We can expect to see some savage rises in the cost of electricity before the end of the year warns consumer organisation FACUA.
You see, we all know about the fuss earlier this year with the electric companies keeping the price artificially high. The government was forced to act due to public outrage (and the threat of an EU investigation), and prices dropped, ever so slightly.
Well, they’re going back up again, and the government has quietly loosened the rules that were supposed to prevent this happening.
FACUA has tracked the average household bill. Assuming, they say, an average use of 366Kwh and a potencia of 4.4 Kw, August will set you back 75.87€, 1.4% more than this time last year.
That same bill would have cost you 67.62€ in January this year (16% less than 2013), 66.33€ in Feb & March, 63.98€ in April, 71.46€ in May, 75.31€ in June, 73.88 in July and 75.87€ in August. Facua estimates the cost by December to over 85€.
Since homeowners now pay a vast amount of basic tax and charges on their bills, the amount you use doesn’t really change the amount you pay. Instead, a vast amount of your bill is a fixed amount.
So far, the price per KwH as set by the government has almost doubled in the last year.
FACUA filed a complaint with the EU last year on behalf of Spanish consumers calling for an investigation into the Spanish energy market, controlled by just a small handful of large companies, all of whom have a lot of ex-politicians sitting on their boards.