We recovered 12,450 PLN in a week for a bakery in Sopot
In March 2024, we entered a small bakery in Sopot that had been struggling with rising electricity costs for months. The owner, Mr. Andrzej, was convinced that high bills were simply the result of inflation and that nothing could be done about it. However, the numbers told a different story, and our audit showed that the actual state differed drastically from what appeared on the invoices from the supplier.
An analysis of invoices that caused sleepless nights
We started by reviewing documents from the last 14 months. The 'Złoty Róg' bakery on Bohaterów Monte Cassino Street paid an average of 8,432 PLN per month for electricity alone. Mr. Andrzej noticed that despite lower production in January and February, the bills did not decrease at all. This was the first alarm signal. We checked the technical parameters and the contracted power stated in the contract with the energy supplier. It quickly came to light that the bakery was paying for readiness to draw power that it was physically unable to use with its current machinery.
The analysis lasted exactly 2 hours and 14 minutes before we made our first diagnosis. It turned out that the billing system showed three draw points, while in reality, the bakery only used one main meter. The other two had been inactive since a renovation in December 2022, but fixed and subscription fees for them were still being charged every month. This is a classic example of how a lack of invoice verification allows money to leak from a company without any economic justification. The actual state was: 427 days of paying for something that didn't exist.
To be honest, such mistakes happen more often than you think. Energy suppliers rarely inform you about overpayments or incorrect tariffs themselves because it's not in their financial interest. In the case of this specific bakery, the total of unnecessary fixed fees for inactive meters amounted to exactly 3,140 PLN for the entire period. However, this was just the tip of the iceberg, as the most serious error was hidden in the tariff itself, which Mr. Andrzej had no idea about when signing an annex to the contract a year earlier.
The numbers speak for themselves: 427 days of paying for inactive meters is a pure loss that no one had noticed before.
The wrong tariff and a 0.14 PLN difference on every kWh
The biggest burden for the bakery was the C11 tariff. This is a single-zone tariff where the price for electricity is constant 24 hours a day. For a company that consumes the most energy at night and in the early morning while baking bread, this is the worst possible choice. We analyzed the energy consumption profile at 'Złoty Róg' using recorders connected for 7 days. The results were clear: the bakery consumed 74% of its energy between 10:00 PM and 6:00 AM. In the C12a tariff, which offers cheaper energy at night, the same kilowatt-hours would have cost 0.14 PLN less.
The difference seems small, but with consumption at 5,200 kWh per month, the amounts add up quickly. The specific plan involved an immediate tariff change and applying for an invoice correction for the last six months, citing incorrect advice from the sales representative when signing the annex. The Pomeranian Audit Center prepared full technical documentation proving that the bakery's business profile had been the same for years and the C11 tariff was imposed without a needs analysis. It wasn't magic, just pure mathematics and knowledge of energy law.
The owner was in shock when we showed him the graphs. Savings in black and white averaged 728 PLN per month just from the tariff change alone. Over a year, that's over 8,700 PLN staying in the entrepreneur's pocket instead of the energy giant's account. At PCA, we don't play around with fluff – we showed Mr. Andrzej specific columns in the invoice where the supplier 'hid' these costs. Most entrepreneurs just pay the bills because they believe they are indisputable. We prove that an invoice is just a proposal that is always worth checking for technical errors.
Recovering 12,450 PLN in 6 working days
After gathering the evidence and preparing the complaint letters, we sent the documents to the supplier on Monday morning. We didn't wait the standard 30 days for their response. Thanks to our contacts in billing departments and pinpointing errors in the price list, the case gained momentum. By Thursday, we received confirmation of the complaint acceptance for the inactive meters and consent to transfer the overpayment resulting from the incorrect contracted power assignment. The entire process took us less than a working week, which was an absolute record for Mr. Andrzej.
The total refund amount, which hit the bakery's account the following Tuesday, was exactly 12,450.60 PLN. This consisted of refunds for distribution fees, unjustly collected subscription fees, and a correction for the last 4 billing months in the wrong tariff. This was an amount that allowed the owner to pay off two leasing installments for a new convection oven and still had a reserve left for raw materials. The actual state after our audit: the company became profitable almost overnight, without raising bread prices for the residents of Sopot.
At PCA, we believe in results, not promises. This case shows that an audit is not an expense, but an investment with a very fast rate of return. For the 'Złoty Róg' bakery, our fee was a fraction of the recovered amount, meaning the service paid for itself within the first three days. Perhaps your company also has such 'dead meters' or tariffs that are draining the budget. You won't know until someone from the outside looks at your bills without emotion but with a lot of knowledge about how energy concerns operate.
Complaint accepted in 6 days. A 12,450 PLN refund allowed for leasing repayment and improved the company's financial liquidity.
How to check an electricity invoice yourself?
You don't have to be an expert to catch the biggest mistakes. First, check the 'Contracted Power' field on the invoice. If your company has contracted power at 40 kW but you only consume 18 kW at peak, you are paying for empty watts every month. This is the most common mistake in smaller companies that once had more devices but now work on modern, energy-efficient equipment. One phone call to an electrician with a meter is enough to check the real consumption and submit an application to reduce the contracted power, which lowers the bill by several dozen zlotys a month immediately.
The next step is to analyze the time zones. Look at the 'Active Energy' columns and see at what hours you clock up the most units. If you run a restaurant, a car workshop, or production, a single-zone tariff almost never pays off. Check if your supplier is charging you fees for reactive energy. If you see 'inductive reactive energy fee' on the invoice, it means your machines are feeding energy back into the grid and you are paying penalties for it. Installing a simple reactive power compensation system usually pays for itself in 7-9 months.
One last piece of advice: watch contract deadlines. Many companies fall into the trap of so-called 'reserve pricing' after a fixed-term contract expires. Reserve pricing can be up to 40% higher than the market price. Mr. Andrzej from Sopot didn't know about this either until we looked at his documents. If you don't have time for such analyses, the Pomeranian Audit Center will do it for you. Remember that every day of delay is real money that could have stayed in your company. Check your savings plan in 48h and stop overpaying for supplier errors.
