Why did you launch the new service for commercial and craft enterprises?
Clemens Graf von Wedel: There are commercial and trade customers who want to optimise their energy purchases and manage them more independently. They want to make greater use of the market and conclude fixed-price contracts for electricity and gas for one or more supply years. We have therefore focused on the requirements that arise purely in fixed-price tendering and developed our free Gewerbe& Handwerk service.
How much experience is needed in purchasing to use the service and the online portal?
Rainer Otto: Both experienced and inexperienced managers or buyers can use our online portal. It is intuitive to use and customers will find all the familiar purchasing steps, but online. With the active support of our service team, energy procurement can be optimised quickly.
What is the registration process?
Rainer Otto: Registration takes place online on our website at www.enportal.de. After registering, customers are asked to upload their current energy data. This is usually the last energy supply contract and current bills, as well as a completed enPORTAL power of attorney for load profile procurement from the current supplier. The latter is used to ensure that the data is automatically retrieved and permanently available online. As soon as the documents have been viewed by enPORTAL and entered into the portal, our service team will contact you by telephone and explain all the further steps involved in the tendering process and the conclusion of the contract.
Why is the Trade & Crafts service free of charge for customers?
Clemens Graf von Wedel: We bring customers and energy suppliers together as quickly as possible via our online marketplace and demand payment from the suppliers for the Gewerbe & Handwerk service. Once the customer has decided on a supplier and confirmed the conclusion of the contract, the commissioned supplier pays us an agency fee for acquiring the customer. This fee is the same for all suppliers, so that all suppliers have the same chances of acquiring customers via our online portal. We attach great importance to fairness in the process and competition in the market.
What are the advantages for the customer?
Clemens Graf von Wedel: Every hour counts for the exchange-traded products electricity and gas, which means: the faster buyers can react to favourable market opportunities and the greater the number of supplier offers requested, the sooner the customer finds the right supplier for him. With our portal, we offer speed, an overview of the market and thus potential savings in energy purchasing.
Rainer Otto: Since we take care of the preparation and presentation of the energy data and a tender is standardised, our customers benefit from immense workload reduction, competition and time savings.
Some shoppers may still be sceptical about online shopping - how do you respond?
Clemens Graf von Wedel: Online processes have already become established in many business areas. Digitalisation offers many new possibilities in energy purchasing, which we have mapped on our portal. If you want to save costs, you will not be able to avoid going online in the future. It has been shown that digital communication and fast data transmission have great potential for greater efficiency. Customers who already use our service can no longer imagine procuring electricity and gas offline.
