Pinergy Review Ireland 2026
Pinergy pitches prepay electricity as a smart product: a smart meter, usage data every 30 minutes, top-ups from your phone. We put that pitch against its own tariff sheet. The app side holds up — it is the best usage tool of any Irish prepay supplier. The money side does not. At CRU typical usage, Pinergy’s own published annual figure is €2,219.97 in an urban home on the standard rate, a 41c-a-day prepayment service charge sits on top of the standing charge, unit rates go up another 7.6% on 14 September 2026, and walking away early costs €150 ex VAT — triple what most bill-pay brands charge.
Pinergy review: key takeaways
- ✓Pinergy’s published Estimated Annual Bill at CRU typical usage (4,200 kWh) is €2,219.97 urban and €2,250.29 rural on the standard 24-hour rate — before the 7.6% rise that lands on 14 September 2026.
- ✓New pay-as-you-go customers get 10% off unit rates for 12 months plus €110 welcome credit, bringing the published year-1 urban figure to €2,051.74. After month 12 you revert to the standard rate.
- ✓A prepayment service charge of 41c a day ex VAT — roughly €163 a year including VAT — is charged on top of the normal standing charge. That is the line the "smart" marketing never leads with.
- ✓The early exit charge is a flat €150 ex VAT for residential connections, the steepest of the nine suppliers we review. Most bill-pay brands quote around €50 per fuel.
- ✓The smart layer is genuinely good: balance and usage in the app every 30 minutes, €10 emergency credit, friendly credit on evenings and weekends, and top-up by app, online, phone or Payzone shop.
- ✓Pinergy sells electricity only — no gas, no dual fuel — so a gas-heated home will always need a second supplier.
- checkGenuinely good smart-meter app — balance and usage data every 30 minutes
- check€10 emergency credit plus friendly credit on evenings and weekends
- checkTop-up by app, online, phone or any Payzone shop
- check10% unit-rate discount and €110 welcome credit for new PAYG sign-ups
- checkNo credit check and no deposit to get connected
- closeAll-in prepay cost runs well above a discounted bill-pay tariff
- closeA 41c/day prepayment service charge sits on top of the standing charge
- close€150 ex VAT early exit charge — triple the €50 most bill-pay brands quote
- closeUnit rates rise 7.6% from 14 September 2026, the second rise in a year
- closeElectricity only — gas has to stay with another supplier
How Pinergy scored
Six categories, scored from published rates and Estimated Annual Bills, contract terms, billing behaviour and complaint records — never a supplier brochure.
Pinergy at a glance
Plans and estimated annual bills
Estimated Annual Bills (EAB) at CRU typical usage — 4,200 kWh electricity, 11,000 kWh gas — including standing charges, PSO (electricity), carbon tax (gas) and 9% VAT. Urban (DG1) figures; rural (DG2) standing charges are higher. Year 1 is with the new-customer discount, year 2 is the standard rate the same plan lands on. A dash means we have not verified the figure this week — we never invent one.
| Plan | Fuel | Meter | Payment | Year-1 EAB (urban) | Year-2 EAB (urban) | Exit fee / fuel | Checked |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pay As You Go Smart (new-customer offer) | Electricity | Prepay (PAYG) | Prepay | €2,052 | €2,220 | €150 | 2026-08-28 |
| Pay As You Go Smart (standard 24h) | Electricity | Prepay (PAYG) | Prepay | €2,220 | €2,220 | €150 | 2026-08-28 |
| Pay As You Go NightSaver | Electricity | NightSaver | Prepay | €2,094 | €2,094 | €150 | 2026-08-28 |
| Family Time (monthly pay, smart) | Electricity | Smart time-of-use | Bill pay | — | — | €150 | 2026-08-28 |
| Work from Home (monthly pay, smart) | Electricity | Smart time-of-use | Bill pay | — | — | €150 | 2026-08-28 |
Who it’s for
Pinergy suits households that need or want prepay — no credit check, no deposit, no bill shock — and will actually use the usage data to cut waste. If you are on a landlord-fitted Pinergy meter, or you budget week to week and a quarterly bill is genuinely unworkable, it does the job with better information than any rival prepay screen. If you can pass a credit check and hold a direct debit, the same 4,200 kWh costs meaningfully less on a discounted bill-pay tariff, and the €150 ex VAT exit charge makes Pinergy an expensive place to change your mind.
