The world upside down, or almost. Aline is an executive in the legal sector in Ardèche, and a client of the supplier Mint Energie. She has just learned that her bill will quadruple on October 1: “I received a letter from Mint Energie yesterday which tells me that with EDF’s regulated tariff, my annual budget would be 3,217 euros less compared to now”she explains. But there is even more astonishing: as Aline specifies, this official letter that franceinfo was able to consult him “also indicates the whole procedure to change operator and as easily as possible.”
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In question: for a year, the price of electricity has been multiplied by seven, an increase which cannot be passed on to all customers. As a result, alternative energy suppliers are experiencing a real crisis situation, with a 30% increase in one month for the price of electricity on the wholesale market.
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Thus, according to François Carlier, general delegate of the consumer association CLCV, if electricity suppliers want to get rid of some of their customers, it is because they have signed electricity contracts at a fixed price, a much lower price than that currently paid on the wholesale market.
“This is completely unprecedented in economic history, while it is commensurate with the disruptions in the energy sector, but also with an opening of the market which will have been very, very, very fragile.”
Francois Carlier, CLCVat franceinfo
Faced with a risk of bankruptcy, the government has also launched a support unit for the forty or so alternative operators. Nevertheless, the firm of Agnès Pannier-Runacher, in charge of Energy Transition, tries to reassure: “There is no case of imminent bankruptcy!”
The risk for these alternative operators is to see their customers massively flee to the incumbent operator EDF and its regulated tariffs. “There will be probable bankruptcies”, believes for his part Jacques Percevois, economist and professor emeritus at the University of Montpellier. He explains that some small suppliers did not anticipate the purchase of electricity enough when the prices were affordable and are today forced to buy, on the wholesale market, the kilowatt-hour seven or eight times the price was worth at the beginning of the year. But the consumer association CLCV suspects suppliers have another reason to push their customers out.
“It turns out that these operators have a right of access to EDF nuclear. They can speculate with it on the markets to justify this speculative right, they must justify a certain volume of customers until the summer.”
Francois Carlier, CLCVat franceinfo
“There, coincidentally, at the end of August, they are all trying to get rid of customershe adds. We still expect to discover major fraud on this system of nuclear law which would have taken place during the year 2022. In any case, we expect a lot from the regulator and the State in terms of control in this area. “specifies the consumer association.
To give an idea, alternative suppliers were able to buy the kilowatt hour from EDF at 42 euros. The market price was listed on Thursday August 25 at more than 600 euros. Thanks to a complex resale mechanism on the wholesale market, suppliers can achieve commercial margins, sometimes playing with legal limits. A risk to put into perspective, according to Jacques Percebois, who believes that there could be a little speculation, but without it being massive. The Ministry of Energy Transition indicates, for its part, to remain vigilant and confirms that investigations would be carried out in the event of suspicion. The government even calls on companies in the sector to alert it if they observe such behavior.