The power company losing the most customers

New Zealanders are often told to check to see if they could get a better deal from another power company. So who's winning and who's losing the battle for those customers?

Data from the Electricity Authority shows that Genesis Energy was the biggest loser in recent times. It lost a net 35,015 customers in the year to June.

Nova lost 9059, Manawa 3329 and Mercury 2706.

Contact gained 20,577, Electric Kiwi 11,590 and Meridian 10,288. Meridian gained the most customers on a gross basis, adding more than 100,000 in the year to June but it lost 93,919.

The data includes any subsidiary brands within the parent company's numbers.

There were just under 458,000 switches in total in the year to June.

Genesis also had the most significant number of net losses over two years, at almost 51,000.

Over five years, it lost just under 40,000 net, just ahead of Mercury which lost 33,276.

Powerswitch general manager Paul Fuge said the Genesis loss was probably due in large part to the company retiring the Frank Energy brand.

"We saw a significant increase in Powerswitch traffic and switching activity from June 2025, which coincided with Genesis's announcement that its budget brand Frank Energy would be phased out. Frank stopped accepting new customers on June 9, 2025, and existing customers were subsequently migrated to the Genesis brand - unless they chose another retailer, which many did.

"That change was the main trigger we observed. We received a noticeable increase in enquiries through both Powerswitch and the Consumer NZ contact centre from customers wanting to understand their options and compare plans before deciding where to move."

Fuge said smaller brands tended to do better on Powerswitch. "Where the gentailers want to acquire, they have these challenger brands and that's their vehicle for acquisition, generally. Frank was performing that task for Genesis.

"It's a good strategy for them because there's a large customer base out there who's quite apathetic for lots of reasons... there's a lot of disengagement and mistrust in the industry. There's a large cohort of customers who just sit with their incumbent retailer and will grumble a bit but tend to stay with them even though they could do better with a lower-cost provider.

"I think with Genesis losing that challenger brand that was their big acquisition channel from Powerswitch's point of view anyway, not only did they lose quite a few customers through that transition but they're probably not acquiring at the same rate they were."

Less aggressive

He said many retailers were also making IT improvements and had become less aggressive about acquiring customers.

"The market isn't as competitive as people might think in terms of acquisition. Retailers want customers, of course, but they want a certain type of customer.

"The other thing we've observed is over the last couple of years we've seen declining conversion rates. That means they're turning away more customers than they were previously. What that indicates to us is they're more nervous around taking on customers, particularly risky customers, in terms of what they perceive as the ability of that customer to pay. Customers with poor credit are probably being turned away at higher rates than they were previously."

He said the gentailers were largely making money from wholesale rather than retail customers.

A spokesperson for Genesis said it had moved three retail brands to one Genesis brand, and that had an effect on customer numbers.

He said the switching data did not take into account new connections from homes and using that data, Genesis had only lost a net 28,942 customers over the year.

"Bringing Genesis, Frank and Ecotricity together creates a simpler experience for customers and allows us to focus on helping households electrify and reduce their total energy costs. As part of that transition, we saw some attrition in electricity customer numbers as we put a focus on building long-term customer value. Genesis has a multi-faceted offering, and we are encouraged by recent growth in broadband and LPG customers."

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