MSE News: Big six energy firms must tell customers their best tariff

TheTallOne_2 · 12 April 2012 at 1:38AM

Expect the cheapest tariffs to increase in price then.

Bad of people who actively switch to get the cheapest tariff, marginally better for the people who currently don't but end up doing so because of the letters they send out.

spiro · 12 April 2012 at 6:46AM

What about all the people who are going to get a letter once or twice for some customers, saying you would be better of on a DD, Online Billing, Online account management tariff and they don't want to pay by DD and dont use the internet! More money wasted by the suppliers which the rest of us have to pay for.

The other fun one will be for customer who are entitled to 2 reviews a year and they happen to have an E7 meter, at the end of the summer they get told 'youll be better off on a single rate tariff' then in the spring they get told 'youll be better of on an E7 tariff'?

Norman_Castle · 12 April 2012 at 9:01AM

Expect energy companies to introduce new expensive tariffs. They will then show you the "cheaper" tariff.
Is this government stupid? Is that a stupid question?

Pincher · 12 April 2012 at 10:02AM

spiro wrote: »

The other fun one will be for customer who are entitled to 2 reviews a year and they happen to have an E7 meter, at the end of the summer they get told 'youll be better off on a single rate tariff' then in the spring they get told 'youll be better of on an E7 tariff'?

What we should demand is a tariff that automatically become single rate April to September, for electric only customers.

What happened in these meetings?

Nick Clegg:"Could you make it a bit less?"
Utilities:"No."
NC pees in his pants:"At least tell your customers the cheapest tariff."
U:"Tell you what we'll do. We fuzz the wording, so you can pretend you made us do something, but we get the opportunity to sell whatever we want to under the banner of a government initiative."
NC changes his trousers:"Deal."

babyj3 · 12 April 2012 at 5:38PM

Terrylw1 wrote: »

Looks like EDF's new policy was always in the pipeline but they've jumped the gun just telling the public there was a thick brown envelope involved.

EDF wrote to me a few years ago assuring me that they would always make sure I was on 'the best tariff' and like a fool I believed them until I got a computer and out of curiosity checked their online tariffs and found a cheaper deal - when I complained they tried to fob me off by saying that the letter was a standard one offering advice and that I had taken that particular wording out of context but it was quite a clear statement to me and very misleading given that they were not making sure I was on the best trariff - we now we have Blue+ Price Promise which sounds like the promise they made me in that letter so let's hope they stick to their promise - only time will tell but I hope the regulator will keep a close eye on this as there always seems to be too many get out clauses or ambiguity with these type of promises - so I won't hold my breath until they prove themselves and keep their promises
That said any step such as this is a step in the right direction but why Oh! why can't they just have a couple of tariifs that can be easily calculated
It must cost them a fortune to pay all of these customer service people to deal with all of the complaints and queries I am sure they could make a huge saving if they simplified their tariffs

Terrylw1 · 12 April 2012 at 9:33PM

Pincher wrote: »

What we should demand is a tariff that automatically become single rate April to September, for electric only customers.

What happened in these meetings?

Nick Clegg:"Could you make it a bit less?"
Utilities:"No."
NC pees in his pants:"At least tell your customers the cheapest tariff."
U:"Tell you what we'll do. We fuzz the wording, so you can pretend you made us do something, but we get the opportunity to sell whatever we want to under the banner of a government initiative."
NC changes his trousers:"Deal."

Did you know that many customers could do that? Many E7 meters are set up as both in the industry data which means the supplier can switch your tariff over the phone and then just updates the distributor to show the new use.

Its even possible for most meters to create the required industry data to do this. Its just that its obscure and only certain utility specialists ever understand this data.

Terrylw1 · 12 April 2012 at 9:36PM

babyj3 wrote: »

EDF wrote to me a few years ago assuring me that they would always make sure I was on 'the best tariff' and like a fool I believed them until I got a computer and out of curiosity checked their online tariffs and found a cheaper deal - when I complained they tried to fob me off by saying that the letter was a standard one offering advice and that I had taken that particular wording out of context but it was quite a clear statement to me and very misleading given that they were not making sure I was on the best trariff - we now we have Blue+ Price Promise which sounds like the promise they made me in that letter so let's hope they stick to their promise - only time will tell but I hope the regulator will keep a close eye on this as there always seems to be too many get out clauses or ambiguity with these type of promises - so I won't hold my breath until they prove themselves and keep their promises
That said any step such as this is a step in the right direction but why Oh! why can't they just have a couple of tariifs that can be easily calculated
It must cost them a fortune to pay all of these customer service people to deal with all of the complaints and queries I am sure they could make a huge saving if they simplified their tariffs

Stop talking sense

you'll never get a job at ofgem :rotfl:

davidgmmafan · 12 April 2012 at 10:48PM

babyj3 wrote: »

EDF wrote to me a few years ago assuring me that they would always make sure I was on 'the best tariff' and like a fool I believed them until I got a computer and out of curiosity checked their online tariffs and found a cheaper deal - when I complained they tried to fob me off by saying that the letter was a standard one offering advice and that I had taken that particular wording out of context but it was quite a clear statement to me and very misleading given that they were not making sure I was on the best trariff - we now we have Blue+ Price Promise which sounds like the promise they made me in that letter so let's hope they stick to their promise - only time will tell but I hope the regulator will keep a close eye on this as there always seems to be too many get out clauses or ambiguity with these type of promises - so I won't hold my breath until they prove themselves and keep their promises
That said any step such as this is a step in the right direction but why Oh! why can't they just have a couple of tariifs that can be easily calculated
It must cost them a fortune to pay all of these customer service people to deal with all of the complaints and queries I am sure they could make a huge saving if they simplified their tariffs

I agree that this particular tariff is a step in the right direction. However one could make the argument if they can't get their super duper new billing system to work how can anything it throws up be trusted? I think someone may have made that exact argument on here, but I'm working an early shift this week so not particularly sharp lol

Pincher · 15 April 2012 at 5:04PM

Personally, I had a couple of good winters on E.On FixOnline tariffs, and would have paid more if I had been on variable rate.

Fixes depend on futures contracts, so it's pure luck when a good one year fix turns up. This simply doesn't fit into the annual review model. The problem is, would I read any mail that begins with "This is a really good deal, unlike all the other junk mails we have been sending you."

anguk · 15 April 2012 at 5:56PM

jeepjunkie wrote: »

Is this the best the ConDems can come up with....!

Surely national Govt. has better things to do than pander to all the lazy gits in society who can't be bother to look for a better deal in EVERY aspect of life :mad:

penrhyn wrote: »

More spoon feeding from the yellow stains in the coalition.
What's next, legislating for all checkout operators to advise you you could have bought a cheaper brand?
All this means in addition to the fuel surcharge so the middle classes can stick ecobling on their roofs, prices will rise as the can't be bothered brigade get cheaper bills.

That's a bit unfair, not everyone has access to the internet or can use the comparison websites to find the best deal for them. Many pensioners for example just stick with the same old British Gas standard quarterly bill because it's what they've always done and they don't know how to go about finding cheaper deals.

It's easy for us on a Money Saving website to say everyone should find the cheaper deals themselves but not everyone is able to do that.

That said this latest government "initiative" is nothing more than a sticky plaster on a jugular wound. They'd be much better looking at why energy prices are so high and the energy companies are making such vast profits. And they should simplify tariffs, I'm sure many people just stick with the same supplier because it's so damned difficult to work out who is cheapest for them.

MSE News: Big six energy firms must tell customers their best tariff

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