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Utility Warehouse (Telecom Plus) Discussion
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Neither Ebico or GoodEnergy claim to be cheaper than anyone else, at least not in any literature or any advertising that I've seen.
I understand why UW reps are disliked so much, all of my dealings with them have left a bad taste & as said previuosly I like their profit margin but dislike the methodology behind it.
You can't compare BG today with BG even a year ago, they've made massive improvements in CS and provide a real tariff for vulnerable customers. Though SSE still have the best CS.
If you are on the right tariff with BG, they are cheaper than UW.
For phone/Broadband I might actually prefer UW, but I am with neither, their domestic broadband service is not good enough and BTs' commercial SDSL is horrendously expensive.
All of my properties with PrePay are with Ebico for gas and BG for electric.0 -
kippen_noedel wrote: »Neither Ebico or GoodEnergy claim to be cheaper than anyone else, at least not in any literature or any advertising that I've seen.
I understand why UW reps are disliked so much, all of my dealings with them have left a bad taste & as said previuosly I like their profit margin but dislike the methodology behind it.
You can't compare BG today with BG even a year ago, they've made massive improvements in CS and provide a real tariff for vulnerable customers. Though SSE still have the best CS.
If you are on the right tariff with BG, they are cheaper than UW.
For phone/Broadband I might actually prefer UW, but I am with neither, their domestic broadband service is not good enough and BTs' commercial SDSL is horrendously expensive.
All of my properties with PrePay are with Ebico for gas and BG for electric.
Ebico certainly have in the past been 'guilty' of making a claim that was probably not quite as good as it appeared. It does appear the intervention of myself (and my new best friend Cardew) caused them to withdraw that particular claim.
Here's the Ebico rep's response to my question:The £1 million figure is based on how many customers switched to us and the difference between our tariffs and the standard British Gas and 'in area' supplier's tariff. Lets just say it's a conservative estimate.
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.html?p=19355077&postcount=40
Sounds very familiar *cough* TVG? *cough* :eek::D
Certainly a familiarity Cardew picked up on in the thread:
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.html?p=19359433&postcount=42
Like I have said before, there are absolutely no 100% good guys in this discredited industry.Call me Carmine....
HAVE YOU SEEN QUENTIN'S CASHBACK CARD??0 -
OK let us spell out, for any new readers of this thread,The mind of the bigot is like the pupil of the eye; the more light you pour upon it, the more it will contract.
Oliver Wendell Holmes0 -
Do you think other members can not read or understand English? I posted the full thing in order to let people decide for themselves. It seems that you are like the present government we have in that they too can not understand the public have brains of their own and are capable of their own decisions.
The creed of Caveat emptor as applied to friends and family eh?
I certainly don't think many people bother to read the small print, even some of those who post on the gas and electricity forum(who presumably have some interest in prices) show an appalling lack of understanding of tariffs.
In the case of UW, that can be because they can't be bothered to read the small print, cannot understand it if they have read it, or trust the person selling them the tariff.
What percentage of people in UK do you think would understand the significance of their Regional electricity supplier? and realise that it is the most expensive supplier for their area? That UW take that regional supplier's most expensive tariff for comparison purposes - and to add insult to injury, exclude discounts that regional supplier in the comparison?
They read the headline statement in the TVG and simply do not appreciate that the small print renders it meaningless.
In fact going by the input of some UW distributors on this forum, they appear so thick that they don't understand how the small print makes the TVG meaningless.0 -
I don't have a family member/friend etc who is a UW distributor. I number-crunched and discovered they would be the cheapest supplier for us all on my own
I readily accept that, if I hadn't 'thought outside the box' and taken the trouble to 'dig deeper' instead just relying on the comparison sites I certainly wouldn't have gone for UW for my gas and electric. But in the case of UW the comparison site is seriously lacking in giving potential punters the necessary info to decide if it really is for them (basically they can't be arsed because there's no incentive as they get no commission from UW for a punter switching).
Fact is this company is very very different to ALL other utility companies in the services/incentives it offers. The deal needs explaining (unless you are an incredibly bright obsessive like myself). Hence one of the reasons it is sold like it is - another major reason is its obvious value for money to the company.
PS Apparently 16 million people shop with Sainsburys every week. Taking into account there will be some of these who shop more than once, let's say 6 million individual households shop there weekly. I wonder what proportion of these households could get their utilities for less with UW than any other supplier if they were willing to use the card instead of their debit card? 4-5 million? Remember the 5% is also granted on petrol and diesel. This is not some niche retailer we are talking about here.Call me Carmine....
HAVE YOU SEEN QUENTIN'S CASHBACK CARD??0 -
The creed of Caveat emptor as applied to friends and family eh?.
