Origin sells gas in most states where reticulated gas exists, bundles it with electricity and internet, and runs an Everyday Rewards tie-in. All of that is real and none of it is the important question.
The important question for a household with solar is whether you should be on gas at all. Answer that first, then pick a retailer. For the broader retailer comparison, see our Complete Guide.
The Gas Question Comes Before the Gas Plan
A gas connection carries its own daily supply charge, typically 70 cents to a dollar a day, entirely separate from your electricity supply charge. That is $250 to $365 a year before you burn anything.
For a household using gas heavily, for ducted heating through a Melbourne winter and hot water for four people, that fixed cost is spread across enough usage to make sense.
For a household down to a cooktop and little else, it does not. Plenty of people pay several hundred dollars a year in supply charges for a gas hob they could replace with induction, and never do the arithmetic because the charge is buried in a bill they glance at.
Do the arithmetic. Look at your last four gas bills, separate the supply charge from the usage charge, and ask what the usage is actually buying you.
Where Solar Changes It
A household with a decent array has cheap electricity in the middle of the day and gas at a fixed rate all day.
That shifts the economics of every gas appliance. A heat pump hot water system running on your own generation costs close to nothing to operate. A gas hot water system costs the same whatever your roof is doing. Reverse-cycle heating running on solar during the day is cheaper to run than ducted gas, and it works as cooling in summer, which gas does not.
Victoria has banned reticulated gas connections in new homes, and other jurisdictions are moving the same way. That direction of travel matters for a decision with a fifteen-year appliance life attached to it.
None of this means ripping out working appliances. It means that when the gas hot water unit fails, the default replacement should not automatically be another gas one.
What Origin Actually Offers on Gas
Assuming you are staying on gas, here is what is on the table.
Bundling. Origin has won Canstar Blue awards for bundled energy and telecommunications in 2023 and 2024. Combining gas, electricity and internet typically produces a monthly discount on the internet plan or on the energy account.
The saving is real. Weigh it against the fact that bundling makes switching harder, and switching is where most energy savings come from. A bundle discount that costs you the willingness to compare plans annually is not a saving.
Everyday Rewards. Points on energy spend, redeemable at Woolworths, plus fuel discounts up to 10 cents a litre.
Worth something if you shop there anyway. Worth nothing if you do not, and it should not decide a plan.
Sign-up offers. Bonus points or credits that appear and disappear. Treat them as what they are: marketing spend that does not change the underlying rates you will pay for the following decade.
Connections and Moving
Origin's Moves Promise commits to connection by the next business day if you book online before 1pm on a weekday, with a daily credit if they miss it.
That is a useful commitment if you are moving. It applies to both electricity and gas.
Connecting gas to a new build requires a meter installation, which involves the distributor rather than the retailer and takes longer. Start it early.
Managing the Account
Online portal and app for usage tracking, bills, payments and plan details.
Standard across the industry now. What is worth using rather than admiring is the usage data: gas consumption by billing period tells you whether your heating or your hot water is the larger load, which is the number that decides which appliance to replace first when one of them fails.
Understanding the Bill
Gas bills have the same structure as electricity: a daily supply charge, a usage charge per megajoule, and any concessions or discounts applied.
Two things to check.
Whether your usage rate is tiered. Many gas tariffs charge a higher rate for the first block of consumption each billing period and less above it, which makes low-usage households pay more per unit than heavy ones. If you use little gas, that structure works against you and reinforces the case for disconnecting.
Whether you are receiving your concession. State gas concessions exist for eligible households and they drop off after account changes more often than they should.
Safety
If you smell gas or suspect immediate danger, call 000.
For outages and faults, the distributor rather than the retailer owns and maintains the network. Origin's site has a postcode lookup to identify yours, and that is who you call for a supply problem rather than a billing one.
The Practical Answer
If you use gas heavily, Origin is a credible option and the bundling is a genuine advantage where you want the other services. Compare it on total annual cost through Energy Made Easy using your own consumption, not on the rewards.
If your gas usage has fallen to a cooktop and a hot water unit approaching the end of its life, the more valuable conversation is not which gas plan to choose. It is whether the next appliance you replace should run on the electricity your roof already generates.
