John McCluskey

Have you heard of bill smoothing? No, it’s not the guy who played the aging rocker in Love Actually* or the singer of hits like Lean On Me and Ain’t No Sunshine**. Bill smoothing is the antidote to bill shock. Bill shock is what happens when you get a big bill or, even worse, several… Read More

Google has been everywhere for a while now. As by far the dominant search engine globally, just about everyone who has ever connected to the internet has used Google. Many people use it every day, and it’s now more than a decade* since it became quite literally synonymous with looking up information on the world… Read More

A couple of weeks ago, the Friday before Australia Day, we had blackouts in Victoria after the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) ordered load shedding as the high demand for electricity on a sweltering hot day put an undue strain on the network. Around midday, the chief executive of the AEMO, Audrey Zibelman, announced that… Read More

According to the Government’s Scamwatch website, Australians lost $340 million to scammers in 2017. While phone scams remain the most prevalent, as you can see by the most recent monthly figures here, between 25 and 40 per cent of scams reported are email ones. Collectively, these sorts of scams are known as “phishing”. What is… Read More

As we head into 2019, you could easily be convinced that energy prices will be going down. All you’d have to do is pay attention to the Prime Minister, who has been in the news recently claiming a victory over rising energy prices and telling anyone who’ll listen that his government has forced prices down…. Read More

As we farewell 2018, it’s hard to put the past 12 months into perspective – other than to say that this year wasn’t as tumultuous for the Australian energy market as 2017 was (hard to believe as that may be). To ring in 2019, let’s look forward with optimism and positivity. Here are some energy-related… Read More