Get it if
- You need prepay — no credit check, no deposit — and want the best app and usage data any Irish prepay supplier offers.
- You budget week to week and would rather top up small amounts than face a quarterly bill.
- You are moving into a home with a Pinergy meter already fitted and want it working today with minimal fuss.
- You will genuinely use half-hourly data to shift and cut usage — the app only saves money if you act on it.
Skip it if
- You can pass a credit check — a discounted bill-pay tariff costs meaningfully less at the same usage.
- You want one supplier for electricity and gas — Pinergy sells no gas, so dual fuel is off the table.
- You might want out early — the €150 ex VAT exit charge is the steepest in the market.
- You are rate-sensitive right now — unit rates rise 7.6% on 14 September 2026, the second increase in eleven months.
What they sell
Pay As You Go electricity. The core product. A smart meter runs in prepay mode: you top up by app, online, phone or at a Payzone outlet, and the app shows your balance and usage every 30 minutes. €10 emergency credit is available from the meter, and friendly credit keeps you on supply during evenings and weekends if it runs out. New sign-ups currently get 10% off unit rates for 12 months and €110 in welcome credit.
Monthly-pay smart plans. Pinergy also sells billed smart-meter plans with time-of-use discounts — Family Time (40% off units 19:00 to midnight every day) and Work from Home (30% off units 09:00–17:00, Monday to Friday) — paid as a level monthly amount based on forecast usage. Pinergy does not publish annual-cost figures for these, so we have not verified what they come to at typical usage.
EV and solar. There is a home EV charging offer built on the smart plans, and a solar-panel installation business with an 18.5c/kWh export payment for microgeneration. Neither changes the core maths of the supply tariff, and the solar arm is a separate purchase decision we do not rate here.
Gas. Pinergy does not supply gas to households. If your heating is gas, you keep a second supplier for it — there is no dual-fuel discount to weigh, which at least keeps the comparison simple.
Our verdict
Take the marketing at face value and Pinergy is the modern one: while other prepay meters show you a shrinking number on a keypad, Pinergy’s app shows you half-hourly usage, lets you top up from the couch and nudges you about waste. On that axis the product delivers. In our testing of what Irish prepay actually feels like day to day — top-up friction, visibility, avoiding the midnight dash to a shop — Pinergy is the best of the specialists, and its Trustpilot record (around 4.5 from over 1,300 reviews) suggests the service behind it mostly holds up.
Then you read the tariff sheet, and the smartness gets expensive. The standard urban rate works out at €2,219.97 a year at typical usage by Pinergy’s own published figure — and that includes a prepayment service charge of 41c a day ex VAT layered on top of a 71.25c standing charge. Call it roughly €163 a year, including VAT, purely for the privilege of paying in advance. The new-customer offer softens year 1 to a published €2,051.74 with €110 of credit thrown in, but the discount dies at month 12 and the standard rate is rising 7.6% on 14 September 2026, the second increase in eleven months. A typical Pinergy home will be paying around €370 a year more than it was in autumn 2025.
The exit charge settles the verdict. Leaving mid-contract costs a flat €150 ex VAT — triple the €50-class fee most bill-pay brands quote, and the steepest of the nine suppliers we review. So the microscope shows a genuinely good app bolted to a dear tariff with the market’s heaviest door. If prepay is a requirement, Pinergy versus Prepay Power comes down to data versus reach: Pinergy has the better app and usage insight; Prepay Power has gas as well as electricity and a bigger footprint. If prepay is merely a preference, a discounted bill-pay tariff beats both, and that is the honest test result.
We test suppliers the same way regardless of how they brand themselves: the all-in annual cost at CRU typical usage (4,200 kWh) in year 1 and year 2, urban and rural, with every daily charge and levy counted; then contract terms, exit charges, billing experience and how green claims are evidenced. For Pinergy, that means treating "smart prepay" as a claim to verify against the tariff sheet, not a category of its own. Where Pinergy publishes an Estimated Annual Bill we use its figure and date it; where it publishes none, we print a dash rather than guess.
