This was posted 8 months 12 days ago, and might be an out-dated deal.

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3 Hours Free Power (3am to 6am), Half Night Rates (9pm to 7am) Everyday on EV at Home Plan @ Z Power

140

Seems like a better rates compared to contact if you own EV. It's good to have night half rates. Free hours times are not ideal but might work for some.

3 free charging hours
Between the hours of 3am and 6am everyday.*
Make the most of your 3 free hours by adding an Evnex smart charger to schedule your charging sessions while you sleep.

Great prices

Your personalised pricing: * Incl gst.
* Daily Charge: 103.50c/day
* Day rate (7am-9pm):34.52c/kWh
* Night rate (9pm-7am):17.26c/kWh
* Free rate (3am-6am):0.00c/kWh

Half price rate at nights

From 9pm to 7am everyday!*
Take advantage of cheaper electricity while you sleep.

T&C

Referral Links

Z App: random (4)

Referrer gets 1 free coffee (up to 3 max).

Z Electric: random (17)

Referee gets 50L+ extra 25L. Referrer gets 50L.

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closed Comments

  • +1

    Based on the information about your address we can’t connect with you.
    Unfortunately, we currently don't support the meter setup at this address.

    I have a very new smart meter setup with day/night and solar, which really should not matter these days as they can group usage digitally on the backend, which I assume is how they will do the free 3 hours.

    • Maybe there system still has old ICP info?

      • As Ace indicates, definitely worth checking with them that the ICP they are seeing is the same as your meter.

        • Haha it's not that new, just over a year old.

          • +1

            @jesserockz: Okay… not sure how that verifies that the provider has the correct ICP, but it sounds like you know what you are talking about.

    • Perhaps they don't support your solar export?

    • Some neighbours of ours got told similar for day/night pricing, the issue with them was apparently that the metering company couldn't get a good signal off the meter to read it to know what to charge them for. No idea if that's what might be stopping you getting this plan.

  • Ouch, my day rate came out a bit high.

    45.90c/kWh exc. GST

    • Wow. Do other providers are in similar range?

  • Does the referral system do anything with this new plan?

    Looks like they don’t get anything but maybe the referrer still gets fuel ?

    • I don't think so. Referral is only valid for regular plan.

  • Apart from the half price nights, the pricing seems higher than my current Contact plan.

  • Your personalised pricing:*

    Daily Charge:
    90.00c/day
    Day rate (7am-9pm):
    30.57c/kWh
    Night rate (9pm-7am):
    15.29c/kWh
    Free rate (3am-6am):
    0.00c/kWh


    Nice, it looks like this will be better for us than the contact good nights plan, which currently has a slightly lower daily rate (60c), but a slightly higher rate per kWh for the day rate.
    We can pretty easily shift our free use to 3am -6am (timed EV charging/heat pump/hot water cylinder/drier). With the added bonus of the cheap night rates… Good stuff.

    I actually think the free hours are preferable to 9pm-12am, because we can set the heat pump to warm up the house so we have warm spaces when we get up.

    Thanks for sharing!

    • Yes. 9-12 free hours are good. I also run all heatpumps during that time. I would have liked to have peak & off peak rates along with free hours as WFH helps.

    • How do you time the hot water cylinder?

      • +1

        We got an electrician to install a timer on the switchboard.
        It cost maybe $250, but cut between $40-100 p/m off our heating bill (cylinder is in the roof space, and it gets very cold, so I figure it needs to work quite hard to heat water even for our small household).

        • are you able to adjust the timer yourself? or does the water heater only run at certains times now?

          • +1

            @justaddwater: Yep, we can set the timer ourselves to run for any chosen hour(s) during the day.

            We have it set to heat the water only during 9pm-12am (our free power hours). We could add extra hours any time if we wanted to. But those 3hrs are enough to get the water hot and stay hot all day (for morning and evening showers).

    • Currently with contact good night plan and I'm paying 60c fixed daily and 30.4 variable.

