Electric Ireland has announced that it will increase electricity and gas prices from April 1.
The supplier will increase residential electricity and gas prices by 4%,
This is expected to lead to an average annual increase of €38.40 to electricity bills and €29.88 to gas.
The supplier has cited rising wholesale energy prices, in particular, gas, as the reason for the hike.
Daragh Cassidy, Head of Communications at price comparison and consumer website bonkers.ie said: “Last November Electric Ireland promised to freeze its prices over the winter months when many of its competitors had already increased theirs, so there was an inevitability about today’s announcement.
"Electric Ireland is now the second energy supplier to announce a price hike in 2019 after Bord Gáis Energy announced an increase earlier this month. But as Ireland's largest electricity supplier in terms of customer numbers, this increase will be felt far and wide by consumers.”
This is the second price increase from Electric Ireland in just over six months. The supplier increased prices by 6.2% for electricity and 8% for gas just last August.
Electric Ireland currently has over 1.1 million electricity customers and almost 140,000 gas customers according to latest figures from the Commission for Regulation of Utilities.
