A proposed rule would require your energy retailer and network to communicate with you in a way that meets your needs. The AEMC wants views by 11 February 2027

What is proposed

The request came from Chris Bowen as Chair of the Energy and Climate Change Ministerial Council, the federal, state and territory energy ministers. His covering letter says the council agreed on 8 May that he should lodge it, and it was submitted on 10 June 2026. It asks for a new overarching rule in the National Energy Retail Rules. In the AEMC’s words, This would require energy retailers and distributors (electricity and gas) to communicate with their customers in a way that meets their needs. Distributors are the network businesses that own the poles and wires or the gas pipes; you deal with them at a few points, such as before a disconnection or during an outage.

The request offers three ways to word it. The shortest, taken from the Australian Energy Regulator’s review of payment difficulty protections, is this:

A retailer [and distributor] must take [reasonable] steps to engage with a [small] customer in a way that meets their needs.

Option A in the ministers’ rule change request, June 2026. The square brackets are the request’s own: words still to be settled.

The second option borrows the wording of the family violence protections: take into account the customer’s particular circumstances and ensure they are engaged appropriately and effectively. The third adds supporting duties to that, including taking reasonable steps to find out how you prefer to be contacted, using more than one channel to reach you with key information, and taking reasonable steps to make sure you understand what you have been told. The request also says the rule would not reach solar, batteries or other new energy services: it is only intended to cover retailers and distributors in their provision of traditional energy services.

It would sit beside a non-binding guidance note from the AER with examples of good practice. Individual complaints would still go to the energy ombudsman in your state, case by case. The AER would deal with systemic failures, and could consider civil penalties.

Why ministers say the current rules fall short

The existing rules are detailed about content and timing. A benefit change notice must go out no earlier than 40 business days and no later than 20 business days before the change; a tariff change needs notice at least five business days before it takes effect. The request’s complaint is that these rules check that something was sent, not that it worked. On the disclosure statement you get before signing a contract, it says:

there is no obligation for retailers to present information in an easy to understand format (e.g. using plain English), to check for customer comprehension or to clarify points where needed.

Ministers’ rule change request, June 2026, p. 3

Retailers told the AER’s review that the rules make frontline staff give out information about every form of assistance at once, rather than in stages. The request adds that because the disclosure and timing rules carry civil penalties, retailers lean on set call scripts and standard letters. The request then lists results it reads as a failure to reach people in time, citing the AER’s retail market reports: average debt on entering a hardship program of $2,102 for electricity and $947 for gas in 2024-25, and 55 per cent of people entering those programs carrying debt more than six months old. It also cites the ACCC’s finding that 36.5 per cent of customers, nearly 2.5 million, were paying at or above the default market offer. The request is careful on that last point: it says the rule is not intended to improve switching rates.

Source: AEMC consultation paper, section 2.2. The three groups sum to the paper’s approximate total of 135.

The trade-off

A principle is flexible; a set rule is something you can point to. The AEMC’s paper puts the case for each side plainly. Its summary of its own drafting approach says Prescriptive regulation is more appropriate where risk to the end user is higher without standard processes, and it names guaranteed connection and standard retail contracts as examples. Ministers want the existing rules reviewed for duplication once a principle is in place, but the request sets a limit, which the AEMC repeats: streamlining should only be undertaken insofar as it improves consumer outcomes and does not result in a reduction in overall consumer protections.

Both from the ministers’ rule change request: the first describes NERR rule 48A as it stands, the second is the request’s Option A wording.

The request is frank about two costs. A standard like “meets their needs” is harder to judge than a deadline: This may potentially result in an increased volume of disputes about whether the subjective criteria have been met, particularly in the early stages of implementation. And tailoring takes systems and training, so there is a risk that these additional costs may be passed on to customers. Among the questions the AEMC asks is whether the AER has enough tools to enforce an outcomes-based rule at all.

The direction is not new. From 30 March 2027 retailers will have to try at least two ways of reaching a customer at risk of disconnection, from no fixed list of channels; the AEMC cites that rule as an example of the approach (what that rule does).

When, and how to have a say

The rule would apply in the states and territories under the National Energy Customer Framework: New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania and the ACT. Victoria has its own Energy Retail Code of Practice, which the AEMC says it will consider for alignment. Anyone can make a submission through the AEMC website using project code RRC0078. The AEMC’s timetable:

1. 10 June 2026Ministers’ rule change request lodged.
2. 5 November 2026Consultation paper published.
3. 11 February 2027Submissions close.
4. May 2027Directions paper, marked “TBC” by the AEMC, with submissions closing in July (also TBC).
5. October 2027Draft determination (14 October on the project page).
6. February 2028Final determination. Any start date for the rule itself would come later.

Our view

Our view, labelled as such. The diagnosis is right. A system where only 29 per cent of people definitely know how their bill is worked out, and where people arrive at hardship programs owing, on average, more than $2,000 for electricity, is not one where sending the correct notice on the correct day has been enough. A duty to communicate in a way people can actually use is worth having, and it should apply to everyone, as ministers propose, not only to customers already in trouble.

But the principle should be added to the floor, not swapped for parts of it. A five-business-day notice period is something a household, an ombudsman or a financial counsellor can check in a minute. Whether a retailer took “reasonable steps” to meet your needs is something the request itself expects to be argued over, case by case, for years. The protections people rely on most when things go wrong, notice periods and the steps before a disconnection, are where the AEMC’s own test points to prescription. The streamlining should be confined to genuine duplication, and the submissions should say so.