Do I really get to save as much as these sites say?

Anton30

Our gas and electric bill will total over £2500 this year, which is a lot, and we are desperately looking for ways to reduce that to more managable levels. On Moneysupermarrket, after doing a comparison using one of their tools, we are told we will be able to save around £300 to almost £600 against current suppplier depending on the provider we switched to if were to use the same amount of electrcity and gas as we did this year. Are these figures cut and dried, or have they hidden stipulations? Also, are they subject to changing energy prices or fixed for the year? I find it difficult to believe how there can be such discrepancy in the pricing between one firm and the next.

victor2

Most of those sites cost your current tariff and then the same supplier's standard tariff if you do nothing when the current tariff ends and automatically go on to the standard (most expensive) one. So, the "savings" predicted are totally unrealistic - unless you have at least a year to run on your existing tariff, and it is a fixed rate.
Assuming you know what your annual usage in kWh is for both gas and electricity and you put that in to the comparison site, you will get realistic figures for the future cost with a choice of suppliers, IF you use the same amount of energy. Ignore the savings figure. You know what your current cost is, so compare that to the predicted costs. If you're on a competitive tariff, then you possibly are not going to be able to better it, but it will give you an idea how much the cost is going to change by.

Bluebirdman_of_Alcathays

Yes and no. These comparisons are based on people rolling over to standard (expensive) tariff when their (cheaper) fixed tariffs expire, so the savings are often inflated. That said, if you are currently on a standard tariff anyway, then the saving will be real - you haven't given us enough info in your opening post. The focus should be on what is the cheapest possible tariff, not on any notional "savings".


There can easily be around 20% between most expensive in the market and cheapest - so your numbers are believable. The largest energy companies know that a massive proportion of their customers pay quarterly when the bill comes through the door, and will never switch or go to DD. These people's tariffs subsidise the rest of us.

macman

If you are currently on Standard tariff (which I assume you are if you have never switched before) paying £2.5K, then a £300+ saving is perfectly possible on the best fixed discount tariff.
Unit prices will be fixed for the minimum term contract period if you pick a fixed tariff, but variable up or down if you pick a variable tariff.
You don't say how large the property is, but you may also need to address the issue of why your usage appears to be around twice the national average. If you want meaningful advice on this, post your annual kWh usage on each fuel.

[Deleted User]

The comp sites and Ofgem expect people to be complete idiots. Once people get used to very good one year fixes they never go back onto standard/variable rip offs. Its similar to house insurance and car insurances when the golden rule is never auto renew and face a 30% hike