Energy Suppliers

Soldato
Joined
9 Mar 2003
Posts
14,058
I just switched again, fixed for 12 months this time with money saving expert switch deal.

Got bored of changing every few months as the prices keep going up and up. Only 2 providers were cheaper but not by much and are variable. The referrals helped though!
 
Soldato
Joined
24 Mar 2006
Posts
9,069
Arr yes sorry. I was talking about First Utility.


I just switched again, fixed for 12 months this time with money saving expert switch deal.

Got bored of changing every few months as the prices keep going up and up. Only 2 providers were cheaper but not by much and are variable. The referrals helped though!

Was that the Green Network Energy deal?
 
Soldato
Joined
9 Mar 2003
Posts
14,058
Yes, only peoples energy and another was cheaper and it wasn’t much. I expect both of those will increase prices in the near term as there is no sign whole sale prices are coming down.

Scottish power and EDF both have reasonable fixed deals on too if you want big six but not as good as green energy and questionable service (Scottish power).
 
Associate
Joined
14 Apr 2011
Posts
1,153
Location
Stafford
I have been with Bulb since Feb of this year and with the recent price hikes I was looking to switch to someone else. I did a uswitch comparison based on my current monthly usage and it told me I was on the cheapest deal it could get me currently. The nearest I could get to it was an increase of £16 a year or so on my current deal. Its just not worth the hassle of switching at the moment. Also, it does look like other providers prices are now catching up to bulbs as there has been a rise in the cost of wholesale gas over the last few months and only the larger suppliers can really afford to eat this rise without passing it on to customers straight away. ..
 
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Caporegime
Joined
9 May 2004
Posts
28,551
Location
Leafy outskirts of London
Finally found an officail Wholesale Gas Price chart

https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/data-portal/wholesale-market-indicators

The thing that grabs my attention is that while prices are fairly high atm (62p/therm) they've been higher in 2013 (86p/therm) and anther peak in 2015 (53p/therm) and I'd hazzard a guess when those rises occured we got the usual Utilities price increases accross the board but when they dipped afterwards, did we get any decreases? I think I recall one price decrease in the last 8-10 years but probably 10+ increases usually in the 2-5% range all of which in my mind adds up to a lot of compounded increases vs 1 decrease. against a fairly flat looking overall price over the last 10 years.

Is someone able to perhaps correlate this graph against for example British Gas's tarrif over the same period as I do think we're being screwed with not getting corresponding price decreases when prices go down but almost immediatly the price goes up, the tarrifs we pay go up?

Businesses gonna business I'm afraid. :(
 
Soldato
Joined
9 Mar 2003
Posts
14,058
I would go even further and say the whole consumer energy market is broken, who do we need so many 'middle men', surely one, fully transparent (i guess government owned), not for profit supplier will provide better value to consumers than the cluster we have now. All you need is 3 simple tariffs (time of use, flat rate, PAYG), made up of 2 components a kwh price for the gas and electric and a set charge that covers the transmission to your area and running costs of billing etc.

All this pseudo competition is just utter **** and it just means the most loyal and most vulnerable of customers are left subsidising my cheaper tariff or making rich people richer.

You could even bin off the regulator by then and just put it in the scope of the NAO to measure sure they are keeping spending in check.
 

Kol

Kol

Man of Honour
Joined
8 Jan 2003
Posts
14,201
Location
London
Anybody else seen Bulb have a new smart tariff?

Looks good if you don't use much energy between 4pm-7pm. Well, good in that the kWh price is 1p less (which isn't a lot, no) but half price overnight. Essentially economy 7 really...?

That peak rate, though!

Electricity
Standing charge
24.56p per day
Off-peak rate
12.19p per kWh
Peak rate
29.75p per kWh
Overnight rate
7.45p per kWh
 

Kol

Kol

Man of Honour
Joined
8 Jan 2003
Posts
14,201
Location
London
It is, however, if you use most outside of 4-7pm it would be cheaper. Their standard is ~13p kWh, off peak would be 12p and overnight only 7.45p so.of people use most outside there could be an opportunity to save.

Edit - I suppose if you've got an EV for example, it could work out pretty well, charging overnight.
 
Soldato
Joined
9 Mar 2003
Posts
14,058
If you had a home battery setup it would be a no brainier. You could even set the battery to charge from the grid during the night assuming you don't get a full charge from any the solar.

EDIT: I can see this sort of tariff becoming the norm from 2025 when 2nd gen smart meters are common, though I expect overnight use will slowly get more expensive as more and more EV's come online.
 
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