Homeowners in Spain urged to check shared energy bills as consumer group finds costly contracts

Owners in Spanish apartment blocks and urbanisations could be paying more in community fees than they need to, simply because nobody’s checked the energy contracts behind the lift, garage and communal lights. Consumer group OCU’s look at 100 shared bills found plenty of room to cut, although any saving would belong to the whole community.

Shared electricity bills had room to fall in most cases

Owners who’ve already hunted down a better deal for their own home may still be overlooking the electricity bill hidden inside their community fees (gastos de comunidad, the monthly charge owners pay towards shared costs). Those fees cover supplies including lifts, garages and communal lighting, and in some buildings central heating too.

Consumer group OCU (the Organisation of Consumers and Users) published its findings on Tuesday October 20 after analysing 85 electricity bills from communities of owners. In 84 per cent of them, the building could have cut its contracted power (the maximum electricity a supply can draw at any one time, which is paid for whether it’s used or not).

Trimming only the peak-hour power would save about €314 a year per supply on average, according to OCU. Over the last year, the buildings had used just 37 per cent of their contracted peak power and 35 per cent of their off-peak power on average, which points to many paying for capacity they rarely need. 

The gap to the dearest contracts topped €1,500 

OCU also worked through an example community with 6.93 kW of contracted power using 5,500 kWh a year. On the regulated PVPC tariff (the state-backed price that follows the wholesale market), it would pay about €1,231, compared with an average of €1,667 across the free-market contracts OCU analysed, a difference of about €436. 

However, the gap widened to more than €1,500 against the worst-priced communities. Free-market deals can beat PVPC, though OCU says they need close watching, with renewals usually coming round every year.

Shared gas heating cost 54 per cent more than the regulated tariff

Communities with central heating face a bigger number. OCU checked 15 gas bills, all on free-market contracts, against the TUR (the regulated gas tariff, reviewed every three months under a public formula). On average they were 54 per cent higher than TUR, and in several cases the cost came to nearly double. 

Switching to TUR would save a community using 133,000 kWh a year about €3,515 annually, according to OCU’s calculation, while one using 630,000 kWh could save about €16,274. Communities have been able to contract TUR since July 2024 whatever their consumption, as long as they’ve got systems to measure each home’s heating use (unless that’s technically impossible) and a favourable energy-efficiency inspection.

There’s a catch for this winter though. The government capped October’s rise in TUR, but OCU says that only defers it, with the difference expected to be recovered from April 2027, so it recommends comparing the full price that would have applied without the cap. It adds that fixed-price free-market deals signed months ago may be worth keeping until they renew.

Why the savings won’t land straight in owners’ pockets 

The figures are for the whole community, so individual fees won’t automatically fall. Any change would be for the community to decide, usually with the administrator (administrador de fincas, the professional who manages the building’s accounts) or the community president leading the way.

The study is also small, with just 85 electricity bills and 15 gas bills, all on free-market contracts, and OCU gives no further detail on how they were chosen. The gas examples involve big consumers too, so they’re illustrations rather than a promise.

What to ask the administrator or community president

A sensible first step is asking when the shared energy contracts and contracted power were last reviewed. OCU suggests one person or a small group takes charge of checking the gas and electricity contracts, keeps the invoices and compares tariffs every year, including TUR before winter.

Contracted power can be checked on the bills or in the electricity distributor’s web portal, which shows monthly and hourly detail. Buildings with a lift or another service that needs continuous supply can ask about a maximeter (a meter that records peak demand without cutting the supply) instead of a standard power-limiting breaker, so contracted power can be lowered more safely.

OCU also says to compare the total annual cost rather than just the price per kWh, including power charges, rental fees, maintenance, lock-in periods and penalties. So at the next owners’ meeting, it’s worth asking whether the community’s contracts still match what the building actually uses.