2. Data submitted by energy suppliers
Data is currently made available by a number of energy suppliers. These respondents submit a monthly integral file with their rates and the number of connections they service by contract type. It is essential that the data supplied includes pricing details for all consumer contracts, so that CBS gets a comprehensive overview of the respondents’ customer base each month. However, different respondents use different file structures and coding, and the details provided vary as well. Some suppliers submit micro-level data for each customer, while others only provide aggregated information, such as their average price rates and the total number of customers per contract type. The data provided by each supplier goes back to at least January 2020 and continues until the current reporting month.
Besides data on energy rates and numbers of connections, data on contract types is also available. Distinctions are made based on:
- Single rate or double rate;
- Green or grey energy;
- Contract duration;
- Brand.
Energy suppliers may offer multiple brands under different names. If this is the case, the respondent in question supplies data for all its brands and specifies under which name each contract type is offered.
Whether a contract has a fixed or variable rate can also be considered a product characteristic, but this is not mentioned separately here because it is directly related to the duration of the agreement: contracts with a duration of less than one year are classified as variable contracts, all other ones as fixed. For some suppliers, the effective starting month of the contract and the date of signing are also known.
The following rates are distinguished for electricity:
- Variable rate, single meter (euros/kWh);
- Variable rate, double meter, off-peak (euros/kWh);
- Variable rate, double meter, standard (euros/kWh);
- Standing charge for electricity (euros/year).
There are two rates for natural gas:
- Variable rate (euros/m3);
- Standing charge for natural gas (euros/year).
When the data is entered into the production system, a number of checks are done, and records with missing rates or rates equal to zero are deleted. Besides the above data, which is provided directly by the energy suppliers, additional data – for instance on average electricity consumption – is also used in the calculations. This is explained in more detail in the next chapter.