Regulators overseeing the electricity market across Australia's east coast, have released their draft prices for the next financial year.
More than a million residential customers on default offers will be impacted first.
The majority of customers on discounted market retail rates will feel the pinch when their contracts expire.
Gavin Dufty from St Vincent De Pauls explains.
"The default market offer is the most expensive so it's gone up nineteen to twenty four per cent. The market offers which are a lot cheaper, will likely rise at a greater rate than the default offer because they just coming from a lower base."
The surge is driven by the impact of the war in Ukraine on global supply, and outages across power stations in Australia.
The federal government's market intervention last year [[2022]], limiting coal and gas prices, did have an effect according to Clare Savage from the Australian Energy Regulator.
The regulator controls prices in South East Queensland, New South Wales and South Australia.
"The interventions in the coal and gas market has actually reduced price expectations this year. Contract prices have fallen by 50%. And that's why our decision today is 20 to 22% instead of 40 to 50%."
Energy Minister Chris Bowen says the fall in price expectations justifies the government's response.
