Posting on behalf of my mum, switching suppliers

sean1604

My mum is with scottish gas for both her electricity and her gas, currently paying around 90 for gas and 70 for electricity.
Neither of us are very clued up on this stuff and i was just wanting some opinions on where to go for the best deal as she wants to switch.
We had a salesman in from npower tonight who quoted us cheaper prices, from looking at the gas bill we're being charged 6.696p for 676 kwh and 3.125p for the next 677.81 kwh, we are above average users. The guy from npower quoted us 2.7p per unit (guessing he means electricity) where as we're paying (he says) 3.5p from scottish gas, seems like a good saving.
He said we should keep the amounts my mum pays the same so if we end up paying more we'd be in credit.
Again just wondering on what the best options for her/us, we have a 14 day cooling off period obviously and then 6 weeks before they actually take over the DD's from scottish gas.
Oh yeah and he also said we'd get £100 DD bonus (i think after 6 months) for switching and a £100 energy something bonus too.
thanks.

macman

Have you used the comparison sites such as recommended on the main site, energyhelpline and uswitch being the main two? They will give you a rather less biased approach than a rep from npower who is only interested in his commission.
Anf of course if you do pay less and the DD's stay the same, then you are simply lending them free money!
No idea of the size of the property, but asuming she is using gas for heating and hot water, then your electricity bills seem extremely high. £1920 a year total seems very high indeed.

sean1604

I just used uswitch, it said that first:utility would be the best to switch too @ £1523 per year, then e-on @ £1554, then ovo @ £1580 then eon tiwce more and then npower @ £1655 per year so to be fair it seems to think npower is cheaper.
ITs a 3 bedroom semi-detached property, have a gas bolier which heats the water, we have an imersure which we use to heat the water sometimes if the boiler hot water gets used up. I run a lot of electrical stuff in my room as does the whole house, heating is generally on for a few hours a day now with winter coming up.

macman

But first utility is £132 cheaper than npower! Obviously depends on the tariff though. Try it with energyhelpline as well.
Don't really see the sense in putting on an imnersion heater if the tank runs cold, better to boost it from the boiler, it's much cheaper to heat the water by gas. Your electricity consumption still seems extremely high for a property of that size, unless you are constantly running electric showers, cooker, tumble drier etc-the heavy cost items.

Gerrard_8_lfc

I would be intrested if you posted your mums BG tariff and the the Npower one.

As said before you would be as well going with first utility and save even more money.

dogshome

Hi sean 1604 - Phew! That was a close one, for a moment there I thought you had already closed the deal on the word of a doorstep salesman that his wares will be cheaper
Cancel the switch now and by the way the usual window for cancellation is 7 days, not 14
Work out your annual consumptions and go to the "switchwithwhich" website - As in fact Dual Fuel tariffs, even with their duel discounts, are not always the cheapest option, enter you figures on the switchwithwhich website 3 times - One for just gas supply, one for just electricity supply and one for Dual Fuel, and by the way, have a look at the comments about n'power on this site before even considering signing up with them
Good Luck

Premier_2

sean1604 wrote: »

...Neither of us are very clued up on this stuff and i was just wanting some opinions on where to go for the best deal as she wants to switch...

Get your mum to contact Scottish Gas to find out what her annual consumption of gas & electricity is in kWh.

Then put that data into a couple of the comparison sites in the resource bar above and see what is the best deal for your mum. It's good to use a couple of sites to check you get a consistent answer.
I'm not suggesting the comparison sites are wrong, but inputting the data and requesting the output can be confusing sometimes ... resulting in mis-leading info.

Remember to check single tariff supplies Vs duel fuel. Duel fuel is not always the cheapest solution.

saver8

Following advice from comparison websites, I've just switched from e-on to EDF. But British Gas phoned me and explained that comparison sites are commission-led and, as BritGas don't pay them, they don't tell you their best offers. I checked and found that comparison sites only list BritGas Web Saver tariffs, but the British Gas website offers a better Tracker tariff. And British Gas offer an even better rate to Boiler Homecare customers. Don't take comparison sites as the last word. They don't do 'what it says on the can'. I've taken up the better offer from British Gas.

Premier_2

Which comparison sites did you use that didn't list the BG Track & Save 2011 tariffs? All the comparison sites list all the generally available tariffs.

e.g. I've just checked Energyhelpline as an example, and that does indeed list the BG Track & Save 2011 tariff

It is true that comparison sites do not list those tariffs not generally available to all. e.g. those that restricted to customers of BG Boiler Homecare (because any discount is subsidised by the horrendous cost of the Homecare product)