Marks and Spencer

Susan1942

another query best to go for no standing charge or is standing charge the best option for me. Used 2180 of day time electricity in the past 12 months. NOw still thinking about things

Sue

victor2

A tariff with tiered prices and no standing charge can be compared to one with a standing charge and everything at the secondary rate. Take the following (fictitious) example...
Primary rate of 17p per kWh for the first 900 kWh used in a year
Secondary rate of 10p per kWh for all other usage
No standing charge

900kWh x 7p(Primary - Secondary) = 6300p/year = 17.26p/day standing charge
Then price all usage at the secondary rate of 10p/kWh
This assumes that you use at least 900kWh a year and is roughly based on typical electricity rates. So unless you have lengthy periods where you use no electricity at all (more of a possibility with gas), then it allows you to consider rates without a standing charge to ones with.

Susan1942

I am not quite understanding this. I only have Electricity and most of my use is night economy 7 units. This current year I used 2145 day and 8952 night use. Looks like as I use more than the 225 units per quarter I might be better without the standing charge. Is this correct?

Thanks

Sue

victor2

You know your usage in kWh, so use that to let a comparison site tell you which tariffs appear to be the best.
Without a standing charge, you'll pay more for the initial electricity usage and effectively pay the standing charge that way. A comparison site should show you what the charges will be with your current supplier, which you can verify from your actual bills, and what the charges will be with an alternative supplier. This may be with or without a standing charge. There's no hard rule to say which billing method is better than the other.

Susan1942

Thanks you I do appreciate your advice. For me it is a bit of a nightmare trying to look at the different tariffe out there. I have printed off the tariffe for some companies and now I need to compare them. Hopefully at the end of the day I will be happy with my choice. Sue