Confused.com has become Energywatch’s 13th accredited energy price comparison website. Energy consumer advocate organisation Energywatch has recently named Confused.com as its 13th accredited energy price comparison website. Price comparison sites are popular with consumers, but the proliferation and varying standards of these sites should make suppliers wary of whom they align with. Many customers use price comparison websites, not only for electricity or gas, but also to compare financial products, travel, and other goods and services. These sites provide a great opportunity for customers to compare different propositions from different companies based on criteria provided by the customer. However in many cases, customers fail to realise that these websites normally charge suppliers to be shown on their site, and as a result, customers are likely to be choosing from a segment of offers in the market not all available offers. The number of price comparison sites available and the lack of consistency between sites will most likely add to the confusion of customers. In addition, suppliers that are not clients of sites are less likely to be informing them of new prices when changes occur, and will usually leave it to the site administrators to update prices where incorrect information can mislead customers. Indeed, the large increase in uptake of ‘online only’ tariff options by customers could be attributed to the increased use of price comparison sites. Ofgem figures show that between 2006 and 2007 there was a 100% plus increase in accounts that were signed up online. One advantage for suppliers is that often the price comparison sites will collect all the required information and then pass it through for the supplier to activate the switching process, saving call center and back office costs. Recently, price comparison sites have attempted to differentiate themselves by introducing service and quality ratings on some sites, but these could be open to abuse. As these rankings are operated by the site administrators, their interests may be best served by promoting the suppliers that pay the highest fees. In addition, most service rankings could be disputed and suppliers could argue about their rankings. Ultimately, energy suppliers would want a consistent and robust pricing system across all of these price comparison websites, to ensure customers are not needlessly confused. However, for the time being, web portals can negotiate varying commission structures that suppliers may accept just to be able to win potential business.

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