Who needs to join EWOQ
There are 2 types of EWOQ scheme participants:
When an energy or water provider joins our scheme it ensures that their customers have clear consumer protection and access to a free, fair and independent dispute resolution service for unresolved complaints.
Scheme participants must include EWOQ’s contact details on final disconnection notices or restriction notices and publish contact details on their website.
Energy and water providers
Under the Energy and Water Ombudsman Act 2006, all authorised energy suppliers in Queensland, and water distributor-retailers in South East Queensland, must join the EWOQ scheme if they supply electricity, gas or water to small customers.
Small customers are:
- all residential customers
- small businesses who use less than:
- 160 megawatt hours of electricity per year
- 1 terajoule of gas per year
- 100 kilolitres of water per year (South East Queensland only).
Local councils supply water to customers outside South East Queensland and are not currently within EWOQ’s jurisdiction.
Energy and water distributors and retailers must apply to join once they’re eligible:
- energy distributors—as soon as they receive a distribution licence in Queensland
- energy retailers—within 10 business days starting to sell energy to a Queensland residential or small business customer.
See section 64 of the Act for details on when various energy and water entities become scheme participants.
Penalties apply for not applying to join the scheme in the required time frame.
What does it cost?
EWOQ is fully funded by scheme participants through participation fees and user-pays fees.
Scheme participants pay an annual participation fee in July (or part-fee if they become a scheme participant during the financial year). They also pay user-pays fees to cover the costs of resolving complaints we receive about them. These are calculated according to section 69 of the Act.
We publish these fees in our annual budget guidelines(PDF, 873KB).
If a scheme participant believes the number of cases they're being billed for is incorrect, they can follow the invoiced cases disputed by a scheme participant procedure(PDF, 211KB).
Under the Act, the Ombudsman may impose a supplementary fee if, due to unforeseen expenditure or a revised budget, the total fees won’t cover all the Ombudsman’s functions.
Exempt sellers
Under the Energy and Water Ombudsman Regulation 2022, residential electricity exempt sellers must also join EWOQ.
This applies to embedded network owners and operators with a class D2, D6, R2, R3, R4, ND2, ND6, NR2, NR3, NR4 or individual exemption as described in the Australian Energy Regulator's (Retail) Exempt Selling Guideline and Network Service Provider Registration Exemption Guideline.
Exempt seller with 2,000 or fewer customers
If you’re an exempt seller with 2,000 or fewer customers, you’re automatically considered an EWOQ scheme participant.
Please apply to join so we can support you with updates and resources. You will not pay an annual membership fee.
Exempt seller with more than 2,000 customers
If you’re an exempt seller with more than 2,000 customers, you’re required to apply to join and pay a $5,000 annual membership fee.
Authorised retailers who on-supply electricity will pay $5,000 per year for the first authorisation and $10,000 per year for more than one authorisation.
I’m a body corporate
If your body corporate is legally named as an exempt seller, it must join EWOQ, even if you have a billing agent, strata manager or embedded network manager acting on your behalf.
However, your participation can be managed by your billing agent, embedded network manager or strata manager. This includes applying to join EWOQ and managing complaints on your behalf.
To do this, you’ll need to authorise a representative, providing details for both the body corporate and the agent.
I’m a billing agent
If you manage an embedded network on behalf of an exempt seller you are not required to join EWOQ. However, you can act on their behalf, including applying to join EWOQ and managing complaints.
To do this, you’ll need to authorise a representative, providing details for both the exempt seller and yourself.
What does it cost?
When an embedded network customer contacts us about a complaint, exempt sellers won’t be charged case management fees at this time.
Resources for exempt sellers
We provide exempt sellers with information to help them understand their obligations and how to work with us.
View our resources for exempt sellers: