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Ctrl-Shift For The Changing Consumer Empowerment Landscape A report prepared by Ctrl-Shift for www.ctrl-shift.co.uk April 2014 1 The Changing Consumer Empowerment Landscape Ctrl-Shift April 2014 Contents Contents ........................................................................................................................................................... 2 Introduction ................................................................................................................................................... 3 Executive summary ..................................................................................................................................... 4 1. The challenge of empowerment ........................................................................................................ 7 1.1 Imperfect knowledge ...................................................................................................................... 8 1.2 Inertia ................................................................................................................................................ 10 1.3 Impotence ........................................................................................................................................ 11 1.4 Section summary ........................................................................................................................... 12 2. The changing dynamics of empowerment.................................................................................. 13 2.1 Wave 1 – Choice ............................................................................................................................. 13 2.2 Wave 2 – Voice ............................................................................................................................... 15 2.3 Wave 3 – Consumer empowerment as a service/business .......................................... 16 2.4 An expanding view of value creation, markets and value exchange ......................... 18 3. Empowerment ‘hot spots’: trends, issues and developments to watch out for ........... 20 3.1 Price, product and service comparisons .............................................................................. 20 3.2 Collective Switching ..................................................................................................................... 25 3.3 Impartial advice ............................................................................................................................. 27 3.4 The organised consumer? .......................................................................................................... 31 3.5 Personal data empowerment ................................................................................................... 34 3. 6 The consumer as producer....................................................................................................... 38 3.7 Smart consumers? ........................................................................................................................ 39 3.8 Home and asset management .................................................................................................. 40 3.9 Behaviour change as a consumer service ............................................................................ 43 3.10 Empowered versus vulnerable consumers ...................................................................... 46 4. Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................... 49 Appendix 1: Different definitions of ‘the vulnerable consumer’ ............................................ 52 Appendix 2: Organisations/services researched for this Interim Report .......................... 53 References ................................................................................................................................................... 56 2 Introduction This research was designed to help Ofgem scope out, define and articulate how the consumer empowerment landscape is changing in relation to energy. Although this was commissioned by Ofgem this report not necessarily reflect Ofgem’s views. This report sets out key themes, and where relevant takes a deep dive into some of the most innovative initiatives and ideas. In preparing this paper we have looked at over 50 of the most innovative services and websites that have empowering consumers as an essential element of their purpose (see Appendix 2 for the full list of services reviewed) and conducted 10 expert interviews (see Appendix 3). The report also takes account of the outputs of Ofgem’s Consumer Empowerment roundtable discussion, held in March 2013. Many of the themes of this paper will be relevant to Ofgem’s developing policy around the role of Third Party Intermediaries (TPIs) in the Energy market. 3 Executive summary Consumer empowerment in the energy industry is changing in two important ways. First, what ‘consumer empowerment’ actually looks like and how it is achieved is changing. Second, these changes have brought it to the verge of a potential transformational step change in its degree of impact on the dynamics of energy markets. In turn this will have an equally transformational impact on the role of regulators and the issues they focus on. Traditionally those aiming to empower consumers have tended to focus on consumer rights, consumers’ understanding of these rights, consumer education (e.g. the ability to understand bills, labels and product claims) and, increasingly, access to relevant useful information. But this agenda does not address the full range of informational, behavioural and structural The very nature of issues which materially impact the degree to consumer which consumers are truly empowered. Now, empowerment is in however, the very nature of consumer flux, potentially empowerment is in flux thanks to the transforming the emergence of new Third Party Intermediary (TPI) business models that see ‘empowering the dynamics of the consumer’ as a new business opportunity. energy market. These services are changing the ways markets work in multiple ways. As this Report shows they are: Providing new ways to help consumers access and use information, reducing many of the barriers to effective consumer empowerment. Giving consumers voice as well as choice: Choice between products and services is not the only market mechanism. Reputations are also important, and consumers can increasingly exercise influence over suppliers and markets by expressing views and opinions which affect suppliers’ and other parties’ reputations. Enhancing traditional take-it-or-leave-it mechanisms of ‘choice’ via new opportunities for negotiation such as collective switching. Providing access to new technologies and creating new collectives and communities that have the effect of increasing consumers’ bargaining power (by, for example, helping them act as energy producers as well as energy consumers). Empowering consumers with better understandings of their own behaviours, via mechanisms such as midata (where companies release consumption and 4 other data back to consumers who ask for it in portable, machine readable form so that they can use this data for their own purposes), and by deploying new insights into human behaviour from behavioural economics and other disciplines to help consumers understand and change their own behaviours. The causes of consumer dis-empowerment are multiple, complex and interconnected. They can be summed up in ‘Three Is’ : imperfect knowledge (i.e. lack of skills, access to, or understanding of information), inertia and impotence (i.e. lack of bargaining power). Each of these is multifaceted, involving, for example, psychological and behavioural issues as well as practical issues relating to the availability of information or how easy it is to act effectively. The ten ‘hot spots’ of consumer empowerment identified in this Report together have the potential to tackle all the main barriers to effective consumer empowerment. If this happens, it would alter the ‘balance of power’ between energy suppliers and their customers, and the dynamics of energy markets. However, the practical impact of these developments so far is marginal and may Regulators need to be remain so. There are many ways for new and alternative approaches to consumer clear: what is the empowerment to fail and/or to produce ‘purpose’ of consumer negative unintended consequences. For empowerment in the example, commission-driven business models energy sector? Is it a could confuse things further for consumers as ‘good thing’ in its commission incentives tempt intermediaries to own right? Or is it a distort the information and advice they provide their users. Or new consumer empowering ‘tool’ to help reach services could empower the already policy objectives. If empowered, leaving the dis-empowered so, which objectives? relatively worse off. Trends in consumer empowerment therefore pose new questions for regulators. Regulators’ decisions will have a significant impact on the final outcome, affecting how far, how fast and in what directions the emerging market for consumer empowering services develops. These decisions, in turn, depend on the view they take of the ‘purpose’ of consumer empowerment in markets. Should regulators positively encourage initiatives which empower consumers or should they remain neutral? Is consumer empowerment simply a desirable end in itself? Do regulators wish
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