MSE's Cheap Energy Club: Discuss & feedback

SuiDreams

One query I have with the Cheap energy club is that, some providers e.g. First Utility have a warning about bad feedback etc, but yet with all the problems with NPower posted on the forums, including MSE articles there is still no warnings against NPower.

Seems rather odd

Consumerist

davie wrote: »

. . . I notice this same ploy in calculating annual usage for energy customers whose deal is ending within 12 months is being used by uSwitch and other comparison sites.

The drawback with kind of "intelligent" annual estimate is that you, or the comparison site, need to know exactly which tariff you are currently on but many just don't know.

The disappointing aspect of this change of methodology is that the results from comparison sites will now become inconsistent with each other, causing greater customer confusion. The energy industry are doing their utmost to keep customers confused and it's disappointing that Cheap Energy Club appears to be chasing the money from switching rather that helping consumers.

In the end, as ever, it will be up to the consumer to estimate energy costs, on the basis of unit costs and standing charges, for themselves.

MSE_Dan_L

SuiDreams wrote: »

One query I have with the Cheap energy club is that, some providers e.g. First Utility have a warning about bad feedback etc, but yet with all the problems with NPower posted on the forums, including MSE articles there is still no warnings against NPower.

Seems rather odd

Just to let you know that we have now added a warning to Cheap Energy Club results for NPower following the disproportionate amount of negative feedback provided by our users who have switched.

We do think it's important that are users are aware of this so that they can factor it in to any decision to switch suppliers.

Consumerist

A change to be welcomed.

In the ordinary course of events, one might expect npower reps on this site might take note and pass it on. But this is npower so it will probably be business as usual.

In truth, I don't think they know what to do to help themselves - let alone their customers.

MSE_Dan_L

As a follow up to comments and questions posted about calculations for Cheap Energy Club users on fixed rate tariffs, we thought itwould be helpful to explain how this works.


Following changes introduced by Ofgem, the energy regulator, calculations on comparison sites have to factor in the tariff costs for the remainder of the fixed tariff, as well as the standard tariff the energy suppliers moves customers onto when the fixed tariff ends. This means if you have two months of your fixed rate tariff remaining, your calculation is based on two months atthe fixed tariff rate, and then ten months at the standard tariff rate.


We don’t think this is particularly easy to understand so we're working on showing your fixed cost and go to costs separately, as we think its clearer this way.

Consumerist

MSE_Dan_L wrote: »

. . . Following changes introduced by Ofgem, the energy regulator, calculations on comparison sites have to factor in the tariff costs for the remainder of the fixed tariff, as well as the standard tariff the energy suppliers moves customers onto when the fixed tariff ends. This means if you have two months of your fixed rate tariff remaining, your calculation is based on two months atthe fixed tariff rate, and then ten months at the standard tariff rate.

We don’t think this is particularly easy to understand so we're working on showing your fixed cost and go to costs separately, as we think its clearer this way.

In my view, this is a complete dog's breakfast which is so characteristic of Ofgem.

Do the calculations also have to factor in the early-termination charges on fixed tariffs?

MSE_Dan_L

Consumerist wrote: »

Do the calculations also have to factor in the early-termination charges on fixed tariffs?

Tariff comparisons do not include the cost of the early exit fee (if applicable), however on the results page we do feature a warning message indicating the exit fees of a user's current tariff and that this should be factored in against any saving if leaving early.

dougalldeejay

My Cheap Energy Club is not letting me change my password.
I follow the link in the email to submit a new password. When I provide that, it askes me to login. The login attempt is always 'unsuccessful. HELP!

MSE_Dan_L

dougalldeejay wrote: »

My Cheap Energy Club is not letting me change my password.
I follow the link in the email to submit a new password. When I provide that, it askes me to login. The login attempt is always 'unsuccessful. HELP!

If you have any issues with your account, the best way to let us know is by sending an email to [EMAIL="energyclub@moneysavingexpert.com"]energyclub@moneysavingexpert.com[/EMAIL] as we don’t always see forum comments. If you’re still having issues please drop us a line including your full name, the email address you joined with and your postcode, and we’ll take a look for you.

ic451uk

MSE_Dan_L wrote: »

Following changes introduced by Ofgem, the energy regulator, calculations on comparison sites have to factor in the tariff costs for the remainder of the fixed tariff, as well as the standard tariff the energy suppliers moves customers onto when the fixed tariff ends. This means if you have two months of your fixed rate tariff remaining, your calculation is based on two months atthe fixed tariff rate, and then ten months at the standard tariff rate.


We don’t think this is particularly easy to understand so we're working on showing your fixed cost and go to costs separately, as we think its clearer this way.

I'm sorry this is going to be a long [STRIKE]rant[/STRIKE] post

What a ridiculous approach. This effectively assumes that, once my fixed price deal ends, I will do nothing and drift into my provider’s exorbitant undiscounted variable rate tariff. This exaggerates the cost of my current supplier and may have persuaded me to switch if I hadn’t checked the calculation. Using this method, it will always appear to be worthwhile to pay a cancellation charge to switch to a new fixed rate deal as the expiry of the current deal approaches, when this is not actually true.

To take a simple example:
Mr. A has a 12-month fixed rate, fixed term electricity contract with ABC Ltd. He’s paying £480 per year (£40/month), and there is a cancellation charge of £30. ABC’s Standard Variable Tariff costs 20% more than its fixed rate, fixed term deals. Here is what the Cheap Energy Club will show is the annual cost of this tariff at the start of each month:
Month 1: 12x£40=£480
Month 2: 11x£40+1x£48=£488
Month 3: 10x£40+2x£48=£496
Month 4: 9x£40+3x£48=£504
Month 5: 8x£40+4x£48=£512
Month 6: 7x£40+5x£48=£520
Month 7: 6x£40+6x£48=£528
Month 8: 5x£40+7x£48=£536
Month 9: 4x£40+8x£48=£544
Month 10: 3x£40+9x£48=£552
Month 11: 2x£40+10x£48=£560
Month 12: 1x£40+11x£48=£568
Last Day of Contract: 12x£48=£576
Now let us say that XYZ Ltd has a tariff that is 10% more expensive than ABC Ltd. This will come up on Mr. A’s results as costing £528/year. Therefore, from Month 6 onwards, the CEC website will mislead Mr. A into wanting to escape from his deal with ABC and switch to XYZ – only the cancellation charge stops him. Towards the end of month 10, the savings exceed that cancellation charge and he switches. Once he puts his new details into the Cheap Energy Club website, it immediately tells him that he could save money by switching from XYZ back to ABC! The correct action was actually to do nothing!

May I therefore suggest that the tool be adapted to include an optional alternate calculation method in these sorts of cases? This calculation period should be until the end of the fixed rate deal that the customer is currently on (this may need to be a choice of either date in the event of having two separate fixed terms for gas and electricity). This will avoid giving a new deal this apparent but unreal advantage. Presumably making this available as an 'option' (to be selected by the user once they've seen the dog's breakfast OFGEM demands) would avoid upsetting the lame dog of a regulator?

And breathe... Thanks for reading through all this - I would have sent it to [EMAIL="energyclub@moneysavingexpert.com"]energyclub@moneysavingexpert.com[/EMAIL], but SpamCop has a downer on Talk Talk email addresses at the moment.

IC