E.On - question regards "price protection May 2014" tarrif

JustAnotherSaver

I asked my mum whether she was fixed or not for her electricity bill & she said she was fixed.
She then told me the other day she got a letter through saying her price was going up from £92pm to £117pm.

According to the letter she's on a "price protection may 2014" tarriff. Price "protection" would suggest to me fixed, but is it really?

Thrown her figures (apparently 9,552KWh was used in the past 12 months) into an online comparison site & there's numerous cheaper options (from companies i've never even heard of - are these any good?). These are actually fixed, which she likes. There are even some variables cheaper than what she's getting.

Just wondering 2 things - 1) whether this is a fixed plan or not & 2) is that the figure you use for the comparisons (9,522KWh?)

Thanks.

macman

Oh dear. Major misunderstanding here. 'Fixed price tariff' means that the unit kWh price is fixed. Not the monthly DD price. If she uses more kWh than her DD covers then the DD level goes up.
It's not like an 'all you can eat for £92 per month buffet'. No supplier offers that.
The tariff you refer to is actually a capped tariff, not a fixed one. Very few of those around now.

dogshome

Assuming your Mum has a Standard meter, ( Not an ECO 7, which would be dearer ), her annual cost for the 9552 Kwh she uses a year comes in at appx. £1,200 a year

But her £92 a month D/Debit figure totals only £1,100 a year, which means that she has built up a debt - The D/D increase to £117 is designed to charge for what she is actually useing, and, recover some of the existing debt month-by-month over, probably, the next 12 months

E.ON_Company_Representative:_Helena

Morning JustAnotherSaver,

Agree with the others here, there has been some misunderstanding, it is the unit prices that are fixed not the usage, so this means the Direct Debit can increase or decrease depending if the usage changes.

If a balance has built up on the account then the payments will need to increase to cover the ongoing usage and the debt.

It is always best to pop your usage in kWh when using comparison sites as this is a more accurate way of doing this.

You will normally pay a bit more to be on a capped tariff as this means you won't be affected if we do have a price increase, so you pay a premium for peace of mind really.

Hope this helps a little.

Helena

macman

But a capped tariff does not prevent a price increase. It just prevents you paying more than a pre-determined maximum amount. The price can still increase up to that maximum.

JustAnotherSaver

Ahh that's confusion there on my part then. Thanks for clearing that up.

Using the figure that E-ON gave us, these are the following results:



Some variable rates in there also which still claim to be saving.

So if we move provider we'll owe E-ON an amount. Isn't it still worth shifting to another provider though?

dogshome

YES - It's worth jumping ship - *Probably

So far as Mum's present debt to Eon is concerned, I'm afraid she owes it and must pay it back, but if it's less than £200 the Ofgem guideline is that Eon should let her Switch
Ideally she should pay off the debt, which will be shown on her Final Bill in one single payment

*I'm not familiar with Eon's "Price Protection May 2014" tariff, but it's likely to have Early Exit Fee's if she leaves before May 2014, so look on the T&C's to see how much this will cost, or phone Eon and ask