Ebico do not have daily standing charges

meercatsunited

I know some others do not have them but many are going to in the future.

If you are one who is always trying to use less because of limited income then you may want to change.

I believe Ebico was originally set up with those on a low income in mind, having said that the electricity charge is a little higher than some but they do have a simple system.

You can leave Ebico any time without penalty.

Other suppliers could have saved me £20-25 per year, that was before they introduced the compulsory standing charges and you would have to be tied in to them for 18 months or so and its £50 if you leave.

wakeupalarm

meercatsunited wrote: »

I believe Ebico was originally set up with those on a low income in mind....

And now is being flooded by second home owners who are hardly there most of year and so have tiny bills but incur large admin costs to Ebico.
The no-standing charge policy won't last too long once their costs rise.

bxboards

Scottish Power also are still offering no standing charges. I am a very low gas user, so changed from nPower to SP due to nPower's recent 45p a day standing charge which would have cost me £175 just via the charge vs the £10 a month in actual usage.

Wywth

wakeupalarm wrote: »

And now is being flooded by second home owners who are hardly there most of year and so have tiny bills but incur large admin costs to Ebico.
The no-standing charge policy won't last too long once their costs rise.

Incorrect. That old line was trotted out over 10 years ago, but Ebico have gone from strength to strength, increasing customer numbers year on year.

Ebico have confirmed they have no intention of changing their current business strategy and USP of offering a single unit price and no daily standing charge.

Wywth

Those on the original British Gas Standard tariff (no longer available to new applicants - their new 'standard' is Clear & Simple) do not get charged any daily standing charge.

However I would suggest anyone, no matter what your consumption level is, consults a comparison site to find the best deal for them.

e.g. a tariff with a daily standing charge may still be the cheapest option, especially if there are some large discounts being offered. In fact you may be lucky and find a supplier prepared to pay you

macman

Despite the new billing rules, what is to stop Ebico (or indeed any other supplier) simply charging a nominal 1p per day standing charge?

Wywth

macman wrote: »

Despite the new billing rules, what is to stop Ebico (or indeed any other supplier) simply charging a nominal 1p per day standing charge?

Nothing at all, but Ebico are not going to.

As I understand the 192 page Ofgem proposals, a daily standing charge can be any amount starting as low as 0.0p per day

This is a cause for concern. The orginal proposal was for Ofgem to set the daily standing charge so that all suppliers would charge the same. That would mean there would be an easily comparable single unit cost for customers to compare.
But Ofgem caved in, and now suppliers can set their own standing charge - some suppliers even have different standing charges within their own tariff range :eek:
(In fact they can also change by, for example, day of the week! - but I don't think any supplier does this yet)
Confusion will still reign. Thank god for comparison sites

The variation in standing charges was discussed in last weekends BBC moneybox
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01s7tpz (12mins 20 seconds onwards)

ian1969uk

Might sound like a daft question, but if Ebico are not for profit, why aren't they much cheaper than companies who have a profit element built into their prices?

I just did a quote for Ebico and they are almost 50% higher than the best of the comparison website quotes.

MK55

That's because they will be trying to break even. Most energy companies at the top of the list are selling energy at a loss.

Wywth

ian1969uk wrote: »

Might sound like a daft question, but if Ebico are not for profit, why aren't they much cheaper than companies who have a profit element built into their prices?

I just did a quote for Ebico and they are almost 50% higher than the best of the comparison website quotes.

Because all they do is level out the price to all their customers they pay SSE for. SSE is a 'for profit' company.

Ebico is particularly suited to low user, and low consumption is something they wish to encourage. (See their website for more details)

DragonQ

ian1969uk wrote: »

Might sound like a daft question, but if Ebico are not for profit, why aren't they much cheaper than companies who have a profit element built into their prices?

I just did a quote for Ebico and they are almost 50% higher than the best of the comparison website quotes.

They are cheaper but for low users only. If they were a large company they could probably be cheaper than all of the big 6 for most users considering how much profit those companies make.