Energy companies' various plans and conditions aren't as infamously complicated as private health insurance but they're of the same school: maximise revenue; keep customers by keeping them in the dark.

The major power companies' default mode is to treat loyal, long-term customers as complete mugs. It's fallen to the ACCC to remind consumers that all the energy retailers offer discounts if a customer bothers to ask. Don't ask and you'll pay the mug's price.

It's going the next step, finding the best deal, where the pursuit of cheaper power becomes complicated.

Life is short and comparison shopping tedious, so if the energy retailers run systems that even the comparison sites don't quite understand, there's a fair chance consumer inertia will mean many customers give up trying and stick with the incumbent.

Driven by the aforementioned sticker shock, your newly-humbled columnist has discovered he has been guilty of paying "lazy tax" by not asking for a discount. He has also discovered that the comparison sites can't agree on which retailer has the best deal.

For my postcode and requirements, the federal government's ironically-named Energy Made Easy site found 77 electricity offers with estimated annual costs ranging from $997 to $2,659 for a medium level of electricity use. A company called QEnergy scored as the cheapest. The best offers from the two dominant Sydney players, AGL and Origin, were $118 and $168 more respectively.

The best estimate by Mozo.com.au was an annual bill of $1,792 from Dodo Power & Gas, with QEnergy close behind at $1,836.

Canstar blue gave the cheapest estimate to Simplyenergy with $1021.77 but on "customer satisfaction and annual cost" Red Energy was the site's recommendation at $1166.52. Origin's "Maximiser Online Bonus" fell between the two at $1131.41. QEnergy's offering had not been rated yet.

And then there were the meerkats at Comparethemarket.com.au. They played the big companies' favourite game of comparing apples with oranges. The site - and a follow-up phone call - painted AGL as having the best offer with a "24 per cent discount". The trick here is what the discount is on - AGL's usage rate is higher to begin with than, for example, Origin's, which offers a 22 per cent discount.

Red Energy, Canstar's favourite, was dissed on the site for offering a discount of only 10 per cent and, over the phone, for having a high usage charge as well.

Different comparison sites can reasonably make different assumptions about what my "medium" electricity use might be, but that would only partly explain the wide variation in some recommendations. And I've kept this example relatively simple by not doing a combined gas and electricity test.

So after four comparison sites and no two agreeing, realising I'd probably have to fill out a form or something and arrange a new direct debit approval if I changed supplier - I'm turning off the computer, and lights, and going to bed.