Bulk LPG - Cheapest suppliers / supply route?

Following on from SD-253's (a.k.a. brandeberryj) earlier post (#846), I thought it would be sensible to double check on my facts and make sure that I wasn't posting mis-information. Following a quick ring round and asking the right questions, here is a breakdown of the situation in respect of LPG supply from the four cooperatives that I mentioned in my post #842. I specifically didn't go into contractual details in respect of LPG supply or pricing as my questions were in respect of the mechanics and availability of membership to the "general public". Following on from these discussions, it has become apparent that there is actually a wide network of such cooperatives, many of whom work together to wield greater buying power and leverage even greater discounts across a wide range of products and services (including, as mentioned above, LPG, Oil and Electricity) and many of them (I can't say all as I haven't phoned them all) offer membership to the non-farming general public. Clearly, they all have geographic boundaries, so to get the best deals, you will need to contact your most local ring member.

For England and Wales, details of all ring members can be found on the "Machinery Ring Association of England and Wales (MRA)" website, at http://www.machineryrings.org.uk/ringlinks.html

For Scotland, the "Scottish Machinery Ring Association" website is http://scottishmachineryrings.co.uk/

Again, note that this will still not provide a comprehensive list of Farmers cooperatives as some (Mole Valley Farmers being one example) are not members of any ring (in exactly the same way that NOT ALL LPG suppliers are members of UKLPG), so, as always, diligent homework is required when searching for the best deal for your LPG.

Well, following on from all the recent discussions on the much-vaunted UKLPG supplier search tool (clearly labelled "Find a bulk LPG supplier near you using our post code search") not only, as has been shown, does it fail to list all LPG suppliers for any given area, but not all of the companies that it returns are bulk LPG suppliers!

Try it for a Bristol Post code. One of the bulk suppliers offered will be "Andy's Gas", but if you give them a ring and ask them for a quote, they will (politely) tell you that they supply bottled gas and Autogas, but do not deal in delivered bulk LPG!

This is the reply from Ipsos/Mori which carefully ignores my questions regarding my details and Flogas.......

Quote


The interviewer reads from a script in this particular study and near the beginning of the interview does mention the client name Calor Gas. The interviewer is also able to disclose this at any time during the interview if they are asked. In some other studies clients wish to remain anonymous and in these situations our interviewers would not be allowed to disclose the name of the client, but a false client name would never be offered.

We do ask for permission to record interviews but in reality only a small proportion of interviews get recorded, and are done so for quality control purposes.

Kind regards

Unquote.

Still looks quite near the mark for me though.

ps. Just sent another email back to Ipsos/Mori asking them the question directly.

"Where did you get my details (as an LPG user) from, was it Flogas ? "

We will await their reply, and then ask Flogas.

HateLPG wrote: »

Following on from SD-253's earlier post (#846), I thought it would be sensible to double check on my facts and make sure that I wasn't posting mis-information. Following a quick ring round and asking the right questions, here is a breakdown of the situation in respect of LPG supply from the four cooperatives that I mentioned in my post #842. I specifically didn't go into contractual details in respect of LPG supply or pricing as my questions were in respect of the mechanics and availability of membership to the "general public".

Anglia Farmers

Will supply to anyone working in agriculture or farming (including smallholders). There is an annual fee for joining, and goods and services are provided at a discount;

They have recognised that there is a demand from the general public for the discounted rates available to farmers. To cater for this demand, they have set up a partner company (run from the same offices) called Affinity (http://www.af-affinity.co.uk). The same range of goods and services is available as to full members, but there is NO membership fee to join. Instead, a small levy is applied to the discounted price for all goods and services at the time of purchase. They did not give me a current LPG price for either membership structure.

Mole Valley Farmers

This is an interesting one. Basically, membership is a flat-rate £10 per year membership fee, and is open to anyone, with no restrictions. This will give access to all products and services. Bulk LPG is supplied primarily by Calor and Flogas (although supply is apparently available from other suppliers on request). The current Calor price is 46.5ppl.

Where things get a little more interesting is that instead of paying a £10 annual membership fee, you can choose instead to pay a £150 life membership fee. This life membership will offer additional discounts on many products (sadly not LPG) over and above those available to standard members and entitles you to vote at the AGM. The real bonus is that if at any time (without limit!) you decide that you no longer wish to be a member, they refund the full membership fee. This sounds odd at first, but the way it works is that you are effectively buying a share in the company with a flat-rate buy-back agreement, so when MVF give you back your £150, what they are effectively doing is "buying back" your share at a rate that will be (they hope) below the current market price for that shareholding.

Borders Machinery Ring

Membership is available to the non-farming general public at a cost of £45 per year (£135 for businesses). Membership gives access to discounts on goods and services including domestic bulk LPG.

Highland Business Services Ring

This is open to farmers and non-farmers alike. The membership fee is £45 per year and gives access to all their discounted products and services including LPG, Oil and Electricity.

Following on from these discussions, it has become apparent that there is actually a wide network of such cooperatives, many of whom work together to wield greater buying power and leverage even greater discounts across a wide range of products and services (including, as mentioned above, LPG, Oil and Electricity) and many of them (I can't say all as I haven't phoned them all) offer membership to the non-farming general public. Clearly, they all have geographic boundaries, so to get the best deals, you will need to contact your most local ring member.

For England and Wales, details of all ring members can be found on the "Machinery Ring Association of England and Wales (MRA)" website, at http://www.machineryrings.org.uk/ringlinks.html

For Scotland, the "Scottish Machinery Ring Association" website is http://scottishmachineryrings.co.uk/

Again, note that this will still not provide a comprehensive list of Farmers cooperatives as some (Mole Valley Farmers being one example) are not members of any ring (in exactly the same way that NOT ALL LPG suppliers are members of UKLPG), so, as always, diligent homework is required when searching for the best deal for your LPG.

So if I go through these cooperatives I can access companies who are on http://www.uklpg.org/supplier-search/search.php but though a middleman (the cooperative) some of whom charge a not inconsiderable amount (at least it would be to me) or take a cut? If this price “Calor price is 46.5ppl.” is for domestic customers and not commercial it looks reasonable. And I will defiantly look at http://www.machineryrings.org.uk/ringlinks.html for the other benefits which maybe quite substantial when my contract comes up. Thank you for that info. Below is the email I got from HBSR

Hi,
Thank you for your enquiry about a domestic supply of LPG in bulk.
Unfortunately we cannot do domestic supply as the agreement we have with Calor is for commercial premises only.
If you have a commercial side to your business, then we can probably do something for you.
If not, I can pass your details onto the domestic supply side of Calor if you let me have an address and phone number.
Many thanks for your enquiry,
Richard

Richard Jones
HBS Ring Ltd Sales 01463 811603
richard@hbsring.co.uk
www.hbsring.co.uk
Mob 07921 569731
Highland Business Services Ring Limited
Glaikmore
North Kessock
Inverness
IV1 3UD
Tel 01463 811603
Fax 01463 811084

This clearly conflicts with your statement.

Got a reply today regarding the source of my information. They said it came from Calor, the sponsor of the poll itself.

I am quite willing to believe this, because in my quest for prices and contracts etc, most companies want your contact details in order to quote etc.

But quite why Calor wanted my opinion via poll beats me.