How to find best dual fuel deal if only on electric currently

mumma2one

My mum is moving home and I want to find the best deal for her.
She currently lives in a property with just electricity, no gas, where she is moving has gas central heating. I have looked on a couple of comparison sites but it seems to be comparing what you are using now and obviously she isn't using gas at the moment.
Is there a way of finding out which company/deal will be best for her? She lives alone and the property is small so she wouldn't be using that much.

jalexa

mumma2one wrote: »

I have looked on a couple of comparison sites but it seems to be comparing what you are using now and obviously she isn't using gas at the moment.
Is there a way of finding out which company/deal will be best for her?

Quite easy really but first of all a caution. The moment your mum moves into the new house "deemed contracts" are created with the current suppliers to that house. Normally it is evident from "to the occupier" letters who the current suppliers are. If not there are ways to find out. On entry it is imperative that your mum takes readings and contacts the suppliers with the readings to set up accounts.

Back to the comparison. If you enter "average" readings of 16,500 gas and 3,300 electric into the comparison website the price order of the tariffs will be approximately correct for quite a wide range of consumption. For very low consumption, a social supplier such as Ebico *may* prove cheaper.

Be aware that tariffs towards the top of the comparison table are often there by virtue of one of more "gotchas" designed to deliver a top listing.

I recommend that serious consideration is given to fixed-price tariffs extending over the next winter.

HappyMJ

It's a bit tricky...If she can get the usage of the previous occupiers of the new property then that is a start otherwise she'll have to have a guess at usage.

Even though she lives alone it costs about the same to heat the place whether she is the only one in it or there are lots of people living in it. The cost and usage for water heating will be different though depending on how much hot water is used but hot water doesn't cost too much so should not make a huge difference.

I would go for a rate that does not have a cancellation charge so that once she gets an idea of usage after a few months she could consider switching again to a better deal if the intial figures provided are not quite as she expected.

j2011

Could she not ask the previous owner/tenant what their consumption was?

This would then give her a starting point.