comparison sites top picks are with standing charge?

Premier_2

JennyR68 wrote: »

Tier 1 = 500 units at 24.041 p per kwh

500 units at 24.041 p per kwh = £120.20 per annum

£120.20 per annum = 33p per day

500 units = 1.36 units per day = 32.7p per day

is there something wrong with arithmetic?

Yes, you are not paying 30p per unit. You are paying 24.041p per unit.

In your example you are using 1.36 units per day.

JennyR68

Oh for goodness sakes no your quite right i'm paying 32.7 p for 1.3 units per day. when I'm working out the days cost in my head I find it so easy to work in tiny fractions.

JennyR68

O.k how on earth could I not use 500kw per year when it is only 1.3kw a day? That argument makes no sense!

Premier_2

JennyR68 wrote: »

O.k how on earth could I not use 500kw per year when it is only 1.3kw a day? That argument makes no sense!

Sorry, I revised my above post having worked out what you were actually doing.

Yes it's unlikely that you'll use less than 500kWh per year of electricity for an occupied property. For gas, it it is quite easy to not use the max tier 1 level during the summer.

But you never know what will happen, Perhaps you go on holiday, a nice long cruise, you are asked by your employer to work elsewhere for some time, or perhaps you may have to go into hospital for a few months.

The point is, with a SC tariff, you will always pay the standing charge. With a NSC tariff, you will never pay more than the same SC (an an equivilent tariff from the same supplier), but you may pay less if you iuse less.

Why anyone accepts a SC over a NSC alternative beats me.

molerat

Simple sums

Electric
32.80p per day SC
or
23.73p tier 1 - 10.3845p tier 2 x 900 kWh / 365 = 32.91p per day, .11 p per day cheaper

Gas
22.89p SC
or
6.5248p tier 1 - 3.40725p tier 2 x 2680 kWh / 365 = 22.89p, the same.

Only a marginal difference but I have never used less than the tier 1 level in the past 36 years so I just prefer it that way and it does not cost me. If companies introduced a real NSC tariff instead of a H(idden)SC or P(roportional)SC tariff then that would be a different matter.

molerat

Premier wrote: »

Why anyone accepts a SC over a NSC alternative beats me.

Because in mine and many many others situation it makes about !!!! all difference

Premier_2

molerat wrote: »

Simple sums

Electric
32.80p per day SC
or
23.73p tier 1 - 10.3845p tier 2 x 900 kWh / 365 = 32.91p per day, .11 p per day cheaper

Gas
22.89p SC
or
6.5248p tier 1 - 3.40725p tier 2 x 2680 kWh / 365 = 22.89p, the same.

Only a marginal difference but I have never used less than the tier 1 level in the past 36 years so I just prefer it that way and it does not cost me. If companies introduced a real NSC tariff instead of a H(idden)SC tariff then that would be a different matter.

Glad you now agree it's the same once the tier 1 level is reached. The very small difference is again probably due to rounding errors. Let us know the tariff, supplier & region and that can be further investigated.

As for gas, well as I say, it's often possible to not meet the tier 1 level in summer, but that is customer dependant.

If you want a real NSC tariff, look at Ebico
No standing charges, no tier 1 rates. Just a single flat rate for every unit used
But they may not be the cheapest, you'll need to use a comparison website for that. They are usually competetive for low users. As you nust the tier 1 level for gas even in summer, I suspect you are not a low user by any means.

Premier_2

molerat wrote: »

Because in mine and many many others situation it makes about !!!! all difference

But it does!

With a SC tariff you will pay the standing charge.

With a NSC tariff, there is an opportunity if you have any reason to reduce consumption to benefit from lower charges.

The difference between you will definitely pay it, and, given worse case scenario you'll pay it but you might not. Why gamble???
Take the option that might save you money, not the one that definitely won't save you any.

Cardew

molerat wrote: »

Simple sums

Electric
32.80p per day SC
or
23.73p tier 1 - 10.3845p tier 2 x 900 kWh / 365 = 32.91p per day, .11 p per day cheaper

Gas
22.89p SC
or
6.5248p tier 1 - 3.40725p tier 2 x 2680 kWh / 365 = 22.89p, the same.

Only a marginal difference but I have never used less than the tier 1 level in the past 36 years so I just prefer it that way and it does not cost me. If companies introduced a real NSC tariff instead of a H(idden)SC or P(roportional)SC tariff then that would be a different matter.

I have an annex where I never use anything like the full Tier 1 allocation for electricity and for 3 quarters in the year do not use the full allocation of Tier 1 gas units.

With the duel fuel discount applied to the electricity account, BG actually pay me to take their electricity i.e. the 'income' each quarter is more than my expenditure in electricity.

There must be plenty of holiday homes that also use very little gas and electricity and so the no SC is also a lot cheaper.

shaggy

EDF online save Dual Fuel v5 comes up cheapest for me . This has an annual standing charge of around £94 for elec and £68 for electricity. Couple this with £80 quidco at the moment and the deal sounds tempting (penalty of £50 applies if you switch before march 2011 I think).

Really not sure what to do here. I would describe myself as a medium user except I tend to have the heating on all night on cold winter nights like this. Very roughly current dual fuel bill works out to be around £1400(ish) per year)

Advice anyone?