In brief

  • The tariff for the purchase of ancillary services falls to 12.72 lei/MWh from 1 October 2026. This is the component of the electricity bill out of which the reserves kept ready to hold the grid in balance are paid for. The previous level was 14.70 lei/MWh, so the difference is 1.98 lei/MWh, that is a fall of 13.5%.
  • Who is concerned. Every electricity consumer in Romania, from households to factories, because the tariff reaches the final bill through the supplier. It is collected by the National Electricity Transmission Company „Transelectrica” S.A., the operator of the transmission grid.
  • The figures and the time limits that count. 12.72 lei/MWh excluding VAT from 1 October 2026, against 14.70 lei/MWh, a level that applied for 273 days, from 1 January 2026. The order was published on Tuesday, 29 September 2026, and applies from Thursday, 1 October, so a single working day is left for updating the billing systems.
Act: Order of the President of the National Energy Regulatory Authority no. 60/2026 approving the tariff for the purchase of ancillary services for the National Electricity Transmission Company „Transelectrica” — S.A., applicable from 1 October 2026
Published: Official Gazette of Romania (Monitorul Oficial), Part I, no. 827 of 29 September 2026, page 8
In force from: 1 October 2026, under Article 4 of the order

The electricity bill gets slightly cheaper from 1 October 2026, and the saving comes from a line almost nobody reads. The National Energy Regulatory Authority has approved a tariff of 12.72 lei/MWh for the purchase of ancillary services, against 14.70 lei/MWh, the level in force since 1 January 2026. Ancillary services are the power reserves which the operator of the transmission grid buys from power stations and, more and more often, from large consumers, in order to hold frequency and voltage within the permitted limits. The same authority also built this summer the mechanism by which Transelectrica pays factories that cut their consumption at peak hours, a source of flexibility which goes into the same pot of costs.

The order has four articles and a single figure. Article 1 sets the tariff at 12.72 lei/MWh, Article 2 says who is to carry it out, Article 3 repeals Order no. 73/2025 of the president of the same authority, which had set 14.70 lei/MWh from 1 January 2026, and Article 4 sets the entry into force at 1 October 2026. The repeal and the entry into force fall on the same day, so there is neither an interval without a tariff nor a day on which two levels would apply.

The tariff is not paid directly by the consumer. It is charged by the transmission system operator, and suppliers include it in the final price, alongside the transmission tariff, the distribution tariff and the regulated contributions. On a household bill it usually appears under the heading „servicii de sistem”, ancillary services, in a table of the regulated components, or, in single-price contracts, not separately at all.

What it changes in practice

The gross difference is 1.98 lei for each megawatt hour consumed, excluding VAT. How much that comes to depends entirely on consumption, because the tariff is a unit price, with no fixed component.

A household consuming 100 kWh a month saves about 20 bani a month, a fifth of a leu, that is 2.38 lei a year. At 250 kWh a month, a consumption typical of a home with a family and plenty of appliances, the saving rises to around 50 bani a month and 5.94 lei a year. These are sums which change nobody’s budget, and any presentation of them as a visible cut in the price of electricity would be an exaggeration.

For industrial consumers the figure begins to matter. A company using 50 MWh a year pays 99 lei less. A medium-sized factory, with 20,000 MWh a year, saves 39,600 lei a year. On the scale of the whole system, every terawatt hour consumed means 1.98 million lei less collected through this component, and therefore also 1.98 million lei less available for buying balancing reserves.

The second effect is administrative and falls on suppliers. The tariff changes on 1 October, while the billing cycles of most suppliers do not begin on the 1st of the month. Consumption read for a period running past 30 September has to be split into two slices, charged at different rates. Suppliers had a single working day, Wednesday, 30 September 2026, in which to make the change in their billing systems.

What has changed compared with the previous situation

Until 30 September 2026 the rate applied was 14.70 lei/MWh, a level approved by Order no. 73/2025, published in the Official Gazette of Romania, Part I, no. 1173 of 18 December 2025. That order disappears completely, by repeal, not by amendment.