      Pretty comparable these two plans you can't go wrong with either I'd say.

  • If you are comparing and have an EV Electric kiwi movemaster is another to consider.
    My rates:

    0.00 1 free hour daily (I choose when)
    31c peak
    22c off peak shoulder
    16c night
    $1.85 daily charge
    12.5 solar buyback

  • +2

    Your power rates will depend on your local power network a they set the line charges. Just pointing it out as comparing pricing from other users is only relevant if they live in the same area as you with the same pricing structure.

  • Referral link takes you to a 404 page!

    • Yes. As mentioned above referral are only for regular power plan. Not for EV plan

  • +2

    Looks like they have significantly reduced the number of "off peak hours" to compensate for those free hours, by creating a day and night rate which they are using to overcharge for off peak day time power costs.
    Compare with poweshop and flick for example, where during the day is off peak and all weekends are off peak. Peak for them is the actual peak grid times of first thing in the morning and end of the day to mid evening.

  • I don't own an EV but the EV plan is better for me.
    What happens if you sign up to the fuel one, and receive the 50L reward. Then switch to the EV one after a month. Is this allowed?

  • They just created more hours to compensate for the free 3 hours of power?

  • wait… i'm paying 11.96c/kWh to Meridian on EV plan. same 9pm - 7am night times.

  • Do they check if you have EV?

    Can you sign up to this plan without EV?

    • +1

      No they don't check. There is currently no way to determine if you have EV or not. So yes, you can sign up.

      • Thank you

      • Meridian asked for proof of ownership when we signed up to our plan. Not sure if Z will dot he same.

        • That's first time I have heard about it. Good to know. Thanks

  • When comparing:
    Please take into account GST when comparing.
    When comparing, don’t compare with a third person in a different city!!
    Don’t forget some that some power companies offer % off your final bill and some offer $$ to new customers.
    200c per day fixed charge = $60 per month regardless of use.
    Don’t get stuck on free hours, your off peak and daily hours will be higher than usual.

    • All really depends on your use case. Free hours works for some while not for others. I charge my EV only in free hours which saves me around $100+ a month, Also dishwasher, laundry, Heatpumps and few device charging within that period. I doubt if I move away from free hours to peak/off-peak plan I will save $100+ after discount.

  • There is a power company compare spreadsheet in below article, Plug in your power rates and your usage to find the best power plan.

    https://www.moneyhub.co.nz/power-company-comparison.html?fbc…

    • does it include all providers?

      always found the online compare tools don't have certain providers, that makes them useless because I have to search by myself anyway

      • Probably no. But gives you a way exclude lots them which will be expensive. So will have handful of them to compare.

  •       Z EV Plan | Contact (Open Term)(all excl. GST)(Christchurch)
    

    Daily Fixed Rate - 135c| 90c
    Peak Rate - 25c | 27.7c
    Off-Peak Rate - 13c | 11.9c

  • Does anyone at all have Solar and have their power with Z ? It says our address is not supported - I suspect this is why

  • +1

    Z's referral system is down - it's not about the free power plan, the whole referral system is not working now

  • Daily Charge:
    135.00c/day
    Day rate (7am-9pm):
    25.08c/kWh
    Night rate (9pm-7am):
    12.54c/kWh
    Free rate (3am-6am):
    0.00c/kWh

    Contact better than that

  • +1

    I downloaded my usage data from Mercury and asked chatgpt to see if I will save any money, and here is what it spit out

    Month-Year | Mercury ($) | Z Electricity ($)

    Oct 2022 | 210.97 | 158.97
    Nov 2022 | 184.96 | 136.52
    Dec 2022 | 216.24 | 150.11
    Jan 2023 | 180.65 | 125.92
    Feb 2023 | 181.73 | 131.71
    Mar 2023 | 190.79 | 141.10
    Apr 2023 | 181.31 | 134.04
    May 2023 | 226.17 | 177.27
    Jun 2023 | 250.92 | 197.86
    Jul 2023 | 287.65 | 224.78
    Aug 2023 | 165.80 | 130.62
    Total | 2,277.19 | 1,708.93
    Savings | 0.00 | 568.27

    As shown in the table, the total savings by switching to Z Electricity would be approximately $568.27 over the period covered by the dataset.

