The low users discussion area (under £600 per year total fuel costs)

mardatha

Originally Posted by midgetessa
How much do you spend per year? on elect & LPG £400.....on elect only £260

What supplier are you with? Scottish Power
What deal are you on? Standard elect only, paying cash quarterly

Thinking of changing? no, checked it out and this is cheapest for us.

midgetessa

roobers wrote: »

Considering changing electricity as I could save about £60 a year, but I might just get a new fridge-freezer instead which would take 200kwh+ off my usage.

Which provider are you considering changing to?

You and I have almost exactly the same annual consumption for electricity and gas so it might help me to know.

Ta.

HappyMJ

midgetessa wrote: »

Been thinking of changing to Ebico which would save me about £60 if my calculations are correct but I'm waiting to see if/when they price increase.

midgetessa wrote: »

Which provider are you considering changing to?

You and I have almost exactly the same annual consumption for electricity and gas so it might help me to know.

Ta.

Not trying to point out the obvious but OP did say who they were thinking of changing to. Ebico. Others have pointed out that for very low users such as myself the direct debit, duel fuel discount of £100 that Npower offers can make the bill lower than the Ebico price due to it's fixed amount rather than percentage that most companies offer. You need to do a comparison for your exact usage on a comparison website your area may be different to ours.

GetRealBabe

Hi

How much do you spend (or kWh usage) per year? £500
What supplier are you with? Npower
What deal are you on? SOL21
Thinking of changing? No haven't found a cheaper tariff

MillicentBystander

HappyMJ wrote: »

Not trying to point out the obvious but OP did say who they were thinking of changing to. Ebico. Others have pointed out that for very low users such as myself the direct debit, duel fuel discount of £100 that Npower offers can make the bill lower than the Ebico price due to it's fixed amount rather than percentage that most companies offer. You need to do a comparison for your exact usage on a comparison website your area may be different to ours.

The only downside to this is that, unless npower have changed their T*Cs recently, the £100 bonus isn't granted until you've been with them for a minimum of 12 months plus all their cheapest tariffs also have an exit fee of circa £50. So, say npower announce a price rise that massively impacts on you as a low user (this has happened before and there's a thread on it somewhere and many Scottish power punters have experienced just this happening), if you leave to a cheaper deal within 12 months you not only lose the £100 'bonus' but also you will have to pay the exit fee. Losing £150 as a low user is pretty disastrous IMO.

HappyMJ

MillicentBystander wrote: »

The only downside to this is that, unless npower have changed their T*Cs recently, the £100 bonus isn't granted until you've been with them for a minimum of 12 months plus all their cheapest tariffs also have an exit fee of circa £50. So, say npower announce a price rise that massively impacts on you as a low user (this has happened before and there's a thread on it somewhere and many Scottish power punters have experienced just this happening), if you leave to a cheaper deal within 12 months you not only lose the £100 'bonus' but also you will have to pay the exit fee. Losing £150 as a low user is pretty disastrous IMO.

True but a little known thing is if they do increase rates you can leave for free. You do not have to pay the £50 if you advise them of the reason for leaving. Customer service is not the best though...I am still waiting on my £100 credit since March this year. Had several emails promising me it is on the account but I haven't seen it yet. Haven't paid them anything for a while so we'll see when the next big bill comes. They promise me it's on the next bill after the anniversary date of joining and the bill is yet to come.

Honda2ner

midgetessa wrote: »

I thought this might be a good idea as most of the offers and tariffs available are geared towards average and higher usage customers.

I've discovered over the years that most companies' tariffs work against us......by which I mean that one often has to pay a higher rate for the first chunk (or 'tranche' or whatever it is they call it) each quarter and then the remaining units used are charged at a much lower rate. Very often us low users don't even get out of the first 'tranche', so on average we are paying much more per unit used than a medium or high consumer.

So......

How much do you spend (or kWh usage) per year?

What supplier are you with?

What deal are you on?

Thinking of changing?

Any other hints or tips or points of discussion for low users?



As for me, my total combined bill last year was about £350. I'm with SP on the Pay in Advance No Standing Charge tariff. With the new price increases I would expect my combined bill for this year to be about £450. Been thinking of changing to Ebico which would save me about £60 if my calculations are correct but I'm waiting to see if/when they price increase.

I spend about £120 a year on electric and £180 on gas and nobody beats Ebico, in fact nobody comes close.

Customer service is excellent, the tariff is so simple a left handed half blind monkey (me) can figure it out.

I've even had BG salesmen come to the door and as soon as they hear that I'm with Ebico they make their excuses and leave. They know they can't beat it.

My only mistake is not moving to Ebico sooner.

tim9966

From June 2010 to June 2011 I used 2,480 units of electric. 1600 during the day, and 880 at night.
Cost £306.40 in total. With British Gas. Some web based one where I have to do a meter reading each month.

I don't have mains gas at present, but I've applied to go on it. Just waiting for a date at the moment. I also used £150 on bottled gas.

Next year I expect to pay less for electric but more than £150 on mains gas and nothing on bottled. 800 units were used on water heating, and about 500 were on extra electric heating with should all be gas by this winter.