Price-quality path for Watercare

We are setting the first price-quality path for Watercare (PQP28) under Part 4 of the Commerce Act. It will apply when the Charter ends in mid-2028.

Under a price-quality path we can set the maximum amount of money that Watercare can recover from consumers, and the quality of service they need to provide for that money. We can also set a minimum amount of money they can recover, if we think this helps consumers in the long term.

A price-quality path works with other components of economic regulation, like information disclosure (ID) that requires Watercare to publish information that lets stakeholders understand whether it's delivering the quality of service it must.

On 25 June 2026 we published our Emerging Views Paper on PQP28 and the Supporting Financial Model. This paper sets out our emerging views on the key decisions needed to establish the price-quality path.

On 7 July 2026, we published additional information and models to support our analysis presented in the Emerging Views Paper. This included the models used to estimate components of the cost of capital (beta values, risk-free rate, and a regression model on water production and electricity consumption to Auckland’s gross domestic product). Watercare requested the release of this information and these models. Certain Bloomberg data has been redacted because the terms of our Bloomberg licence do not permit us to publish it.

We received submissions and cross-submissions on the paper. You can view these documents on the Project Timeline below.

Input methodologies 

Regulatory certainty and predictability are important. As outlined in our Approach Paper and Emerging Views Paper we consider the regulatory regime and long-term benefit of consumers are better served if we defer considering whether to set any input methodologies applying to Watercare until after setting PQP28, as permitted under the Commerce Act.