    • Did you feed hourly data? I hope chatgpt considered half rate and free hours. Anyhow that's a decent savings. Try other providers as well.

      • 30 minute intervals

  • +2

    This was interesting so compared it with all I could think of except Octopus energy

    Month-Year | Mercury ($) | Z Electricity ($) | Contact Free Power ($) | Genesis EV ($) | Electric Kiwi ($) | Contact EV Plan ($)

    Oct 2022 | 210.97 | 158.97 | 141.13 | 175.05 | 160.09 | 147.67
    Nov 2022 | 184.96 | 136.52 | 115.57 | 149.09 | 138.50 | 128.90
    Dec 2022 | 216.24 | 150.11 | 129.42 | 164.67 | 156.69 | 147.82
    Jan 2023 | 180.65 | 125.92 | 116.25 | 136.31 | 123.45 | 120.26
    Feb 2023 | 181.73 | 131.71 | 120.09 | 144.19 | 132.52 | 124.54
    Mar 2023 | 190.79 | 141.10 | 125.62 | 154.10 | 139.68 | 131.26
    Apr 2023 | 181.31 | 134.04 | 121.87 | 146.19 | 131.42 | 123.69
    May 2023 | 226.17 | 177.27 | 156.06 | 196.51 | 180.32 | 162.13
    Jun 2023 | 250.92 | 197.86 | 179.22 | 221.01 | 206.09 | 180.49
    Jul 2023 | 287.65 | 224.78 | 199.06 | 252.21 | 235.67 | 208.09
    Aug 2023 | 165.80 | 130.62 | 118.66 | 146.93 | 141.14 | 120.90
    Total | 2,277.19 | 1,708.93 | 1,522.95 | 1,886.26 | 1,745.57 | 1,595.75
    Savings | 0.00 | 568.27 | 754.24 | 390.94 | 531.63 | 681.45

    According to this Contact energy is the cheapest, saving a whopping $754.24 (free plan) or $682.45 (Contact Dream plan)

    • Nice. Can you try flick energy if you don't mind. Thanks

    • +1

      Nice idea with the chatgpt help. One thing I think it will miss though is any potential behavioural changes from making a change. If we moved to contact or Z we'd absolutely be timing the car charging, dryer, water, dishwasher and warming the house to abuse the 3 hours free. Feeding in existing data if you are turning stuff like this on at 9pm now when it goes off peak will make the Z plan look more expensive as you'll be calculating base on paying for a lot of use you might be able to move to the free window.

      • not sure I understood you correctly. My behaviour is based on Mercury who has 1 flat rate for whenever we use. So savings are without any behaviour changes as based on historical data. Now when we would have 3 free power, will be moving and timing lot of things during free power like dishwashing, drying, ev charging, so Z or Contact will even be cheaper.

        BTW I expect will be moving 20% of my power to free power time slot and I even asked chat gpt to do that, saying can you shift 20% of my current power consumption to land on free power time slot how much extra saving can that bring, at that time Chat Gpt crapped out and said your 50 requests are over come back after 3 hours, and I just gave up and signed up for Z as I read somewhere that contact free power had clause not applicable for EVs (don't know how they would know that though)

        • EV clause has been dropped by Contact. I read it somewhere, not sure where, but there was a contact facebook ad saying you can charge EV in free hours.

  • +1

    Some parts of NZ seem to get ripped off when it comes to the rates. These companies have made massive profits this year as well.

    These are my rates and they are quite a bit higher than Frank, who is also owned by Genesis.

    Your personalised pricing:*
    Daily Charge: 155.25c/day
    Day rate (7am-9pm):40.81c/kWh
    Night rate (9pm-7am):20.40c/kWh
    Free rate (3am-6am):0.00c/kWh

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