The Big Switch (Which/38 Degrees)

meggsy

.. and the result is that the Coop now have 52,000 customers

http://www.thenews.coop/node/8676

Richie-from-the-Boro

.... and as a result of - taking an over large chunk STRIKE]greed[/STRIKE of £40 commission per customer for the 'service' they have managed a paltry 52k of the nation,and an even more depressingly tiny % of their uber loyal captive audience of members group of 300,000.

Margin over unit ~ or ~ unit over margin, they chose to walk in to the temple and make a quick quid taking a lot from the very few. They could have chosen to take a little over the very many and in so doing put a pointy-stick in the eyes of the big 6 greed machine.

52k nationwide is an embarrassing start and an abject failure to 'make a case' to their very own membership .. .. pity. That the competition which has been stifled by the dominance of the big 6 leading to poor customer service and lack of transparency could have been opened up by Co-operative Energy, but clearly has failed.

Terrylw1

52k even split across the big 6 is very small potatoes. I'm sure there monthly churn rates will easily deal with that.

kar999

Richie-from-the-Boro wrote: »

.... and as a result of 52k nationwide is an embarrassing start and an abject failure to 'make a case' to their very own membership .. .. pity. That the competition which has been stifled by the dominance of the big 6 leading to poor customer service and lack of transparency could have been opened up by Co-operative Energy, but clearly has failed.

Weren't the Coops numbers capped?

The number of people who could join Co-operative Energy through the auction was originally capped at 30,000. That was 20,000 new fixed rate direct debit customers and 10,000 new variable rate cash/cheque customers. Following the success of the auction and the number of energy customers wanting to switch to Co-operative Energy, the supplier and Which? have today announced that they are to allow a further 10,000 people to join on the new fixed rate tariff. Which? has extended the deadline for switching to Thursday 31stMay 2012 to allow people time to switch.

Terrylw1

kar999 wrote: »

Weren't the Coops numbers capped?

The number of people who could join Co-operative Energy through the auction was originally capped at 30,000. That was 20,000 new fixed rate direct debit customers and 10,000 new variable rate cash/cheque customers. Following the success of the auction and the number of energy customers wanting to switch to Co-operative Energy, the supplier and Which? have today announced that they are to allow a further 10,000 people to join on the new fixed rate tariff. Which? has extended the deadline for switching to Thursday 31stMay 2012 to allow people time to switch.

They had to be. The industry itself applies a daily data transmission cap. This would have needed resolving first but its only been the sales/marketing side, no one who understands the rest seems to have been involved, hence a quick mass switch beneath the cap.

Which avoided letting their customers down by giving some later switch dates and falling foul of Ofgem's anti discrimination SLC in the process.

Which never intended to go big. They just grabbed some quick cash and cheap press.