IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ebl/ecbull/eb-22-00877.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Switching costs in the Swedish retail market for electricity

Author

Listed:
  • Oskar Hellquist

    (Luleå University of Technology and Uppsala University)

  • Jesper Stage

    (Luleå University of Technology)

Abstract

We estimate monetary values for switching costs in the Swedish market for electricity for private household consumers, using two different numerical methods. The electricity providers in Sweden with over 1 per cent market share were studied. Switching costs were estimated to be between 50 per cent and 95 per cent of yearly costs for electricity. Considering that the electricity retail market was deregulated more than 20 years ago, and that the Swedish government continues to facilitate switching for consumers, it is noteworthy that switching costs are still this high. Given that electricity is a homogeneous product where switching costs are mainly due to transaction costs and psychological barriers to switching, it seems likely that switching costs may be even higher in other markets where there are additional barriers to switching.

Suggested Citation

  • Oskar Hellquist & Jesper Stage, 2023. "Switching costs in the Swedish retail market for electricity," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 43(1), pages 18-27.
    • Handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-22-00877
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.accessecon.com/Pubs/EB/2023/Volume43/EB-23-V43-I1-P3.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Shy, Oz, 2002. "A quick-and-easy method for estimating switching costs," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 20(1), pages 71-87, January.
    2. Paul Klemperer, 1987. "Markets with Consumer Switching Costs," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 102(2), pages 375-394.
    3. Ek, Kristina & Söderholm, Patrik, 2008. "Households' switching behavior between electricity suppliers in Sweden," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 254-261, December.
    4. Paul Klemperer, 1995. "Competition when Consumers have Switching Costs: An Overview with Applications to Industrial Organization, Macroeconomics, and International Trade," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 62(4), pages 515-539.
    5. Gehrig, Thomas & Shy, Oz & Stenbacka, Rune, 2011. "History-based price discrimination and entry in markets with switching costs: A welfare analysis," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(5), pages 732-739, June.
    6. Klemperer, Paul D, 1987. "Entry Deterrence in Markets with Consumer Switching Costs," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 97(388a), pages 99-117, Supplemen.
    7. Hellmer, Stefan & Wårell, Linda, 2009. "On the evaluation of market power and market dominance--The Nordic electricity market," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 3235-3241, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bouckaert, Jan & Degryse, Hans & Provoost, Thomas, 2010. "Enhancing market power by reducing switching costs," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 109(2), pages 131-133, November.
    2. Rizkiah, Siti K. & Disli, Mustafa & Salim, Kinan & Razak, Lutfi A., 2021. "Switching costs and bank competition: Evidence from dual banking economies," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
    3. Nogata, Daisuke, 2022. "Determinants of household switching between natural gas suppliers: Evidence from Japan," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    4. Lucio Fuentelsaz & Juan Pablo Maicas & Yolanda Polo, 2012. "Switching Costs, Network Effects, and Competition in the European Mobile Telecommunications Industry," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 23(1), pages 93-108, March.
    5. Amante, Ana & Vareda, João, 2010. "Improving consumer mobility in the mobile voice services market: a comprehensive set of remedies," 21st European Regional ITS Conference, Copenhagen 2010: Telecommunications at new crossroads - Changing value configurations, user roles, and regulation 2, International Telecommunications Society (ITS).
    6. Ruiz-Aliseda, Francisco, 2016. "When do switching costs make markets more or less competitive?," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 121-151.
    7. Wei Yin & Kent Matthews, 2016. "The determinants and profitability of switching costs in Chinese banking," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(43), pages 4156-4166, September.
    8. Miah, Mohammad Dulal & Kabir, Md. Nurul & Safiullah, Md, 2020. "Switching costs in Islamic banking: The impact on market power and financial stability," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 28(C).
    9. Fourberg, Niklas, 2023. "Let's lock them in: Collusion under consumer switching costs," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    10. Stefan Hellmer, 2010. "Switching Costs, Switching Benefits and Lock-In Effects — The Reregulated Swedish Heat Market," Energy & Environment, , vol. 21(6), pages 563-575, October.
    11. Walter Beckert & Paolo Siciliani, 2018. "Protecting Vulnerable Consumers in "Switching Markets"," Birkbeck Working Papers in Economics and Finance 1808, Birkbeck, Department of Economics, Mathematics & Statistics.
    12. Magnus Lundin & Nils Gottfries & Charlotte Bucht & Tomas Lindström, 2009. "Price and Investment Dynamics: Theory and Plant‐Level Data," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 41(5), pages 907-934, August.
    13. Mark J. Tremblay, 2019. "Platform Competition and Endogenous Switching Costs," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 19(4), pages 537-559, December.
    14. Mitja Kovač & Ann-Sophie Vandenberghe, 2015. "Regulation of Automatic Renewal Clauses: A Behavioural Law and Economics Approach," Journal of Consumer Policy, Springer, vol. 38(3), pages 287-313, September.
    15. Stephen Littlechild, 2020. "An Overall Customer Satisfaction score for GB energy suppliers," Working Papers EPRG2027, Energy Policy Research Group, Cambridge Judge Business School, University of Cambridge.
    16. Ioana A. Duca & José M. Montero & Marianna Riggi & Roberta Zizza, 2017. "I will survive. Pricing strategies of financially distressed firms," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 1106, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    17. Javier D. Donna, 2021. "Measuring long‐run gasoline price elasticities in urban travel demand," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 52(4), pages 945-994, December.
    18. Wing Man Wynne Lam, 2017. "Switching Costs in Two-Sided Markets," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 65(1), pages 136-182, March.
    19. Donna, Javier D., 2018. "Measuring Long-Run Price Elasticities in Urban Travel Demand," MPRA Paper 92233, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Jitsuzumi, Toshiya, 2015. "Recent Development of Net Neutrality Conditions in Japan: Impact of Fiber Wholesale and Long-term Evolution (LTE)," 26th European Regional ITS Conference, Madrid 2015 127152, International Telecommunications Society (ITS).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    switching costs; electricity markets; Shy's method; Salies' method; Sweden;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L1 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-22-00877. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: John P. Conley (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.