Energy Suppliers

Caporegime
Joined
13 Jan 2010
Posts
32,495
Location
Llaneirwg
This is what I'm offered if I want to fix right now with my supplier:

Payment method: Direct Debit. Electricity unit rate: 61.456p per kWh. Electricity standing charge: 45.317p per day. Gas unit rate: 19.229p per kWh. Gas standing charge: 32.748p per day. Exit fees: £300.00 per fuel. Tariff Term: 12 months

:eek::(

At these rates I'm not even sure if work from home is sensible in the winter
 
Joined
4 Aug 2007
Posts
21,386
Location
Wilds of suffolk
No one would switch without competition though

Which was exactly why they tried to get the market opened up after privatisation
But as we were discussing last week the changes to the penalty that your new supplier has to pay to your old supplier have gone up so much getting a great switch for now is not going to happen as they will simply be unable to take the hit
 
Can't type for toffee
Don
Joined
14 Jun 2004
Posts
17,338
Location
Newcastle U/T
Eon.Next here....


Current: NExt Flex

Monthly cost​

£243.82
Annual cost £2,925.79


Electricity
Gas
Daily standing charge48.91p27.22p
Unit rate27.09p per kWh7.23p per kWh
Assumed annual usage5,271kWh16,883kWh
Estimated annual cost£1,606.63£1,319.16


My Current Offers:

Next Online V14

Monthly cost​

£324.501
Annual cost £3,894.00

Electricity
Gas
Daily standing charge48.91p27.22p
Unit rate37.44p per kWh9.73p per kWh
Assumed annual usage5,271kWh16,883kWh
Estimated annual cost£2,152.41£1,741.59

Next Online 1yr V 11

ElectricityGas
Daily standing charge48.91p27.22p
Unit rate41.39p per kWh10.68p per kWh
Assumed annual usage5,271kWh16,883kWh
Estimated annual cost£2,360.54£1,902.56


Both are 1yr fixes
 
Permabanned
Joined
24 Jul 2016
Posts
7,412
Location
South West
Which was exactly why they tried to get the market opened up after privatisation
But as we were discussing last week the changes to the penalty that your new supplier has to pay to your old supplier have gone up so much getting a great switch for now is not going to happen as they will simply be unable to take the hit
Do we have any sources regarding penalty’s that the new supplier has to pay to the old supplier?
 
Joined
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Posts
21,386
Location
Wilds of suffolk
Do we have any sources regarding penalty’s that the new supplier has to pay to the old supplier?

I linked it in one of the energy threads last week, probably the one in GD

iirc its now 85% of the difference

Edit found it, it is 85%

 
Permabanned
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South West
So it’s only relevant when the wholesale price drops by 10% which hasn’t happened for a while now.

The only way to guarantee market stability is to move everyone onto a variable rate, that way the market can closely follow the wholesale price a rid the gambling practices for short term gain long term harm.
 
Joined
4 Aug 2007
Posts
21,386
Location
Wilds of suffolk
So it’s only relevant when the wholesale price drops by 10% which hasn’t happened for a while now.

The only way to guarantee market stability is to move everyone onto a variable rate, that way the market can closely follow the wholesale price a rid the gambling practices for short term gain long term harm.

Er no, well

The point being made was that if there is a correction, as expected at some point, then even if the market rate falls significantly, then you wont get cheap deals since the new company wont be able to afford it.
Eg Elec price falls by 50%, lets say 30p to 15p. >10% so new supplier has to pay old supplier 85% of the impact. So you would have hoped to be seeing new deals for 15p since the market rate has plummeted, but your new supplier is in effect paying 15p + 85%x15p = 27.78p per unit. IE they cannot track the market even if they can buy at spot

Moving everyone onto variable rate is probably what should happen but its not allowed as the price cap is stopping that happening so they would need to ditch that mechanism completely, and then individuals would be at risk of the market price.
Your not moving to market price if by default its not market price they are all offering.

