Is this being over-hyped?

sarah1980

With all due respect to Martin and MSE, the whole price-capping thing - is it worth it? I just did a quick check on the Scottish Power website (which stills apears to be offering the capped deal BTW) and it worked out I'd be paying around £90 more per year for Gas & Elec (combined) if I switched.

Now I completely understand we are talking beating future price hikes here. I am currently an Atlantic Gas & Elec customer and our prices went up slightly in April but not enough to be worrying. If they were to go up this much again (around 12-15%) I feel it would be less hassle to stick with them than switch to Scottish Power.

Don't get me wrong, I am not loaded with cash (!), but my past experience of switching to ANY provider (and I've done it 4 times) has been EXTREMELY painful and taken ages.

Also, I am always keen to take into consideration customer service. Atlantic have always been outstanding, UK call centres, efficient and well-trained staff, no !!!!-ups with direct debits (in some cases, even rebates on months when we overpaid for what we used).

What I'm saying is that, I would gladly pay £10 extra a month for great service and save myself hours on the phone when I could (should?!) be earning money at work.

I hope I don't sound dismissive, I know there are sinngle-income families and elderly people who will be hit hard by the increases, but for the rest of us do you think it is worth the headache to switch??

Would be interested to hear your thoughts :-)

BTW I used to be a Scottish Power customer and found them absolutely APPALLING in term of customer service. Their call waiting times were ridiculous, loads of confusing menus, overseas call centres and staff who hadn't had proper training.

spiro

Unless some miracle happens to the oil price or stops the UK becoming a net importer of gas (75% in the near future) then prices are going to go up considerably. 20-40% increase in the next 6-12 months is highly likely.

MSE_Martin

As a number of threads have been discussing similar issues I'm closing them so it can all be in one place.... please continue the discussion here...

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?p=12913599#post12913599