount if you dont care about the the free hours.
Unless i do all my washing etc during the eve.
I think this is the point of these plans, so you shift most of your usage to the off peak hours to avoid loading the network during peak/expensive hours. We've used ~30 - 35 kWh/day since switching and ~25 - 30 of that has been between 2100 - 2400, so it means we get a warm house at night and a low power bill, but clearly doesn't work for everyone and definitely not for someone who goes to sleep at 2000.
whats the length of the contract? had a quick look but ddnt see
edit - dw found it