Choosing “Utility Warehouse” as a supplier in the current climate?

Sean_Dean

1. I was wondering if you guys can give me some insight into my current predicament.

I managed to grab myself the E.On PP17 Capped tariff a couple of weeks back (my 14 day cancellation period ends this Saturday).
I feel there is some uncertainty in the gas and elec market and hence I eagerly switched to this capped price tariff.

But now my cousin who is a Utility Warehouse salesman is saying that it is foolish to cap because he can offer me the cheapest gas and leccy now and for the next year even. He is confident that even if there are two lots of price rises across the industry, his firm, Utility Warehouse, will still be cheapest or one of the cheapest.
I haven’t read anything from MSE Martin on this company and whether or not my cousin’s claims are robust.

My cousin also reassured me that Utility Warehouse’s prices are not fixed to any of the other suppliers. They buy their wholesale gas and leccy independently. Is this true?

Is it a worthwhile bet to go with Utility Warehouse in the current climate of uncertainty?


My second point:

2. I understand that the cheapest tariffs that companies offer are generally the online ones, and these seem to have been protected from any price rises thus far. Are these still available? Are they also a good bet?

Quentin

You can't have looked very hard.

Lots on here about the uw, their reps and their misleading claims.

Do a search. And do your own research by getting quotes from the price comparison sites - see how correct your cousin is, by how far down the list uw comes when comparing prices for your particular consumption.

(Did he mention they don't compete with the cheaper online tariffs, or the monthly fee you have to pay on top of your energy bills just to join their "club"?)

Sean_Dean

Quentin wrote:

You can't have looked very hard.

Quentin wrote:

Lots on here about the uw, their reps and their misleading claims.

I did a few searches but couldn’t find anything on UW in the current climate of capping / price rises etc.. Only general stuff about them.
It doesn’t help that my connection at work is very slow and it's firewalled to make it even slower!

Do a search. And do your own research by getting quotes from the price comparison sites - see how correct your cousin is, by how far down the list uw comes when comparing prices for your particular consumption.

Once I have quotes from other companies how do I compare them to UW’s? Is there any place that can accurately compare the tariffs or is the only recourse to ring up my cousin? They’ve got a rough comparison tool on the UW website, but I’ve been told it’s not very accurate. It actually says that I will save about £20 on my current usage if I switch to them.
Would they also raise their prices along with the others though…I’m guessing they will.

(Did he mention they don't compete with the cheaper online tariffs, or the monthly fee you have to pay on top of your energy bills just to join their "club"?)

He didn’t mention this.
How much is this monthly fee then? Is it a fixed fee?



Many thanks for your input. It’s really given me something to think about.

Quentin

If you do a price comparison on (eg) energyhelpline.com it will list (in price order) the suppliers. (Including uw).

The membership fee is a monthly charge on top of the charges you pay them for your utlities. It is fixed, currently there are 3 levels of "membership", and they charge between £1.76 and £3 every month from the day you join.

You can join up to uw any time, so don't rush into giving up your price cap until you are certain!

amcluesent

>they charge between £1.76 and £3 every month from the day you join.<

And nowhere on the site I could see do they define in KWhs how they band lo/med/hi users. Plus there's some very peculiar small print which 'hints' at other charges, IMHO there's no way to get a certain cost from reading their stuff. One has to assume that's how the reps like it...