Electricity Retail Code compliance and enforcement checks

Changes to the Electricity Retail Code

The Electricity Retail Code changed on 1 July 2026. Changes cover:

offering and communicating the solar sharer offer
information that retailers must give to customers when telling them about prices
record-keeping requirements for retailers.

The ��ԭ�� and the Australian Energy Regulator published a to help retailers understand and comply with certain obligations under changes to the code.

This bulletin was published in April 2026 and updated in May 2026. The update reflects the energy regulator’s final default market offer 8 determination and clarifies stakeholder queries about small business-controlled load and how to apply the amended code to embedded network customers.

Examples of breaches to the code

Breaching the Electricity Retail Code can have serious consequences, including penalties and other enforcement action.

Some examples of code breaches are:

offering standing offer prices above the relevant price or tariff cap set by the Australian Energy Regulator or Default Market Offer
not providing a comparison to the comparison price set by the Australian Energy Regulator when communicating prices to customers
using conditional discounts as the main price related element in advertisements
failing to keep records.

We have previously issued infringement notices for alleged breaches of the Electricity Retail Code against:

The Federal Court also ordered EnergyAustralia to pay $14 million in penalties for:

failing to provide mandatory information required by the Electricity Retail Code
making false, misleading or deceptive statements to hundreds of thousands of consumers about electricity prices.

Checking compliance with the code

We regularly check whether retailers are complying with the code.

We can require electricity retailers to provide us with certain information and documents. This helps us understand whether retailers are complying with the code and whether there are compliance issues we need to focus on.

For information about the actions we take, see Industry code compliance checks.

We also use public information to monitor compliance with the code.

Investigating breaches to the code

We can investigate if we think a retailer has breached the code.

One of the ��ԭ��'s compliance and enforcement priorities is misleading pricing and claims in relation to essential services, with a particular focus on energy.

We may take enforcement action where:

retailers fail to follow the code
retailers fail to respond to our concerns or choose not to take steps to fix compliance failures
the issues go beyond a failure to follow code requirements and involve behaviour that is likely to mislead or deceive consumers.

We have a range of options to ensure compliance with the code. We consider several factors when deciding which option to use.

For more information, see our Compliance and Enforcement Policy.

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