Prices per KWH for gas

stef240377

Hi,
Can anyone help me please?

My father is a widower living alone in a 3 bed house and looking at reducing his gas bill. Being an old fashioned OAP wants to know the full Kwh prices before commiting to a change over etc.

He is currently a long term customer of British Gas, he is on their standard tariff after the removal off the essentials tariff. The bill he has had come today shows he is paying 8.6p per kwh for first portion of use then 3.9p for the remainder.

Having quickly inputed some of his details into mysupermarket.com it is showing tha NPower are cheaper by £115.11 per year with a d/d discount of £50 per year for single fuel. He is not tied into his electricity supplier so wouldnt be opposed to moving to create bigger discounts with dual fuel. The only down side is he is not a computer user so the application would have to be done via the phone or house visit he also wants actual bills sent to him as he double checks everything. Being in his early 70's and having savings he doesnt qualify for a lot of the oap discounts that could be available but as previously mentioned he wants solid figures to work on, yes he may be saving xxx amount but how can we find out the actual unit charge. Any help is appreciated.

HappyMJ

Does he want to pay in advance by using direct debit? A lot of older people like getting bills and paying them in cash after they have used the gas. There is no problem in doing that but when you do the comparison you need to choose cash (pay on receipt of bill) as the payment method. Npower will most probably bill him online. If he wants to see bills then he will have to pay a little extra for them.

stef240377

He said he has paid D/D previously so going back to that format isnt a problem but he doesnt want anything online as he has no pc access hence me doing this on his behalf. He signed up with southern elec for his electric supply and wasnt made aware that he had agreed to online billing - which is totally useless to him when he doesnt have a computer and missed the first bill, was totally oblivious till they sent a paper reminder to let him know and a quick phone call got the billing sorted out.

I think he is more interested in moving suppliers since my sister has told him she pays less than 4p per unit for both rates with EON and this is what has spured him into asking for the actual break down in kwh unit prices rather than just being told sign up with xxx and save xxx.

victor2

Use the comparison sites (such as uSwitch) and look at the dual fuel options. He should be able to get his annual kWh usage for both gas and electricity from past bills, so use those figures for the comparison.

Can he read his own meters and phone readings in, or does he just rely on the meter reader? He wants to avoid estimated readings for his bills if at all possible.

Remember it's not just the rates per kWh to consider, but discounts and standing charge or no standing charge tariffs come into it as well. That's where the comparison sites are useful - they calculate an annual cost for the usage given and show estimated costs accordingly.

zagfles

stef240377 wrote: »

He said he has paid D/D previously so going back to that format isnt a problem but he doesnt want anything online as he has no pc access hence me doing this on his behalf. He signed up with southern elec for his electric supply and wasnt made aware that he had agreed to online billing - which is totally useless to him when he doesnt have a computer and missed the first bill, was totally oblivious till they sent a paper reminder to let him know and a quick phone call got the billing sorted out.

I think he is more interested in moving suppliers since my sister has told him she pays less than 4p per unit for both rates with EON and this is what has spured him into asking for the actual break down in kwh unit prices rather than just being told sign up with xxx and save xxx.

I imagine your sister has a single rate and a standing charge, this won't necessarily be any cheaper.

I normally use energyhelpline for comparisons, you can click on tariff details for each tariff to get the kwh rates, and they tell you in the results list whether it's paperless billing or not.

stef240377

Yes he is perfectly fine reading the meter and always home when the meter reader turns up, he keeps a weekly check on his consumption by writing down the readings and dating them so he knows exactly what the bill should come into once received.

As an example from 8th march to 27th april the bill has come in at £150. Where as his winter useage was approx £360.

The only reason he hadnt previously gone into dual fuel when signing up with southern electric for the leccie was they didnt at that time offer a discount for both fuels and british gas remained cheaper for gas overall.

victor2

Sounds like he's pretty clued up then, even if not computer literate. In fact, if he can understand his tariffs and work out the cost for his usage, he must be a walking calculator!

Just use the comparison sites to point him in the right direction. Let him consider things like fixed or variable tariffs as well. He can also consider the best dual fuel option from one of his existing suppliers - no need to stay with either, but if he's more comfortable only leaving one and can reduce overall cost, then that might be a way to go.

stef240377

This is why i wanted to be able to get hold of a website that shows the exact amount per unit used rather than just showing an overall saving, Dad cant get his head round the fact that different companies all use the same tactics to get you signed up such as telling you that they are 7% cheaper than the leader when there are no figures to mull over to see evidence of this. Thanks to Zagfles i can print off the comparisons including the break down of each tariff for him to ponder and see where this will go in over the next couple of weeks.

Many thanks to all for your quick replies.