Its not the gambling practices that are the issue, its the combination of everything thats in force.
As I said before, if you want to go back to the old ways of doing it thats fine, but all the current combination is doing is killing competition and forcing the market to a more oligopoly like position.
You could argue offgen is forcing them to gamble as they have to buy ahead. Its all terminology and viewpoints at that point.

All the recent changes seem to be to defend the companies rather than help the consumers.
Eventually if the market prices fall we will see them take effect, the changes just mean that will take some time to happen since the prices the companies have purchase at will in effect be setting the market rate in the UK. Once they all start to reduce prices they will fall broadly in line, but as a consumer its going to be practically impossible under the rules to move to a significantly cheaper deal quickly. And lets face it, the reason you move is to get a noticeably better deal. I wouldnt bother for less than about £40 a year, not worth the hastle if it goes wrong.

Now dont get we wrong, it was too easy to setup an energy supplier in effect, it needs to be a bit more restricted and some capital buffer in place so that if they go pop mostly consumer balances are ring fenced and then in theory there is less pooling of the risk.
 
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The fee only applies if the market price drops by 10% and customer is enticed to switch to a cheaper rate by another company. No one currently is offering cheaper deals and certainly not cheaper than what people had before these huge price increases.

I’m all for change. Companies are only offering fixed deals to entice in new customers, this practice is gambling as the market can swing rapidly as we are seeing. If everyone is on a variable tariff which follows the wholesale price then we won’t have all these new companies coming in offering these fantastic short term, unsustainable prices, nobody would jump around from place to place, none of them would collapse and we wouldn’t have this mess.
 
Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
10,163
Location
7th Level of Hell...
Eon Next offering a fix which is £20/month more than I'm currently paying:

Electricity
Daily standing charge -49.65p
Unit rate - 38.19p per kWh
Assumed annual usage - 1,086kWh
Estimated annual cost - £596.07

Gas
Daily standing charge - 27.22p
Unit rate - 9.84p per kWh
Assumed annual usage - 4,586kWh
Estimated Annual Cost - £550.50

No exit fees on both

Might be worth it?
 
Joined
4 Aug 2007
Posts
21,386
Location
Wilds of suffolk
The fee only applies if the market price drops by 10% and customer is enticed to switch to a cheaper rate by another company. No one currently is offering cheaper deals and certainly not cheaper than what people had before these huge price increases.

I’m all for change. Companies are only offering fixed deals to entice in new customers, this practice is gambling as the market can swing rapidly as we are seeing. If everyone is on a variable tariff which follows the wholesale price then we won’t have all these new companies coming in offering these fantastic short term, unsustainable prices, nobody would jump around from place to place, none of them would collapse and we wouldn’t have this mess.

Your again missing the point. The changes mean that even if the market prices drop you wont see it, not for a long time. The new suppliers cant simply be able to offer the market price, its not fixed deals causing this issue its the price cap.
It was also the price cap that was behind a lot of the issues. Sure fixed deals probably didn't help, but even now people are not paying the correct price, the cap is stopping the companies from charging what they should.

The fantastic short term prices were market prices until the massive unpredicted pretty one off event happened, the higher prices from other companies were inflated by buying ahead, as they were forced to do.
Most fixes were short term when you consider how predictable the energy market has been for many years.
I would be very surprised if a new player had they of managed to get to a massive market share and had been forced to buy ahead they would also have gone in just the same way as they wouldn't have had the backup of being well established with reserves.

The cap was the main issue, simply not fit for what it was designed to do, when coming off a fix and moving to a variable rate that is below market is the solution you know the cap isn't functioning.
Simply when a price cap, designed to stop vulnerable people who wouldn't change has the majority of the population on it/moving to it then something is wrong, the majority of the blame must lie with offgem, not the contracts everyone had.
The big players for example often offered rates just as good or very close to some of the next entrants when you shopped around.
In 6 years or so I went from BG to Scot power to Octopus to peoples energy (who went pop recently) and therefore back to BG, thoughout that time one of the big players would always be close to market leading that it made no difference, offering a fixed price deal.
 
