Business energy tariffs by industry

Two businesses with identical annual kWh consumption can need completely different energy contracts. What matters isn't just how much energy you use, but the shape of your load — when you use it, how spiky your peaks are, and how predictable your pattern is from week to week. That shape, known as a load profile, drives almost every meaningful decision in a business energy tender: which meter type applies, whether a fixed or flexible contract suits you, and how much capacity you should be paying for.

Shift patterns are one of the biggest drivers. A manufacturer running three shifts a day has a near-flat, round-the-clock load, while a school or office has a sharp weekday, term-time or 9-to-5 pattern with long dormant periods. Refrigeration duty cycles matter just as much — a takeaway's chillers, a pub's cellar cooling or a care home's cold-chain storage all run 24/7 regardless of trading hours, creating a base load that a generic tariff quote often misses entirely. Seasonal occupancy swings — a hotel's summer peak, a farm's harvest-time spike, a church's Sunday-only heating — add another layer that flat, averaged pricing can't account for.

Then there's the half-hourly (HH) metering threshold: once a site's annual consumption crosses a certain level, it moves from standard non-half-hourly (NHH) billing to mandatory half-hourly metering, which changes both how the contract is priced and what data your supplier needs. Getting all of this right — meter type, contract length and unit-rate structure matched to your actual profile — is the difference between a tariff that fits and one that quietly overcharges you every month. Browse your sector below for guidance built around exactly how businesses like yours use energy.