Whats the cheapest way to pay for a electric/gas bills?

BritishGasWorker

Lee_Dunford wrote: »

Thanks for this BritishGasWorker. Since posting the original question, NPOWER sent me two directdebit forms for my electric and gas to fill out. There was a section on each form which was for internal use only. This section asked how much DD would be set, and £35.00 was filled in by staff at NPOWER for both my electric and gas. not sure where they got that figure from, as I have never received a bill from them as yet. I assumed this is estimated figure, which will mean £420.00 per year for gas and £420.00 for electric, is that a good figure or has NPOWER charged over the odds?

Im afraid Npower confuse me on most issues.....so I am not sure even if they offer payment in advance but asking them may help you you could ask them to look at the previous tennants consumption at the property, or they may just use a national average however, in the end if you consume more than you have paid for they should write to you asking you to top up your account we do and it has proven very popular with alot of people....I dont have the tariffs to hand but i do know they are alot cheaper than the standard tariffs.

Cardew

Originally Posted by BritishGasWorker

If you have the money..the totally best cheapest way to pay is " payment in advance.." how it works is they estimated you consumption over 1 year,,they say you pay say £700.00 for your total years consumption, the charge you the lowest rate possible out of all the rates for your gas/electric..once your money runs out they re-estimate again..so on ...it does save you a fortune! and you dont have to worry about 3 monthly bills

Posted by Cardew
Are you just talking about BG? - I don't think the OP was.

However perhaps you can give some examples of it 'saving a fortune'?

Take BG's normal advance payment gas tariff as an example and compare it with their Click 2 tariff.

Use the average consumption of 20,500kWh per year.

Posted by British Gas Worker
Im afraid Npower confuse me on most issues.....so I am not sure even if they offer payment in advance but asking them may help you you could ask them to look at the previous tennants consumption at the property, or they may just use a national average however, in the end if you consume more than you have paid for they should write to you asking you to top up your account we do and it has proven very popular with alot of people....I dont have the tariffs to hand but i do know they are alot cheaper than the standard tariffs.

British Gas Worker,
This thread asks about the cheapest way to pay for Gas and Electricity.

Firstly you have made the bald statement that it ‘saves a fortune’ using advanced payment. Well for BG it doesn’t.

If we just take gas as an example for someone using the national average of 20,500kWh per year.

The current rates are:(Tier 1 is first 1143kWh per quarter – prices include Vat)

Advanced Payment 3.375p/2.142p for Tier1/Tier2

Standard Payment 4.618/2.352

Click 2 4.346/2.21

However on Standard payment and Click Energy you will get discounts of 10.3% for payment by Direct Debit.(up to a max of £15.08 per quarter) Your discount depends on what you use each quarter but I estimate it to be approx £50 a year.

So for 20,500kWh pa Costs will be:

Advanced Pay £514

Standard Pay £536

Click 2 £501

Also bear in mind that you will lose the interest on your money by paying in advance.

So ‘Save a Fortune’?

tripled

Both Cardew and BGW are right in a way. If you are with BG and don't want an online tariff or are on a price protection package then advanced payment is the cheapest method as BGW said, although for an average user I would agree with Cardew that a 'fortune' is not necessarily an accurate term.

However, the dd discount is capped at £14.36 per quarter for gas, so if you use substantially above the national average then you can make more significant savings on the advance payment tariff as there is no ceiling on the discounted rate.

Lee, I like to have control over my money and tend to forget about direct debits, so am unhappy when sums of money randomly vanish out of my account. I don't mind standing orders as much, but I prefer either a cash account or a payment book/card. Also it supports the local shops.

Cardew

tripled wrote: »

Both Cardew and BGW are right in a way. If you are with BG and don't want an online tariff or are on a price protection package then advanced payment is the cheapest method as BGW said, although for an average user I would agree with Cardew that a 'fortune' is not necessarily an accurate term.

However, the dd discount is capped at £14.36 per quarter for gas, so if you use substantially above the national average then you can make more significant savings on the advance payment tariff as there is no ceiling on the discounted rate.

Tripled,


Firstly: £14.36 + VAT = £15.08 - Pedantic Moi;)

Secondly I don't agree with you about advanced payment being the cheapest method on a Price protection Tariff(as BGW said)

Take gas on PP2010. Advanced payment is 2.974/2.069p(incl VAT) DD is 3.032/2.113.

So taking 20,500kWh Advanced payment comes to: £466 DD(before DD discount) comes to £475.

So with a DD discount of approx £50 it will be £425 and you will still make some savings in interest on top of that. Therefore DD is approx £40 cheaper than Advanced Payment( + savings in interest)



For 41,000kWh(substantially above the national average) Advanced is £890 DD is £908 which with a £60 DD reduction is £848 and a lot more saving of interest! Again DD is over £40 cheaper than aAdvanced(plus a lot of interest)

I don't believe they do advanced payment on PP electricity do they?

Care to comment?


Incidentally the OP simply asked for the cheapest way, and an on-line account is cheaper than advanced payment.

Also he didn't specify BG!

tripled

Cardew wrote: »

£14.36 + VAT = £15.08

Pedantic Moi;)

Consider my hand slapped

The OP simply asked for the cheapest way, and an on-line account is cheaper than advanced payment.

Also he didn't specify BG!

I believe he actually asked which was better as well as cheaper I gave my opinion on dd's further up the page, and answered a follow up question by the op in my last post too. I just thought I'd help clear up the debate between you and BGW. So I'm off now to polish my halo

Cardew

tripled wrote: »

Consider my hand slapped



I believe he actually asked which was better as well as cheaper I gave my opinion on dd's further up the page, and answered a follow up question by the op in my last post too. I just thought I'd help clear up the debate between you and BGW. So I'm off now to polish my halo

Was editing my previous post - when you posted this. Have you read the edited message?

trinidadone

oh, i am even more confused now, than when i first posted the question, people are discussing British Gas and lots of figures are being posted on this thread, i just want to know if paying by DD is the best method from Npower!!! still not sure

tripled

lol, sorry we've hijaked your thread Lee. To the best of my knowledge yes DD is the cheapest method with nPower. It is certainly cheaper than quarterly billing.

Cardew - They used to build the dd discount into the tariff, so you will see the dd rate is already lower than the quarterly rate, there is no extra discount to add, so I'm afraid advance payment is cheaper

espresso

Lee_Dunford wrote: »

oh, i am even more confused now, than when i first posted the question, people are discussing British Gas and lots of figures are being posted on this thread, i just want to know if paying by DD is the best method from Npower!!! still not sure

So why don't you read all about your tariff at the npower website. Dual fuel DD with an annual loyalty bonus is probably the cheapest payment package but there are many different tariffs!

trinidadone

its easy just to look at a website, but far better to get other peoples experiences. Telephoned Npower this morning, there customer services are really bad, was answered promptly, but none of the DD forms i filled out had been registered on my account, and the gas section still has me down as a pre-paid meter (with a key), is that crazy, its the usual advice, sit tight, you are in the system mmmmmmmmmm