Price war on the cards as Electric Ireland drops charges

Electric Ireland has announced a cut of 6 per cent to its standard electricity price, shaving €57.75 per year off the average bill.

The price drop will benefit the utility’s 1.2 million residential electricity customers and could spark a price war if the other providers follow suit.

Electric Ireland is the State’s largest electricity provider and the announcement marks the company’s third electricity price decrease in less than two years, seeing the average annual residential bill for its customers decline by more than € 100 over the last 19 months.

It comes as a result of sustained low oil and gas prices on international markets and the company has come in for some criticism over recent months for not passing on savings to consumers in a more timely fashion.

"By being the first large energy supplier to make three cuts to standard electricity prices, Electric Ireland is again leading by example," said Eoin Clarke, the managing director of price comparison website Switcher.ie.

“It is a positive move by Electric Ireland, in the last two years the company has reduced their average electricity bill by €107 per year. But while these reductions are welcome, today’s announcement should put pressure on other suppliers to follow suit.”

He called on other energy suppliers to follow in Electric Ireland’s footsteps and pass on savings of at least 6 per cent to consumers.

Proactive consumers could make substantially larger savings than those offered by Electric Ireland by taking matters into their own hands.

In all, only 15 per cent of Irish consumers switched energy supplier last year.

A huge proportion of customers are missing out on potential savings as there is currently a €376 per year difference between the average standard plan and the cheapest deal on the market.