Seen over a longer stretch, this tariff is far from stable. The level approved by Order no. 21/2025 applied from 1 June 2025, for 92 days. It then rose to 12.79 lei/MWh from 1 September 2025, by Order no. 60/2025, and stayed there for 122 days. On 1 January 2026 it jumped to 14.70 lei/MWh, 1.91 lei/MWh more, that is a rise of 14.9%, and held for 273 days. Now it comes down to 12.72 lei/MWh. Four different levels in sixteen months.

The benchmark that clears things up is September 2025. The new tariff of 12.72 lei/MWh is 7 bani below the level of 12.79 lei/MWh in force thirteen months ago, so the rise of early 2026 is wiped out entirely and goes a further 0.5% below the starting point.

The rule by which the figure is worked out has changed too. Order no. 73/2025 invoked in its preamble the methodology approved by Order no. 116/2022, whereas the present order invokes the methodology approved by Order no. 12/2026. The 12.72 lei/MWh are therefore the first tariff for ancillary services calculated under the new methodology.

Advantages and disadvantages

What it improves

  • The cost falls for absolutely every electricity consumer, with no application, no form and no eligibility conditions.
  • The rise of 1.91 lei/MWh from January 2026 is wiped out entirely and goes a further 7 bani below the level of September 2025.
  • The act is short and self-contained: one figure, one date, one repeal. The repeal of the old order and the entry into force of the new one fall on the same day, so no interval is left unregulated.
  • The correction mechanism works in both directions. After a rise of almost 15% in January, the first application of the new methodology produces a fall, not a consolidation of the high level.

What remains a problem

  • Between publication and application there are two days, of which only one is a working day. The previous order, the one from December 2025, had left 14 days, that is seven times as much.
  • The order publishes the result, not the calculation. Neither the costs taken into account, nor the estimated quantities, nor the corrected deviations from the previous period appear in it.
  • Nothing in the text says how long the level of 12.72 lei/MWh lasts. The last four changes came at intervals of 92, 122 and 273 days, so practice offers no benchmark either.
  • For a household, the effect is of the order of 20 bani a month. The difference is real, but it is not felt.
  • Article 2 places the duty of carrying out the order on the transmission system operator and on the economic operators in the sector. The final consumer, the one who ultimately bears the tariff, appears nowhere, and nobody is obliged to inform him.

Practical advice

  1. Check the line „servicii de sistem”, ancillary services, on your October bill. If the period billed runs past 30 September 2026, two slices ought to appear, one at 14.70 lei/MWh and one at 12.72 lei/MWh.
  2. Work out the effect for yourself: multiply your annual consumption expressed in MWh by 1.98 lei. For monthly consumption in kWh, divide by 1,000 first.
  3. If you have a single-price contract, which includes all the components in one figure, the fall does not appear separately. Ask your supplier whether and how it is reflected in the price, because some contracts pass on the regulated tariffs at their real level while others freeze them for the term of the contract.
  4. Companies should read the clause in the supply contract dealing with changes in regulated tariffs. That is where you see whether the fall reaches you automatically or only at the next renegotiation.
  5. Remember that the figure of 12.72 lei/MWh is exclusive of VAT. On the bill it appears with the tax added on top, so the real saving is slightly larger than the result of the gross calculation.
  6. No application has to be lodged and no contract changes. It applies automatically, through the supplier.

