It will possibly vary in many parts of Australia, but here in SA I have found very little real competition, even though there are quite a variety of retailers . . . in my example above, the area my brother is in has one, just one retailer, and his FIT is much higher and considerably lower tariff, go figure.
I have used the AGL comparisons to make sure I'm on the best plan with them, and also the GOVCO energymadeeasy.gov.au site, and if you find retailer that is lower in tariffs, they will have much higher daily supply charge, and vice versa.
So you really have to understand your own households usage, what plan is best for that . . . if solar alone will help meaningfully to reduce your bill, if solar without a battery is totally waste of $ for you, etc etc, there is no one size fits all.
So my take on energy retailers is there is often little real competition, they are all either scraping through, or making a heap off consumers.
We can blame the obvious rush to renewables I feel, pushed by GOVCO, and if you believe some of the 'theories' out there, it's from higher up, much higher.
Way too quick for major renewables infrastructure, the capability of the countries power networks.
What should have been done is get more investment in the network to cope with rooftop solar, get more homes / commercial / industrial properties into solar with batteries, and battery storage onto homes with existing suitable solar systems . . . to self consume, and reduce grid problems, some with such setups will totally eliminate grid needs, others taking far less at peak times.
For many systems of good capacity, incentivise them into VPP type deals, taking further stress off the grid by sending power to the grid at peak times.
Gas baseload as needed would have been good in the interim to keep the lights on reliably, and energy prices reasonable, but alas the agenda seems to be nothing but renewables is wanted by the powers that be.
