Dunedin business customers mistakenly offered drastically discounted power if they agreed to switch to Mercury Energy want more time to consider the company's latest offer.
The Otago Chamber of Commerce will seek an urgent change to the terms of the agreement to extend the period past the end of the month.
The company's latest offer to assuage Dunedin customers given incorrect offers last month deserved thoughtful consideration, chamber chief executive John Christie said last night.
"And people are considering the offer, but the key thing for us is that it appears, out of discussions today, that they only have until the end of the month to make their mind about it.
"In my view, this might not be enough time for Mercury to get around the worst affected customers, or all the 420 people that have the offer to discuss it if needed."
Just an hour earlier, Mercury Energy retail manager Luke Blincoe told a meeting of about 25 affected business customers his company was very sorry for the "significant stuff-up".
The savings offers put to customers last month - in one case 30%, saving the customer $16,000 a year - were based on figures that did not include network capacity charges.
Mr Blincoe detailed the revised offer to meet the old offers halfway, and said the company hoped the approach would mean no nobody would be left out of pocket.
He also acknowledged some businesses were told the original offer was intended for customers in Dannevirke, not Dunedin.
That was "a compounding error by someone in a shallow hole, who thought they could get out of it by digging deeper".
After the meeting, Mr Christie said it was likely the businesses would now consider Mercury's position alongside legal advice they may still be able to try and force Mercury to honour the original offer.
