Gas price plummet - but not for you!!

1carminestocky

SwanJon wrote: »

Hindsight's great isn't it.
Based on the same reasoning, why would anyone buy a house/shares/anything at the peak of the market?

If the best information they had was that prices were going to continue to increase, then buying in advance looked like the better deal.
They got it wrong, and we all have to pay.

Your Managing Director was firmly of that opinion just a few months ago. How incredibly embarrassing for him. Err, why should BG and the others getting it wrong mean we all have to pay? You are a private company, not a state-funded dept and surely must succeed or fail on your skills. For instance, cardew has admitted to holding bank shares for quite a while. He obviously believed they would appreciate in value. They've clearly done the exact opposite. Does his stockbroker have to pay for his 'mistake'?

mech_2

storminbalder wrote: »

I don't believe for a moment that all the energy redistributors were stupid enough to buy all their supplies for months/years ahead at the peak of the market.

And if they were stupid enough to do so, why is it that we should suffer.

Thatcher is to blame and has a lot to answer for.

Buying at a different time would just have moved the peak to a different time. It's called a "market". It reacts to what you do and self-balances. It's really quite fascinating. The long and short of it is that retail prices will always follow oil. Trying to engineer higher or lower average prices will fail.

I'm not convinced nationalisation would change anything. Why would a nationalised industry calculate its prices any differently? I can't see any evidence the current regime was established after privatisation. Gas prices will only get more closely linked to oil as the UK imports more and more gas from the continent. The continental energy markets are generally less liberalised than the UK market and does that mean lower prices? Er... No.

storminbalder

mech wrote: »

The continental energy markets are generally less liberalised than the UK market and does that mean lower prices? Er... No.

Er.....I think you find it is yes!

Cardew

storminbalder wrote: »

Er.....I think you find it is yes!

That is interesting!

I think you will find that most of western Europe pays considerably more for Gas and electricity(France has some cheap off-peak tariffs)

We have had this debate many times and all data produced has shown that UK generally has cheaper energy - and that was before Sterling's recent fall against the Euro which makes our prices appear even cheaper in any comparison.

Do you have any figures?

EDIT
this link gives the prices last June

http://www.energy.eu/#domestic

Since then the Euro has strengthen about 13% against £Sterling so it makes our prices even lower in the comparisons.

1carminestocky

As per usual, the old exchange rate trick :rolleyes: . It's all a total nonsense - the only 100% surefire way of comparing energy prices throughout Europe (in fact, ANY commodity) is to plot them as a percentage of average take home pay and average annual fuel bill. We had an energy company worker on here a while ago (forget his name, there's so many of them on here) stating that he'd just been in touch with his friend in Germany and confirmed he was paying way more for his domestic fuel than he did in the UK. I made the point that, maybe his German friend would swap him our energy prices but would he also swap wages? No reply.

Don't fall for the trick, folks.

storminbalder

Cardew wrote: »

That is interesting!

I think you will find that most of western Europe pays considerably more for Gas and electricity(France has some cheap off-peak tariffs)

We have had this debate many times and all data produced has shown that UK generally has cheaper energy - and that was before Sterling's recent fall against the Euro which makes our prices appear even cheaper in any comparison.

Do you have any figures?

Try here.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/oilRpt/idUKL2517431120080225

I'm moving to Estonia!

storminbalder

storminbalder wrote: »

Try here.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/oilRpt/idUKL2517431120080225

I'm moving to Estonia!

Even though Estonia is regarded by some as being in Eastern Europe.

storminbalder

And this is more recent, and although no actual figures, it shows prices are rising here more rapidly than elsewhere.

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/consumer/bills/article.html?in_article_id=442505&in_page_id=510

Word of warning though - this is the Daily Mail!

metrobus

Totally pointless trying to compare country to country price ,the tax situation
and the subsidies (paid for by the tax payer/bill payer) given by the government are not taken into consideration.

Cardew

storminbalder wrote: »

And this is more recent, and although no actual figures, it shows prices are rising here more rapidly than elsewhere.

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/consumer/bills/article.html?in_article_id=442505&in_page_id=510

Word of warning though - this is the Daily Mail!

Methinks that the with the last 2 links(albeit out of date) you posted you are in agreement then that UK are amongst the cheapest for energy?