Total liberalization for household customers will lead to increases in final bills for final consumers in the electricity market, as currently the energy allocated to the regulated market is significantly cheaper than in the free market, says Frank Hajdinjak.

“I expect price increases for household customers in the new year,” he says in an interview with financialintelligence.ro.

“What we can see, both in companies and in the authorities, is that they tried to inform the public. ANRE has a lot of information on the site. Large companies provided information. There was an attempt to inform customers about liberalization. But, many customers are not interested, and this does not happen only in Romania, but worldwide. For the final consumer, it is very difficult to understand the liberalization of the energy market. Gas and energy are not sexy products, like a phone or a car. People want to have a service they can rely on. In all countries, there is a group of customers interested in receiving the best services at the best prices, but many really do not care. Let’s not forget that the difference on the final invoice is not huge for the customers,” Hajdinjak added.

“For gas, we had an oversupply, which led to a decrease in market prices. I would expect prices to return to normal levels, but it will take a while. This means that we will probably see small increases in prices, both for domestic and industrial consumers.”