The company is wholly owned by Nottingham City Council. Its role is to provide low-cost energy to households and address fuel poverty. It provides special tariffs to residents within the boundaries of Nottingham City Council and provides a socially orientated pricing structure to the whole of the UK. The company operates on a not-for-profit basis by keeping overheads as low as possible, and does not pay bonuses to directors. Any profits made are reinvested. The chair of the company's board is a Nottingham councillor. As a publicly owned energy company, the business aims to "champion the average person on the street, and make decisions that are morally and ethically right rather than trying to please shareholders". The company specialises in prepayment meters, as customers with these meters generally can least afford energy, are in fuel poverty or are some of the most vulnerable customers, but are proportionally charged more for it. The company has previously declined to increase these prices for those customers even though costs were increasing.
History
When Robin Hood Energy was launched in 2015 it was the UK's first publicly owned not-for-profit energy company. None had existed since the UK energy system was nationalised in 1948 under the Electricity Act 1947 and subsequently privatised in 1990 under the Electricity Act 1989. A number of employees were transferred from Nottingham City Council to Robin Hood Energy in February 2017. The council retained liability for 80% of those employees' pension costs. In the year to 31 March 2018, the company had 99 employees and made a small operating profit for the first time: the after-tax amount was £202,000 on turnover of £70.4m. In July 2018, the company announced that its electricity supplied to UK homes and businesses would be 100% renewable and it would also voluntarily enter into the Warm Home Discount scheme, which offers the elderly a payment of £140 over the winter period to help with fuel bills. This is only mandatory for energy companies with more than 250,000 customers; Robin Hood Energy has a customer base half the size of this, but voluntarily began to offer the Warm Home Discount from 2018. In January 2019, the business was rated as second best in the UK for customer service as part of the annual Which? survey. As of January 2019, Robin Hood Energy had 130,000 customers. In September 2019, they failed to pass on £9.5m in renewable energy subsidies to Ofgem, the industry regulator, which they had already collected from their customers. The Ofgem director implied that failure to settle this debt could mean losing their licence. Payment was made to Ofgem the next month, after the company obtained a £9.5m interest-bearing loan from Nottingham City Council.
Partnerships
White-label contracts
A large part of the business's growth is through public sector endorsement rather than price comparison sites. The Robin Hood Energy model in Nottingham has been taken to a number of other areas of the UK through local authority and council partnerships. The business works with like-minded councils, with a range of political control and geographical locations, who have an agenda to tackle fuel poverty and address unfairness within the energy market. Robin Hood Energy is the licensed supplier to 10 other councils or private businesses:
White Rose Energy
Robin Hood Energy partnered with Leeds City Council to establish as of September 2016 White Rose Energy, an initiative to provide affordable energy to residents in Leeds and Yorkshire.
Ebico
Robin Hood Energy was announced on 10 March 2017 as the new supply partner for not-for-profit energy provider and registered social enterprise Ebico. This began a transition of Ebico customers who opted-in to be transferred to new Ebico Zero Tariffs provided by Robin Hood Energy. In the decision to opt for a relationship with Robin Hood Energy, Ebico stated "we wanted to ensure our supply partner shared the same values as us; something Robin Hood Energy does in its mission to provide its customers with low-cost energy." The decision by Ebico to end its partnership with its former supply partner SSE plc was due to SSE deciding to close Ebico's EquiGas/EquiPower tariffs to new sales. The partnership was welcomed by a number of prominent politicians including Jesse Norman MP, Minister for Energy and Industry; Dr. Alan Whitehead MP, Shadow Minister for Energy and Climate Change; and Callum McCaig MP, SNP Spokesperson on Energy.