Other Irish energy suppliers we review
| Supplier | Score | Fuels | PAYG | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yuno Energy | 7.9 | Electricity + Gas | No | App-comfortable switchers chasing the lowest year-1 bill |
| Community Power | 7.4 | Electricity | No | Values-led electricity shoppers who will keep gas elsewhere |
| Energia | 7.3 | Electricity + Gas | No | Households that shop around every 12 months and want the deepest big-brand new-customer discount |
| Electric Ireland | 7.2 | Electricity + Gas | Yes | Never-switched homes that want a big, stable brand |
| SSE Airtricity | 7.1 | Electricity + Gas | No | Bill-pay switchers who want a large supplier that is not Electric Ireland or Bord Gáis |
| Bord Gáis Energy | 7.0 | Electricity + Gas | Yes | Gas-heated homes that want one bill |
| Flogas | 6.6 | Gas + Electricity | No | Existing Flogas gas households deciding whether to add electricity, go dual or leave |
| Prepay Power | 6.6 | Electricity + Gas | Yes | Households that need spend control or cannot pass a credit check |
Not sure which fits? Find your energy supplier in 30 seconds. matched.ie is not a CRU-accredited price-comparison site — for the regulated comparators, see CRU.ie.
Pinergy: frequently asked questions
How much does Pinergy cost per year?+
Pinergy’s own tariff sheet puts the Estimated Annual Bill at CRU typical usage (4,200 kWh) at €2,219.97 for an urban home and €2,250.29 rural on the standard 24-hour rate, including VAT, PSO and the prepayment service charge. New pay-as-you-go customers with the 10% discount are quoted €2,051.74 urban for year 1. Both figures pre-date the 7.6% rise arriving 14 September 2026, which Pinergy estimates at about €169 a year.
Is Pinergy putting up prices in 2026?+
Yes. Pinergy announced a 7.6% increase to residential unit rates from 14 September 2026, worth roughly €169 a year on a typical bill by its own estimate. Standing charges are unchanged. It follows an increase of about 13% in October 2025, so a typical Pinergy household will pay around €370 a year more than it did in autumn 2025. The company blames sustained wholesale-market volatility.
What is Pinergy’s exit fee if I switch away?+
Pinergy’s published early exit charge for residential connections is a flat €150 excluding VAT, on a schedule effective from September 2025, and its terms also allow a meter removal charge if you terminate inside the first 12 months. That is the steepest exit charge among the nine suppliers we review — most bill-pay brands quote around €50 per fuel. After your contract term ends, you can leave without a fee.
Does Pinergy sell gas?+
No. Pinergy supplies electricity only to households — there is no gas product and no dual-fuel bundle. If your home heats with gas, you keep a separate gas supplier and shop that fuel on its own merits. That is not automatically a bad thing: dual-fuel bundles are not always cheaper than two well-chosen single-fuel deals, but it does mean Pinergy can never be your one-bill answer.
What is the extra prepay service charge on Pinergy?+
On top of the normal standing charge (71.25c a day ex VAT urban), Pinergy’s tariff sheet lists a prepayment service charge of 41c a day ex VAT — about €163 a year once 9% VAT is added. It pays for the prepay metering service itself and it applies every day, whether you use electricity or not. This charge is the main reason prepay costs more than bill-pay at the same usage.
What happens if my Pinergy credit runs out?+
You can activate €10 of emergency credit from the meter keypad to stay on supply, which is repaid out of your next top-up. If credit runs out during evenings or weekends, friendly credit keeps the power on until the next working morning, so you are not cut off at midnight. Top-ups work through the Pinergy app, online, by phone, or in cash at Payzone outlets nationwide.
Is Pinergy cheaper than Prepay Power?+
They are priced in the same expensive neighbourhood — both carry higher unit rates plus a daily prepay service charge, and both raised prices in 2026 (Prepay Power by 8.8% on electricity from 1 June, Pinergy by 7.6% from 14 September). The real differences are product-shaped: Pinergy has the better app and half-hourly usage data but sells electricity only; Prepay Power also supplies gas. Compare both suppliers’ current published annual figures on the week you switch.
Is Pinergy really 100% renewable?+
Pinergy markets its electricity as 100% renewable. Like most such claims in Ireland, this is done by matching customer demand with renewable certificates over the year — it does not mean the electrons in your socket came from a Pinergy wind farm, because every home draws from the same national grid. It is a legitimate accounting claim, verified through fuel-mix disclosure, but weigh it as paperwork, not as a private green supply.