Joined
4 Aug 2007
Posts
21,386
Location
Wilds of suffolk
Eon Next offering a fix which is £20/month more than I'm currently paying:

Electricity
Daily standing charge -49.65p
Unit rate - 38.19p per kWh
Assumed annual usage - 1,086kWh
Estimated annual cost - £596.07

Gas
Daily standing charge - 27.22p
Unit rate - 9.84p per kWh
Assumed annual usage - 4,586kWh
Estimated Annual Cost - £550.50

No exit fees on both

Might be worth it?

Hard to say (inc VAT?) prices don't look terrible, elec is up about 30% vs cap right now and gas a bit more.
My expectation is unless something dramatic changes you may slightly beat the coming change.

Its all a gamble however, even if Ukraine fixes itself the prices will be going up, but it may be that they would see future contracts coming down in price and as such a lower cap.
 
Joined
4 Aug 2007
Posts
21,386
Location
Wilds of suffolk
BG offered me
Electricity
Standing charge:

38.990p per day
Unit rate:
34.460p per kWh

When was this?, online right now best tariff is Loyalty Jun 23 V2 (for existing customers)

and its

Standard unit rate 35.723p / kWh
Standing charge 43.398p / day*

That does vary a little (standing charge) by region however.

They seem to change fairly quickly right now, I am guessing some sort of balancing going on

Actually for a bit of a laugh, the EV special, ouch (although is zero exit fee), low cost is 12am - 5am daily

Peak unit rate 43.142p / kWh
Off Peak unit rate 21.000p / kWh
Standing charge 46.224p / day*
 
Soldato
Joined
22 Dec 2006
Posts
8,638
Location
Around Town
When was this?, online right now best tariff is Loyalty Jun 23 V2 (for existing customers)

and its

Standard unit rate 35.723p / kWh
Standing charge 43.398p / day*

That does vary a little (standing charge) by region however.

They seem to change fairly quickly right now, I am guessing some sort of balancing going on

Actually for a bit of a laugh, the EV special, ouch (although is zero exit fee), low cost is 12am - 5am daily

Peak unit rate 43.142p / kWh
Off Peak unit rate 21.000p / kWh
Standing charge 46.224p / day*
Our fixed-rate tariff, Exclusive May 23v1, is exclusive to customers who have moved to us since their previous supplier went out of business - you won’t find it anywhere else online.
 
Soldato
Joined
17 Jan 2011
Posts
8,989
Location
the King's city
Our fixed-rate tariff, Exclusive May 23v1, is exclusive to customers who have moved to us since their previous supplier went out of business - you won’t find it anywhere else online.
BG offered me
Electricity
Standing charge:

38.990p per day
Unit rate:
34.460p per kWh

My rates for this tariff are:
standing charge 50.244
unit rate 33.283
 
Joined
4 Aug 2007
Posts
21,386
Location
Wilds of suffolk
Weird how BG works

Just happened to stumble across this. Stunned, this was February!

"Dave Wallace knew that his family of seven would have to think big about their energy use. “Our bills have gone up 35% from around £600 a month to just over £800 because we use electric radiators,”"
 
Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
16,281
Location
Manchester
With the increase in October stating a rise to £2800/yr so around 50% roughly. Am I in the right ball park by simply increasing all my standing charges, and unit prices equally by 50% to get a rough estimate?

I use a spreadsheet with current unit/standing charges for gas and elec using our annual usage to keep track of things. I've created a new column and slapped 50% increase to all prices, presumably this is good enough ball park to get an idea of what October might bring in terms of monthly costs yes? Or will it be more a case of smaller standing charge increase with a huge increase in unit cost (at least with unit costs you can at least use less)?
 
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