Why TPI regulation is happening
For two decades the UK has relied on a curious regulatory asymmetry in business energy: licensed suppliers have been heavily regulated, with conduct standards, complaint-handling rules and binding ombudsman remedies, while the consultancies and intermediaries that arrange the contracts on behalf of customers have been largely unregulated. An estimated 2,700 third-party intermediaries operate in the UK business energy market. Until very recently, none of them required a licence, none were required to disclose commissions, and the few that misbehaved faced little more than reputational consequences.
The political case for change built steadily through the 2022 energy crisis, when complaints to the Energy Ombudsman about TPI conduct rose sharply and the Citizens Advice consumer-affairs unit published evidence of significant consumer harm in the small-business segment. The Government's 2023 call for evidence on TPI regulation drew responses from suppliers, customer-representative bodies and the more responsible end of the intermediary sector itself, almost all in favour of formal regulation. The October 2025 consultation response confirmed Ofgem as the future regulator and set out the implementation pathway.
The current disclosure regime
The first concrete step has already been taken. Since 2024, Ofgem licence conditions on suppliers — not on intermediaries directly — require any TPI placing a contract with a UK licensed supplier to provide written commission disclosure to the customer before contract signature. The disclosure must include both the cash amount of commission and, where the commission is built into a unit-rate uplift, the equivalent in pence per kWh.
The mechanism is supplier-mediated: the supplier collects the disclosure from the TPI and is responsible for ensuring it reaches the customer. Suppliers face licence-condition consequences for non-compliance; the TPI itself faces consequences only indirectly, via the supplier's refusal to onboard them as a sales channel.
The disclosure regime has produced visible improvement in the standard of paperwork on contract signature. It has been less effective in policing the TPIs that operate around the edges of the supplier-direct market — for example, those who target customers nearing contract expiry, secure verbal agreement, and treat written disclosure as a last-stage formality. That is the gap the 2027 register is intended to close.
The 2027 register: what we know
The implementation timeline confirmed in the 2025 consultation response is:
- 2026: Ofgem conducts a survey of the UK TPI population and develops the registration framework. The framework will set the conduct standards, the ADR (Alternative Dispute Resolution) requirements, and the financial-fitness tests for intermediaries. This work is in progress at the time of writing.
- 2027: subject to parliamentary timing, the TPI register opens. From the opening date, it will be a matter of policy that suppliers may not pay commission to any intermediary not on the register; in practice this means non-registered TPIs are excluded from the market.
- 2028 onwards: full enforcement. Ofgem will hold direct enforcement powers against registered TPIs — including fines, registration suspension, and removal from the register. ADR membership will be mandatory.
The register will not be voluntary. The legal underpinning is being placed in primary legislation, and the policy intent is clear that participation in the UK business energy intermediary market will require registration and ongoing compliance.
Four questions to ask any consultant today
Until the register opens, the formal floor under intermediary conduct remains low. The customer's protection is largely self-help — choosing a consultant whose practices already match the regime that is coming. The four questions to ask any consultant before signing a Letter of Authority:
- Are you aligned with the principles of the TPI Code of Practice? The voluntary TPI Code of Practice has been in force since 2022 and reflects the conduct expectations Ofgem is most likely to formalise. As of January 2026, of an estimated 2,700+ UK business energy intermediaries, only around 52 had become signatories — that is roughly 2% of the market. Ask whether the consultant operates to the Code's principles and how they evidence it. (The number of consultancies that can give a credible answer is small. We are one of them — we operate to the Code's principles in our procurement and casework practice, although as the Code is voluntary, formal "signatory" status is a separate badge that is itself being phased out by the move to formal registration.)
- Will you disclose commission on every quote, in cash and p/kWh? Not just on the winning quote. A genuine tender produces multiple quotes with different commission levels — sometimes the lowest unit-rate quote also carries the highest commission, which can mean a competing quote with lower commission would have been better for the customer overall. Demanding line-item disclosure on every quote forces the consultant to optimise for the customer rather than for their own commission.
- How many suppliers do you tender to, and which ones? A whole-of-market tender means at least eight or nine credible suppliers; for half-hourly portfolios that figure can be higher. Anything fewer than five suggests preferred-supplier bias, often driven by commercial relationships the customer will never see. Ask for the supplier panel in writing.
- Are you a member of an ADR scheme? Where things go wrong — in a tender, in a contract switch, in an audit — the customer needs an external resolution route that is not the consultant's own complaints procedure. The Energy Ombudsman handles complaints against suppliers; Utilities ADR and the Consumer Council for Northern Ireland handle others; an increasing number of intermediaries have voluntarily joined an ADR scheme in anticipation of mandatory ADR membership in 2027/28. Ask which scheme.
How procurement will change after registration
For customers signing supply contracts in 2026 and 2027 — before the register opens — the practical risks of choosing an unregistered intermediary are mostly behavioural and contractual. The structural risks become acute once the register is operating.
From 2027/28, expect:
- Suppliers will systematically refuse to deal with non-registered intermediaries. The licence condition on suppliers will be tightened to require it. A customer who has signed a long-term Letter of Authority with an intermediary that subsequently fails to register, or is removed from the register, may find themselves needing to migrate the LOA mid-term.
- Contract length matters. A 36-month supply contract signed in 2026 with an intermediary's commission baked into the unit rate runs into the mid-2029 period. If that intermediary is no longer registered by then, the supplier may refuse to continue paying commission, the unit rate adjustment for the customer is contractually unclear, and disputes are likely.
- Exit rights in LOAs become important. Customers signing LOAs in 2026 should ensure they include termination rights linked to the intermediary's registration status — i.e. the LOA terminates automatically if the intermediary fails to register or is removed from the register.
None of this is reason to delay signing supply contracts. It is a reason to be selective about who you sign LOAs with and to ensure the contracts and LOAs are drafted with regulatory transition in mind.
What "aligned with the TPI Code" should mean
The phrase "aligned with the TPI Code" is one we use carefully. It does not mean "signatory" — that is a specific status with the trade body that administers the Code and we encourage anyone considering a consultant to check the published signatory list rather than rely on assertions. It does mean that the practices the Code formalises are followed in our day-to-day procurement and compliance work. Specifically:
- Whole-of-market tendering — a published supplier panel that includes all the major UK retail and B2B suppliers, with no exclusivity arrangements.
- Transparent commission disclosure on every quote, before signature, in both cash and p/kWh terms.
- Time-limited, revocable Letters of Authority on terms the customer has approved.
- GDPR-aligned data handling — clear retention periods, no onward sale of customer data, and a data-subject access process that does not require legal escalation to invoke.
- Clear ADR route for complaints, separate from the customer's own complaints procedure.
- No high-pressure sales tactics — no fear-of-deemed-rate calls, no "sign today or lose the price" pressure, no unsolicited contract signature on the customer's behalf.
The combination of regulatory direction, contract-length implications and the historical opacity of the sector means that the choice of intermediary in 2026 is more consequential than at any point in the previous two decades. If you would like to discuss how we operate, or to ask any of the four questions above directly, please contact us and we will respond inside two working days.