budgeting with First Utility

Beverley

I recently switched to First Utility via a price comparison website. I tend to switch whenever Martin advises so I've done this several times now. Personally, I prefer to spread the cost of the winter fuel over the cheaper summer months and so I've always paid a fixed monthly fee. It has its drawbacks if the company doesn't adjust the figures often enough but I submit meter readings regularly so the amount I pay and the adjusted figure are usually pretty close.

However, I have just discovered that First Utility ask you to submit a monthly meter reading and you pay for each months fuel as it is used. They do not allow you to pay a fiuxed monhtly fee.

I'll be changing ASAP but I just wanted to warn others of this.

penrhyn

What ever possessed you to swap to FU, can you get away without penalty?

PS I pay for what electricity I use with British Gas, works fine as my electricity consumption is fairly flat over the year. But with Gas CH you are better off with a fixed DD.

Beverley

penrhyn wrote: »

What ever possessed you to swap to FU, can you get away without penalty?

PS I pay for what electricity I use with British Gas, works fine as my electricity consumption is fairly flat over the year. But with Gas CH you are better off with a fixed DD.

FU came up as best on the comparison website and the monthly DD thing was hidden very low in the small print. I have to be with them for 28 days then I can change so I will do it then

aelitaman

Brace yourself for a long battle with FU. Switching from them is not easy as the threads on here prove.

MGSteve

To be fair to FU, switching is only a problem if you owe them money. Which we did, but through their own incompetience.

They let the first one go (gas), but then refused to let the Electric go, which was the most expensive one for us. After a battle on the phone, the agreed to let that one go as long as we paid what was owed.

Which I will do once they can get their fingers out of their backsides and actually give me an accurate final bill - they still are charging us for gas and electric after we changed and they still haven't refunded me the excess they charged for over estimating the usage prior to the smart meters being fitted.

In short, avoid them, they are that bad, we switched to nPower & Scottish Power!

neither of which had good reputations, but ironically who we were with before we switched to FU!

First Utility are a shower of incompetence. To say they are a good utility company is like saying George Bush was one of the great peace time leaders of history.....