'Surprise call from Ed Davey, Energy Minister – on collective switc' blog discussion

Former_MSE_Penelope

This is the discussion to link on the back of Martin's blog. Please read the blog first, as this discussion follows it.

Read Martin's "Surprise call from Ed Davey, Energy Minister – on collective switching" Blog.

Please click 'post reply' to discuss below.

zag2me

Seems a bit pointless to me until they simplify the tarrifs.

I was told by my energy company it was impossible to switch due to my meter being Economy 10.

And I don't even understand the bill I get every year so how do I know what deal is best competitively?

Sort out the basics first then get onto the big changes like this.

RAS

Blog link does not work

Crabman

Not sure collective switching is the answer if the intermediaries are granted loopholes to escape liability.

If an intermediary recommends and switches customers to a particular supplier, they should be liable for anything that goes wrong as a result, whether it's bad service or the tariff turning out not to be the most competitive option.

After all, the intermediary would be making a financial gain through commission payments, so it seems entirely fair that they shoulder a fair level of risk.

MSE_Martin

Crabman wrote: »

Not sure collective switching is the answer if the intermediaries are granted loopholes to escape liability.

If an intermediary recommends and switches customers to a particular supplier, they should be liable for anything that goes wrong as a result, whether it's bad service or the tariff turning out not to be the most competitive option.

After all, the intermediary would be making a financial gain through commission payments, so it seems entirely fair that they shoulder a fair level of risk.

Under your version it wont get off the ground. There's no way you could organise this then be liable for a £1,300 a year bill - to do that you'd need to charge many times the amount.

My point of liability is for individual service. The consumer relationship would still be with the power company not the 'collective switcher' - they're just taking the choice away.

mo786uk

Unfortunatley I think you might be overestimating how easily people will switch.

IMO most people won't want to switch for savings of £40-50 per year if they do not have a problem with their current supplier - its not worth the hassle unless you can gurantee significant savings of say £100 a year (which I don't think you can).

With regard to liability, if there if a whiff of the switchover organisation having any sort of commercial operation then they will surely be liable for things like the advertising if not the end service. It really depends on how the service operates and any promises made I guess.

MSE_Martin

mo786uk wrote: »

Unfortunatley I think you might be overestimating how easily people will switch.

IMO most people won't want to switch for savings of £40-50 per year if they do not have a problem with their current supplier - its not worth the hassle unless you can gurantee significant savings of say £100 a year (which I don't think you can).

With regard to liability, if there if a whiff of the switchover organisation having any sort of commercial operation then they will surely be liable for things like the advertising if not the end service. It really depends on how the service operates and any promises made I guess.

There's no problem with the operation having liability for its actions - its about liability for actions of the power company.

mike_thePeoplesPower

I think Ed Davey's suggestion is excellent - but I would as have just set up a not-for-profit to do exactly this - help people get cheaper energy. We have called it "thePeoplesPower" - hope you think the name is good.

The website is live and ready for people to sign up - am I allowed to post a link to it here? (sorry I'm new to the forum and don't know the etiquette here!)

As to liability debate above - a collective switching company cannot be liable for the switching process as this is controlled by the energy suppliers. That's why switching sites do not accept liability for the entire switching process and the advertised savings for switching are couched in terms like "you can save up to ..."

mo786uk

I dont see why the Govt cannot do it.

With regards to liability - it is difficult to comment without actually seeing something in practice. And it really depends on any promises the 'collective organisation' makes. I think it would be quite easy to NOT be liable for anything the energy company does but at the same time if you wnat people to join up you need to make SOME claims and if there is a comemrcial relationship there (and maybe even if not) then broken promises could lead to some form of redress.

Mobeer

I've seen enough problems where there is only 1 customer and 2 power companies. If the proposal is to have many customers, each with their own previous power company, and a broker, and one new company, then the potential for problems seems to be increased.

The broker would (in my opinion) need to take responsibility for both there being a set number of successful switches for the new power company (e.g. ignoring failed switches from customers in debt trying to escape debt) and for each customer trying to switch. I could see a market for a company that takes full responsibility for the switch being a success, but then this won't be the cheapest option.

Arthurian

With E.on, part of current tariffs include regional discounts. I particularly remember this because it took quite a bit of discovering, and when I rang them to ask how much it was, they said they couldn't tell me as their computer system didn't have that information. Though they did agree the regional discounts (varying between geographical regions) formed part of the bill. So it seemed it was impossible for anyone to fully and properly compare tariffs. This sort of thing would be one of the headaches for the proposed venture, I suspect.