Influencer electricity contract

An Influencer electricity contract is right for you if:

• you want to benefit from timing your electricity consumption to cheaper hours, but find exchange electricity too risky.
• you are able to schedule or time your electricity consumption.
• you want an emission-free electricity contract.

An Influencer contract is best for those who can schedule a significant portion of their consumption to time periods when electricity is cheapest. Typically, this means higher electricity consumption during nights and weekends.

Influencer is particularly suitable for you when you have:

• a large hot-water tank. The heater of the tank can be scheduled to heat water during the cheapest hours of the day, using the heat for heating the house and domestic hot water during other hours of the day.
• an electric or hybrid car. Charging the car during the cheapest hours does not affect living comfort, but with an Influencer contract you can lower the cost of electricity. This is because the consumption of an electric car is typically higher than other household consumption.
• small-scale solar electricity production. In general, spot prices are high during the day and low at night. Solar panels may cover your entire consumption needs during the day, so you don’t have to buy electricity during expensive daytime hours. Naturally, the benefit of a solar power system depends on the season.

With normal consumption, the scale of the user’s own influence on the price typically varies around +/- 2 cents per kWh – so price fluctuations aren’t enormous even if you don’t monitor your consumption closely.

The user’s own influence on the price of electricity is a contract component that affects the price. The user’s own influence depends on when and on which days of the week they use the most electricity.

When your own influence is negative, you save on the bill

• You use a larger portion of electricity when it is cheapest on the energy exchange
• Your consumption is typically concentrated on nighttime and weekends

When your own influence is positive, you get a higher bill

• You use the most electricity at the same time as most consumers in Finland, which is when the price of exchange electricity is usually at its highest
• Your consumption is typically concentrated on weekday mornings and evenings

By factoring the user’s own influence into our pricing, we aim to encourage them to shift their electricity consumption away from peak hours. The price of electricity and the amount of electricity consumption vary by the hour. When consumption is more even, demand peaks that increase the overall price of electricity are avoided.

For most electricity users, the scale of their own influence on the price typically varies between +/- 2 cents per kWh from the fixed energy charge.

Larger variations in both directions are also possible.

The sum of the energy charge and the user’s own influence on unit prices (cents per kWh) cannot be negative.

The rule of thumb is simple: use electricity when it is cheapest.

The spot price of electricity on electricity exchanges can vary dramatically. In windy weather, the electricity price can be negative, while on a windless, freezing day it can be very high.

However, the electricity price is known precisely only the day before, so it’s not possible to know with certainty which days of the week or month are the most economical. It is common for electricity to be cheapest during nights and weekends. On the other hand, on windy days electricity can also be inexpensive in the middle of the day.

Therefore, it is advisable to follow these guidelines:

• in daily consumption, aim to shift electricity usage to the more cost-effective hours. For example, schedule electric heating for the night, wash dishes, and take showers during times when electricity spot prices are low.
• in weekly consumption, you can try to anticipate or take advantage of cost-effective periods. For instance, use the sauna and the oven on the weekends, and wait for the cheapest times to do laundry.

One way to track the inexpensive and expensive hours the day before is through Vaasan Sähkö’s app.

The national transmission system operator Fingrid’s handy Tuntihinta app allows you to see what time of day you should schedule your electricity use. You can also set up alerts to make it easier to manage your power consumption.

Information about the user’s own influence on electricity price per month is available in the Vaasan Sähkö app, and is also detailed on the electricity bill.

You can see in our app how your own influence on price changes over the month. The final size of the user’s own influence on the price for the month is determined only at the beginning of the next month, once the average spot price for the previous month and the amount and timing of the user’s electricity consumption are known.

Vaasan Sähkö’s Influencer pricing is primarily based on a fixed energy price, to which the customer’s own influence on the price is added. When you use electricity during the times when the spot-price of electricity is low, your own influence on the price decreases, resulting in savings for you.

Because of this, the price fluctuations for Vaasan Sähkö’s Influencer contract are smaller than with an exchange electricity, spot-priced contract.

With an exchange electricity contract, the energy price you pay is based on the hourly pricing of the energy exchange, which can vary quite a lot from hour to hour or day to day.

In Basic Electricity, the only way you can influence the size of your electricity bill by consuming less energy. However, with Basic Electricity you know the exact energy price in advance.

Influencer allows you to consume the same amount of energy and still get a discount thanks to being able to control your own influence on the price through smarter timing of your electricity consumption.

In Influencer, the base level of energy charge is lower than Basic Electricity. On the other hand, the energy charge in Influencer may rise higher than with Basic Electricity if you use a larger portion of electricity when it is most expensive.

In our quarterly products, the energy price is adjusted four times a year. The price periods are 1 January to 31 March, 1 April to 30 June, 1 July to 30 September and 1 October to 31 December. We will send a price notification for the next three-month period at the latest one month before the period begins. You can then find the new prices on our website also.