Ebico / SSE partnership has ended!

PaschalFun

Michaelw wrote: »

For prepayment Robin Hood energy site gave me a saving of 71p a year while Uswitch gave £1.70 a year more then British Gas.Robin Hoods prices are the same as the big six on that tarriff.The poorest are lkely to have these meters' in place.

That reaching out message also is concerning.I used to like Ebico/SSE and sorry I switched but Ebico are pushing their customers onto Robin Hood Energy and their not always getting a good deal.Its not worth switching from British Gas as there is no difference in price.

The problem here is what is going to happen in December at Ebico?

For anyone on a British Gas variable tariff, perhaps the more pressing problem is what is going to happen in August at British Gas?

Michaelw

[FONT=&quot]Their the first in the spotlight and going to lose customers but will likely still increase.The best deals are for direct debit even though many would still disagree that its a good deal.

Robin Hood like direct debit also as can be seen from the comparason,compared to quarterly bill.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Robin Hood Energy Prime V8[/FONT][FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Fixed for 12 months You save £36.38 per year that goes to a saving of £83.99 by direct debit.[/FONT][FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT][FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Robin Hood Energy Evergreen[/FONT][FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] You save £4.98 per year going to a saving of 52.58 by direct debit.[/FONT][FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT][FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The examples are on my usage for quarterly bill.Ebico comes in at £103.21 saving but for how long after December? And would involve a meter change.[/FONT][FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]December is a month where a lot of people have money problems so a rise at that time isnt going to create positive thoughts in customers.[/FONT][FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Robin Hood are clearly favoring those in the best position to pay not the least.They dont offer a Warm Home Discount to the most vulnerable who qualify and the message which they are giving is in totally discredit.[/FONT][FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
Most of the big energy suppliers have now announced increases to their energy prices, but you can beat the price-rises by moving to our new tariffs launched in partnership with Robin Hood Energy.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]https://ebico.org.uk/ebico-news/beat-the-price-rises-and-move-with-us-to-cheaper-energy-deals-under-our-new-partnership-with-robin-hood-energy/[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]What they are not mentioning is so did Robin Hood.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Not-for-profit supplier Robin Hood Energy has announced it is hiking prices for its standard domestic gas and electricity customers by a whopping 17% on average - one of the largest increases we've seen.

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/energy/2017/03/robin-hood-energy-hits-customers-with-17-hike-in-standard-dual-fuel-prices[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The problem here is that Ebico have also increased prices in line with their supplier.Is one "ethical" supplier going undercut the other?[/FONT]

john10001

I've decided to stay with SSE because the new Ebico/RHE partnership doesn't allow me to pay by Standing Order which is what I have been doing. They will only allow direct debits which is no good for me because I am paid every four weeks and want to make a payment in line with when I am also paid based on what I am using on average. I do this for nearly all my bills and it works well. There is no way I would be able to pay every quarter by direct debit and have such a larger amount being taken.

PaschalFun

Michaelw wrote: »

[FONT=&quot]....[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The problem here is that Ebico have also increased prices in line with their supplier.[FONT=&quot]...[/FONT][/FONT]

I think you are mistaken

Ebico actually reduced the price or their energy when they switched supply partnership.

There has been no change to their prices since their new partnership, irrespective of what the partner supplier has decided to do.
(Their old partner, SSE, have announced increases of another 15% on average for electricity, so anyone remaining on the old Equipower tariffs will soon be paying about 20% more than Ebico/RHE prices)
RHE have a range of tariffs, some of which are fixed, so are unaffected by the change to variable tariffs you mention.

All Ebico tariffs are variable. Having said that, I understand their prices are guaranteed until Decemebr this year.

EachPenny

john10001 wrote: »

I've decided to stay with SSE because the new Ebico/RHE partnership doesn't allow me to pay by Standing Order which is what I have been doing. They will only allow direct debits which is no good for me because I am paid every four weeks and want to make a payment in line with when I am also paid based on what I am using on average. I do this for nearly all my bills and it works well. There is no way I would be able to pay every quarter by direct debit and have such a larger amount being taken.

John, The Ebico/RHE arrangement allows you to pay monthly by direct debit, not just quarterly, which whilst not precisely four-weekly intervals, would be relatively close.

The advantage of switching to Ebico/RHE is after the end of this month you would, if the figures given on this thread are correct, be paying 20% less than you would be by staying with SSE (unless you have WHD).

If you absolutely have to pay by standing order every 4 weeks, and could have a second bank account that you could make sure you would not use for anything else, then why not open a second account, arrange a standing order to transfer money from your main account into the second one on a 4 weekly basis, and then have the gas/electric direct debit coming out of this second account. It is a bit more complicated than just having a simple monthly direct debit, but would allow you to take advantage of the lower Ebico/RHE direct debit prices whilst in effect still paying the bill from your main bank account on a 4 weekly basis.

Provided you make sure there is enough in the account before the first couple of month's direct debits then you should be on a winner - you pay less for your gas and electric and after a few months will start to build up some savings in the account. Pick the right current account and you could be earning interest on that money rather than handing it over to SSE (or whoever) who are normally more than happy to get the benefit instead.

EachPenny

Xbigman wrote: »

I'd also say that Ebico trying to do an automatic switch was quite reasonable. I signed up with Ebico and was an Ebico customer. I never considered myself an SSE customer, although I now realise that legally I was. Water under the bridge I guess...
Darren

I agree with Darren on this. Although I understood from the start that the supply function was done by SSE I regarded myself as an Ebico customer.

