Unlock potential savings by optimising your network capacity

Network costs make up a significant portion of your electricity bill. Check out your latest bill in Simply Online to see how much you’re currently paying.

If you under-utilise your capacity or are on a higher network pricing category than required, you may be paying more in network charges than necessary. On the other hand, if your actual demand exceeds your nominated capacity, penalties may apply. Therefore, it’s essential to find the right balance – minimising unnecessary costs, while avoiding excess demand charges.

With a simple change to your network pricing category or nominated network capacity, you may be able to reduce your future network costs.

We’ve completed the analysis of your ICPs using half-hourly data from the 12 months (up to 31 March each year) and factored in the upcoming network pricing, effective from 1 April (the year following), to identify a lower-cost option for you.

If you have ICPs in a network that allows you to nominate your capacity (e.g., WEL Network, Orion), we may have sent you a chart that looks like the example below. Key elements of the chart include:

• Peak Demand (Purple bars) – your peak monthly usage for the past year. Also known as Anytime Maximum Demand (AMD) in some networks.
• Current Nominated Capacity (red line) – the capacity value we currently use to calculate the network component of your electricity bill.
• Optimised Network Capacity (purple line) – the capacity value based on our calculation and your last 12 months of data to achieve the lowest network costs. This value may be lower than your highest peak demand, but it accounts for overage penalties.
• Highest Peak Nominated Capacity (green line) – a possible capacity value based on your single highest 30-minute period during the year.

Any savings we’ve calculated are indicative only and are based on 12 months of your usage (up to 31 March each year). Before deciding whether to change your capacity and/or network pricing category, it is important to factor in any expected changes to your electricity usage over the coming year – for example, from new equipment or increased production.

In most networks, your capacity and/or pricing category can only be changed once per year. Where charges are based on nominated capacity, penalties may apply if your actual demand exceeds it. Therefore, it’s important to choose carefully to strike the right balance—minimising unnecessary costs while avoiding excess charges.

In most networks, your capacity and/or category can usually be changed once per year at no cost, subject to network approval.

We are happy to manage any changes with your network on your behalf, so please discuss this with us first.

To help you make an informed decision, we would appreciate the opportunity to discuss this with you directly over the phone or a Teams call.  You can book a call with your Simply Account Lead by emailing solutions@simplyenergy.co.nz or replying to our email.

No, we pass network charges through from your local Network with no added margin.

If you’d like to proceed with adjusting your network pricing category or nominated capacity, please confirm your preferred value before 30 April 2026, and we’ll apply to have the change made with the network on your behalf.