September 11, 2020

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Regulatory inquiries and Royal Commissions continue to identify poor practices by firms delivering essential and complex services, resulting in consumer detriment. Yet in many of these markets there is little information available to consumers to enable them to differentiate companies by the quality of their service, reflecting a key information asymmetry.Where consumers cannot pick ‘lemons’ from ‘peaches’, firms do not face competitive pressure to improve their service offering. 

This report provides a summary of the findings from a collaborative research project between RMIT’s BehaviouralBusiness Lab and the Consumer Policy Research Centre. This research has produced unique empirical data about the value of service quality and how it affects consumer choice in the context of the Victorian retail energy market.*

This project adopted a multi-stage, iterative and self-validating approach to first develop a prototype measure of service quality, and then to test whether service quality information affects consumer choice in an experimental setting and if so, how it affects choices.

Project Aims 

This collaborative research project with RMIT’s Behavioural Business Lab sought to understand what aspects of customer service consumers considered most important in the context of the Victorian energy market. From these insights, we develop and then tested a prototype measure of service quality. 

We aimed to identify whether:

• Consumers consider aspects other than price are important when assessing energy companies, and to examine how valuable consumers consider these non-price aspects.
• Consumers with different decision-making styles seek different kinds of information and respond differently to that information.
• Consumers make different choices about energy providers when service quality information is made available.
• Consumers are more likely to choose companies with a higher service quality rating when service quality information is made available.

*The views and recommendations expressed in this report reflect those of CPRC.

August 28, 2020

 CPRC has previously provided submissions to a number of CDR consultation processes that are relevant to the Consultation Paper, most notably: 

• ACCC consultation paper on the Economy Wide Rules Framework 
• ACCC consultation paper on Data Access Models for Energy Data 
• Australian Treasury issues paper on Future Directions for the Consumer Data Right 

Building off this past engagement, this submission outlines issues for the ACCC to consider when developing the energy rules framework (the “Rules”). In particular – this submission focuses on three areas relevant to the Rules: 

1. Data sets and consumer experience 
2. Building inclusivity into the design of CDR in energy 
3. Privacy and consumer protections 

Download submission.

July 7, 2020

Led by CPRC Senior Research and Policy Manager, Ben Martin Hobbs and co-authored by CPRC Research and Policy Director, Emma O’Neill, the report draws together CPRC’s consolidated insights into the common experiences of older people across essential and important consumer markets. It identifies the priority approaches for policymakers to take forward, to improve consumer outcomes and better ensure markets work for people. As we respond to COVID-19 and consider what recovery looks like for consumers, it’s a unique time for connecting, reflection, creative thinking and change.

Download the report here. 

June 25, 2020

Download the summary here.

June 25, 2020

Download the full report here.

May 25, 2020

Our key message in responding to the Inquiry’s March 2020 Issues Paper is to emphasise that future directions for the CDR must continue to be envisaged as for the consumer, about the consumer, and seen from the consumer’s perspective. We also continue to recommend urgent economy-wide reforms to outdated protection frameworks – such as those proposed by the ACCC Digital Platforms Inquiry including reviews of the Privacy Act and ongoing reforms to the Australian Consumer Law1 – to provide consistency and protection for consumers (and markets), and embedding principles of fairness, safety, and privacy through consistent policy approaches and regulatory provisions for consumer data. 

Download the full submission here.

April 21, 2020

April 20, 2020

March 26, 2020

This submission draws from an evidence base of research and policy engagement by the CPRC. Our work in this area includes: two independent consumer data research reports, Consumer Data and the Digital Economy (2018) and A Day in the Life of Data (2019); experience advising policymakers and regulators through forums including the Open Banking Data Standards Body and the National Data Advisory Council; and ongoing interactions with CPRC’s Consumer Data Research Network (with membership spanning disciplinary research areas across AI, machine-learning, privacy, consumer behaviour, competition law, and consumer law). As well, in the past two years we have lodged public submissions to consultations including the ACCC’s Digital Platforms Inquiry; the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science’s AI Ethics Framework; and a number of responses in relation to the new Consumer Data Right legislation and associated instruments. 

In this submission, we first expand on three core recommendations reflecting on the broader policy environment and highlighting some of the central issues in relation to rights and needs of citizens and consumers in a data-driven society: 

• People should have agency over how technology affects their life choices, chances and trajectories; 

• Government should provide economy-wide protections for consumers and citizens; 

• Civil society should be equipped for balanced and inclusive policy debate and reform. 

Download the full submission here.

March 2, 2020

January 31, 2020

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January 30, 2020

Affordable, effective and quality care is essential to Australia’s ageing population and the growing number of older people choosing to age in place. The sector has seen a range of reforms in response to the Productivity Commission’s 2013 report, Caring for Older Australians. As a result of the Living Longer Living Better and Increasing Choice in Home Care reforms, home care is now assigned directly to the individual with the intent of enabling Home Care Package (HCP) recipients to control and better manage their own care, a Consumer Directed Care (CDC) model.

Introducing a CDC model for HCPs in an environment where older people face major changes to health, long term illness, cognitive decline, digital exclusion and/or social isolation creates a range of challenges. This has been reflected in the evidence put to the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety (ACRC) during hearings to date, raised in submissions, as well as the various reviews of in-home care.

Consumer choice in markets is most effective when:
• barriers to choice and decision-making (such as digital exclusion or financial distress) are reduced or removed
• information disclosed about the quality and price of the product is transparent, accessible and comprehensible
• comparisons can be made simply and easily between alternatives
• costs of switching between providers is minimised both in terms of time or financial costs
• consumers are aware of how to access, assess and act on the available information, tools and supports.

Our study builds on the largely qualitative evidence presented to the ACRC to date, exploring the evidence base for some of these issues across the broader community through a larger quantitative
Computer-Assisted Telephone Interview (CATI) survey of 502 Australians accessing HCPs. Our questionnaire was also directly informed by the University of South Australia’s Financial Capabilities of Older Australians report and structured around CPRC’s Five Preconditions of Effective Consumer Engagement conceptual framework.

We offer a range of insights into the barriers experienced by older Australians and their carers in accessing, evaluating and getting home care services. This is followed by a series of recommendations for change to improve the delivery of HCPs, drawing on the priorities of those we surveyed and our analysis of the research findings.

Download the full report here and media release here.