Frequently asked questions

What exactly are ancillary services?
They are the reserves and technical services which the operator of the transmission grid buys in order to hold the frequency and the voltage of the grid within the permitted limits, when generation and consumption do not match exactly. They come from power stations which adjust their output quickly and, for some time now, from large consumers who cut their consumption on request. The cost of these purchases is recovered through the tariff approved by the present order.
By how much does my bill fall?
By 1.98 lei excluding VAT for each megawatt hour consumed. At 100 kWh a month that means around 20 bani a month and 2.38 lei a year. At 250 kWh a month, around 50 bani a month and 5.94 lei a year. At an industrial consumption of 20,000 MWh a year, 39,600 lei a year.
From when does it apply?
From 1 October 2026. Article 4 of the order sets that date expressly, and Article 3 repeals on the same day the previous order, which had set 14.70 lei/MWh.
Do I have to do anything to benefit?
No. The tariff is regulated and applies automatically to all consumers, through the supplier. There is no application, no deadline for lodging one and no eligibility condition.
Why has the tariff fallen?
The order does not explain. It publishes only the level approved, without the costs taken into account and without the estimated quantities. From the preamble, though, it can be seen that the basis of calculation has changed: the order invokes the methodology approved by Order no. 12/2026, whereas the order it replaces rested on the methodology of 2022.
How long does the level of 12.72 lei/MWh stay in force?
The text does not say. The tariff changes by a fresh order, whenever the regulatory authority decides. The previous levels held for 92, 122 and 273 days, so the interval is neither fixed nor annual.

Editorial analysis

As a legal text, the order is exemplary. Four articles, one figure, one date, a repeal falling exactly on the day of entry into force. It has no references that contradict each other, it leaves no category without a rule and it has no time limits that exclude one another. Its problems are not of drafting but of everything it chose not to publish.

The first observation cannot be seen by reading the act. Compared with the order it replaces, the window of notice has shrunk sevenfold. Order no. 73/2025 was published on 18 December 2025 for a tariff applicable from 1 January 2026, so 14 days of notice, in which suppliers were able to test the change. The present order appeared on 29 September 2026 for a tariff applicable from 1 October, so two calendar days, of which only one is a working day. When a tariff rises, short notice is a problem of cost. When it falls, it is a problem of fairness: the supplier who does not manage to make the change in time overcharges, and the difference is corrected later, if anybody remembers.

The second observation is about perspective. The figure will almost certainly be presented publicly as a fall of 13.5%, which is correct measured against January. Measured against September 2025, when the tariff stood at 12.79 lei/MWh, the 12.72 lei/MWh of today are 7 bani lower, that is half a per cent after thirteen months. This is not a price cut, it is a return to the starting point after a rise of 14.9% which lasted 273 days. Throughout that interval consumers paid 1.91 lei/MWh more than the level before the rise, and nothing in the present order explains why the correction comes only at the end of September.

The third observation is the most important and is invisible in the body of the act. The preamble invokes the methodology approved by Order no. 12/2026, whereas the repealed order rested on the methodology of 2022. The 12.72 lei/MWh are therefore the first tariff calculated under new rules. At the very moment the method changes, the public is given only the result. It cannot be established how much of the fall comes from lower balancing costs and how much from the fact that the sum is worked out differently.

What should be changed

  • The calculation should be published together with the tariff. An annex with the recognised costs, the estimated quantities and the correction of deviations from the previous period would turn the figure from a decision into a demonstration. Industrial consumers, who pay tens of thousands of lei a year through this component, would be able to challenge assumptions, not merely the result.
  • A minimum period between publication and application. The 14 days the order of December 2025 had are a reasonable benchmark. Two days, one of them a working day, practically guarantee wrong bills in the first month.
  • A declared horizon of validity in the text. The wording „applicable from 1 October 2026” gives the impression of a permanent level. A line saying until when it is valid, or at what intervals it is reassessed, would let companies build their energy budget without guessing.
  • Aligning the change with the start of the billing cycle. A one-sentence transitional rule, providing that the new tariff applies from the first cycle beginning after the entry into force, would do away with splitting consumption into two slices and with the disputes that follow from it.
  • A duty to inform the final consumer. Article 2 names the transmission system operator and the economic operators in the sector. A paragraph requiring the supplier to mark visibly on the bill the date of the change and the two levels applied would close the distance between whoever decides the tariff and whoever pays it.

Original text of the legal act

The text below is reproduced in Romanian, the official form of publication.

The full text, as published in the Official Gazette of Romania

Official Gazette of Romania no. 827 of 29 September 2026, page 8 8 pages PDF, 83 KB the act starts on page 8

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This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. For specific situations, consult a licensed attorney or tax advisor.