Monthly costs of taking care of a household, which also includes electricity and gas consumption, represent 9% of Romanians’ spending basket (in 2020, according to Eurostat), 43% less than the European Union average. Perhaps, for this reason, monitoring utility consumption has not been a major concern for consumers until now, when energy has become extraordinarily expensive and inflation has eroded the purchasing power of many families. For example, less than 30% of consumers read and submit the consumption index for electricity and natural gas, now that the topic has become a hot one.

The price of energy is still capped, for most household consumers, according to the regulations in force. According to the estimates made by ANRE (the energy market regulator), more than 8.3 million households will continue to benefit from cap formulas. Even if the price is capped at the 2020 level, it is true that worrying about how the bills will evolve is justified for each of us and we need to be much more careful about how much we consume.

How can we maintain a balance and control of family costs?

The first and easiest step is to read the consumption index and send it to the supplier with whom you have a contract, each month. In this way, you will pay for the energy actually consumed, not an estimated consumption. Knowing your own consumption helps to evaluate costs, plan them and, if necessary, reduce energy waste. One cannot notice if there is something wrong with the equipment in the house, with the meter or with the consumption habits if there is no measurement at all.

Find details on how to read the meter depending on the type you have installed on the dedicated website www.autocitiri.ro!

What are regularizations?

Every three months, at maximum, (it is the case for electricity starting this year, as it is for natural gas), the distributor reads the meter and transmits its value to the supplier. The supplier compares the reading from the field with that of the last estimated index and issues the regularization, brings the payment up to date with the actual consumption. If you have read the meter and the index is up to date, regularization means no additional costs.

Exceptional situations

Recently, some exceptional situations have been reported, such as invoices with large settlement amounts, several invoices received in one month, or cancellation of invoices. Here is a systematization of the causes of the most commonly reported problems.

Lack of distributor access to the meter When the distributor was not allowed access to the meter in the house or in the yard, readings were not possible over long periods of time. There are also cases with backlogs from the pandemic period when access to housing was limited. This has been the most common reason for large settlement invoices in recent times. The legislation stipulates the obligation of customers to ensure the access of representatives of distribution operators to the meter.

Legislative changes (14 in the last year) These required the change of invoicing methods and the adaptation of suppliers’ IT systems. There are situations where the supplier reversed the invoices issued to include the new regulations and the calculation most favorable to the client, according to the newly published formulas, which had to be applied in a very short time.

Delayed official clarifications Some of the suppliers waited for official clarifications and, for this reason, issued invoices for a certain month with significant delay. Thus, two invoicing periods overlapped, which resulted in the issuance of two invoices in a shorter period of time, usually after a period in which no invoices were issued.

Ways to solve the problems that have arisen

The best solution, if you have doubts about the invoice, is to contact the supplier. You can do it online or by phone, you can find the contact methods in the invoices or on the suppliers’ websites. During this period, it is possible that, due to the increase in concerns about the subject, the contact centers will be more crowded. If, after the dialogue with the supplier, you consider that the invoice situation is not clarified, you can contact ANRE.