I find it interesting that apparently to prevent inertia marketing, customers had to positively decide to switch to the new Ebico/RHE arrangement rather than being transferred automatically. If you take into account that SSE were the existing legal supplier, and have subsequently put their prices up, then from that perspective the company benefiting from people's inertia might be said to be the one the rules on automatic transfer were designed to protect. It feels like Ofgem need to do more work on how transfers of whitelabel customers can be handled more efficiently, especially as the whitelabel companies are likely to be smaller and less well equipped to deal with bulk transfers of thousands of customers.

I don't work for Ebico, and have no relationship with them other than as a customer, but I have found some of the contributions on this thread frustrating and unhelpful. I was a bit unhappy to have a letter telling me I needed to do nothing to switch to RHE, and not have a follow-up letter to explain that was wrong.

I only found out by reading this thread that a positive switch request had become necessary. But that didn't cause the sky to come crashing down on me, I didn't suffer a plague of locusts, I just contacted Ebico and asked to be switched. Touch wood, the switch has gone through fine so far.

For the people aggrieved at Ebico's change of approach to pre-payment, I have to say I find the argument that the 'blame' belongs to Ofgem quite convincing.

My original reason for switching to Ebico was when HM Government/Ofgem decided that the energy market would be a whole lot better for consumers if all companies had to have a standing charge plus single tier kwh charge on each tariff, because anything else was far too confusing to us poor simple souls. Better that is, except for customers like me who faced increases of many 100's of % unless you switched to one of the few companies offering zero standing charge.

I'm not generally a fan of nationalistion, but the way the Government (directly and through Ofgem) want to give the impression of contolling things for the benefit of customers and the environment, and the way the market is dominated by foreign (state) owned companies, then you have to wonder in what ways the current set-up is different to if it were wholly owned and operated by the UK Government. RHE may well be an example of the start of a process of rebuilding a nationalised UK energy supply system - in which case I wish them well and for my part am willing to put up with some minor inconveniences when it comes to switching my supply to Ebico/RHE - especially as when it comes to the bottom line they are cheapest for me by mile. :j

Michaelw

PaschalFun wrote: »

I think you are mistaken

Ebico actually reduced the price or their energy when they switched supply partnership.

There has been no change to their prices since their new partnership, irrespective of what the partner supplier has decided to do.
(Their old partner, SSE, have announced increases of another 15% on average for electricity, so anyone remaining on the old Equipower tariffs will soon be paying about 20% more than Ebico/RHE prices)
RHE have a range of tariffs, some of which are fixed, so are unaffected by the change to variable tariffs you mention.

All Ebico tariffs are variable. Having said that, I understand their prices are guaranteed until Decemebr this year.

I should have mentioned in the past they have increased in line with SSE however Ebico once operated alone with increases.

Michaelw

EachPenny wrote: »

I find it interesting that apparently to prevent inertia marketing, customers had to positively decide to switch to the new Ebico/RHE arrangement rather than being transferred automatically. :j

Some customers on prepay would have had a substancial increase in price if they did and lost the no standing charge.SSE are increasing prices but are not preaching fuel poverty or delivering a public message thats in total contradiction of their foundation principles. Its worth mentioning the loss of Warm Home Discount also for those who qualify.

Theres at least hypocrisy here.Also councils should not be seen to acting in a controversial manner thats likely to attract negative publicity.

EachPenny

Michaelw wrote: »

Some customers on prepay would have had a substancial increase in price if they did and lost the no standing charge.SSE are increasing prices but are not preaching fuel poverty or delivering a public message thats in total contradiction of their foundation principles. Its worth mentioning the loss of Warm Home Discount also for those who qualify.

Sorry, I don't understand what you mean by "in total contradiction of their founding principles", could you please clarify what you mean by this?

Michaelw wrote: »

Theres at least hypocrisy here.

"Hypocrisy" is a strong word to use unless you have good justification for using it - as far as I can see the main change Ebico/RHE are making relates to PPM, and there is apparently a strong argument that the new Ofgem rules have created a situation where the old Ebico arrangements for PPM simply don't work financially anymore. If that is the case then it isn't hypocritical for them to say that they can no longer provide the old deal. I think despite the confusion over the letters sent out by Ebico and SSE it has been fairly clearly stated that people with a PPM or WHD may not benefit from the Ebico/RHE deal and should consider staying with SSE.

Michaelw wrote: »

Also councils should not be seen to acting in a controversial manner thats likely to attract negative publicity.

Who says so? Local Authorites have wide ranging powers and responsibilites within the legislative framework they operate within. Provided what they do is not unlawful there is considerable scope for them to implement policies to improve the lives of people within and outside of their administrative area. Not all of these policies will be universally popular and many will be controversial, some will attract vehement negative publicity - that is the nature of Local Government. The one thing they really cannot do is to enter into financial arrangements which will lead to an unreasonable financial burden on the taxpayer - for example selling energy to customers at unsustainably low prices. If public money is wasted in this way there are usually serious consequences.

Michaelw

The answer is a lot nearer.

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=5320333&page=5#topofpage

Pimm's comments are noted also.A lot of people don't have the money to spare and have conditions to manage.