The TVG is not meaningless at all as it is quite specific in thew way it is written.The mind of the bigot is like the pupil of the eye; the more light you pour upon it, the more it will contract.
Oliver Wendell Holmes0 -
The TVG is not meaningless at all as it is quite specific in thew way it is written.
We are in agreement that it is quite specific in the way it is written.
I also agree that the TVG is not meaningless to UW; it enables them to give a guarantee that is worthless to their customers.
You are fully aware, as is any intelligent person, that the TVG is a disgrace. Yet you trot it out time and again on this forum.
My great friend on this forum - Carmine - was so angry with Ebico who tried a similar tactic to the TVG - that he took it up with the firm and to their credit they have withdrawn the guarantee.
No such scruples from UW I would wager!0 -
I was talking about the members of this forum who I assumed to be able to read and make up their own minds, whereas you seem to insist they do not understand "small print."
The TVG is not meaningless at all as it is quite specific in thew way it is written.
Amongst the many uw reps who have come here and tried it on, (using the forum for a bit of spamming/misleading info), there have been some who had newly parted with their £200 to become a rep who apparently believed the guarantee was genuine, and that they were here promoting the company that supplied the "cheapest" g + e, and what's more "guaranteed it"!
Maybe you have missed seeing those posts?
And on the reps forum (where Keggs does his motivation for any reps losing heart), there was the case where despite the guarantee, a prospect was lost because his BG standard tariff was cheaper.
The disgruntled rep took the problem up with your HO who weaseled out of it by putting a new slant on the guarantee, now saying the guarantee has to be explained as only being effective over a 12 month period (even though its wording says UW is always cheaper than BG!), and telling the rep to use this new explanation of the worthless guarantee.
The disgruntled rep published the UW email for all to see:Thanks for your email.
The Triple Value Guarantee (TVG) still applies.
However, it only applies when compared with a like for like direct debit tariff and does not allow for any duel fuel discounts, non standard or internet tariffs.
If compared with a like for like tariff the Guarantee applies over a period of a year. It is possible at any given point within that year that the companies covered by the TVG may be cheaper. We monitor our prices against their prices to ensure that over the course of a year the customer would pay less with us than with those companies.
I hope this clarifies how the TVG operates and should be interpreted or explained.0 -
We are in agreement that it is quite specific in the way it is written.
I also agree that the TVG is not meaningless to UW; it enables them to give a guarantee that is worthless to their customers.
You are fully aware, as is any intelligent person, that the TVG is a disgrace. Yet you trot it out time and again on this forum.
My great friend on this forum - Carmine - was so angry with Ebico who tried a similar tactic to the TVG - that he took it up with the firm and to their credit they have withdrawn the guarantee.
No such scruples from UW I would wager!
My God, I'm blushing.I have made it quite clear on here what i think of any company's guarantee/claim/headlines etc. I pay absolutely no heed to them. I do my own sums and base my decisions on them. The TVG had no bearing whatsoever on my personal decision to join UW, similarly the various claims of 'savings' the Big 6 display on their sites have never influenced me at all.
Actually, Ebico's TVG-like 'claim' was probably worse than UWs on account of there being absolutely no qualifying small print displayed. It was just a straight boast. And, contrary to both our assertions that they have removed it from their site, it's still there (they've just moved it). It's a claim made by the founder of the company, no less. Again, no small print shown explaining how the figure was arrived at. Note the non-specific way it is worded - 'I reckon'.I reckon we’ve saved households about in total £1 million over the last year (2007) and we’d like to double that in 2008.
http://www.ebico.co.uk/html/a_directors.php
If you genuinely was so concerned about any energy supplier mis-selling you wouldn't be with BG.
Talking of small print, I note in Quentin's thread on Eon's £70 cashback he makes absolutely no reference to a very important T&C - namely Eon don't grant any discount on the final bill. (adopts fake Geordie accent) Faux pas or deliberately omitted to gain more thanks? You decide.Call me Carmine....
HAVE YOU SEEN QUENTIN'S CASHBACK CARD??0 -
I hope that all moneysavers, being intelligent people, can distinguish between the lies being spread by the UW salesmen on here and the (largely) factual contributions of the rest. I have been approached by 2 UW salesmen in the last month or so, both of whom I know to be sincere, decent individuals. Both of them have said (because they have been trained to do so) that the 'Triple Value Guarantee' means that UW guarantee to be the cheapest energy suppliers for any individual.
I assume even the UW salesmen on here will admit that that is a lie. But otherwise decent people believe it. Why?
This is the heart of the UW scam. The salesmen are self employed (and of course actually pay UW for the privilege), so UW can say that anything their salesmen say is not their responsibility. But they still tolerate/condone/encourage these dishonest sales tactics.0
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