Bill Hero is not a 'comparison site'. We're a 'Savings Service'.
We make this distinction because comparison sites purport to offer a 'free' service to energy consumers, and we don't.
How Comparison Sites Work
Comparison sites operate by generating commissions from their panel of retailers. The panel is the set of retailers or vendors that the comparison site has commercial relationships with, which dictates whose products they will and will not display.
Most comparison sites have panels with only a few retailers, when there are actually about 50 retailers out there competing for your business.
Those commercial relationships with the panel members always include commissions paid to the comparison site for any sales they facilitate, and they often will also include bonus payments or higher commission rates associated with sales targets and volume thresholds.
It’s also common for those commercial relationships to also include advertising, promotional or positional payments where the retailers will pay addiitonal fees for preferential placement in the comparison site, or for other forms of preferential treatment.
There are some important ramifications of this business model:
Comparison sites rely on commissions from energy retailers for their revenue. This means that the retailers are their real customers, and you are not. You're actually the product that their real customers are buying.
Like all businesses, comparison sites need to keep their customers happy in order to safeguard their revenue streams and maintain a viable business. So the primary incentive for any comparison site is to help its real customers, the retailers, to sell as much product as possible.
Which means that comparison sites will only ever show you products from the retailers on their panel, even when there will be other products available and relevant for you, which are better priced and better suited for you.
And comparison sites may also artificially promote particular products and vendors in order to maximise the potential commissions or advertising revenue they can achieve, even if they have a more suitable product for you in their panel.
So the simple reality is that comparison sites don’t really 'compare the market', and you or I can’t really use these sites to 'select' the best deal.
The truth is that comparison sites only pretend to work for you. Their real customers are the retailers who pay them in order to acquire you as a customer, which makes you the product.
How is Bill Hero Different?
Bill Hero is not a comparison site. We’re a Savings Service, and we work for you, not for them.
Bill Hero does not seek and does not accept any commission payments at all from the retailers whose plans you can compare through our service.
All of our revenue is via subscriptions from people just like you, and our only strategy is to keep you happy by providing great service and helping you always stay on the best-priced plans.
Unlike comparison sites, which really exist to help sellers sell more, Bill Hero is here to help buyers buy better.
That’s why Australia’s premiere consumer advocacy organisation CHOICE has partnered with Bill Hero to offer Bill Hero for CHOICE.
We know that ‘Buying better’ can mean a lot of things. We started with an unambiguous focus on dollar savings and have introduced various non-price attributes into our service over time, such as Green ratings and GreenPower.
After all, everyone is interested in price, but not to the exclusion of other important things like service, quality, and environmental responsibility.
Bill Hero’s mission is to genuinely work to support your interests in finding and buying these kinds of products on your terms, not theirs.
We call this Savings as a Service.
What does it cost?
Bill Hero currently offers 4 subscription types, all of them with a modest annual fee:
Subscription type | Annual fee |
Electricity only | $49 |
Gas only | $49 |
Electricity + Gas Bundle | $79 |
Business Electricity | $99 |
Savings Guarantee
We offer our Savings Guarantee to make sure that every subscriber comes out in front.
Our Guarantee is that we'll be able to find annualised savings for you greater than the price of the annual subscription, on your very first bill comparison.
If we can't, then you can cancel your subscription immediately and get your money back.
Bill Hero offers Savings as a Service with a Safety Net.