SSE THTC Price Hike - Alternatives?

Queechie

The profiteering is not just restricted to SSE as we have been having issues with Scottish Power and their ComfortPlus system. We were notified of price rises of 37% as from January in the 'Heat' unit tariff, supposedly due to Ofgems pricecapping exercise, and this had an overall effect of increasing our electricity bill by 27% (+£600 for a 2 bed cottage) in a single throw!
Not letting this go because of the amount concerned and the total reluctance of other providers to take on our account, I did a bit of investigation to find out that Ofgem raised a report in 2013 regarding Dynamically Controlled Switching tariffs and identified that users (500k in UK) were unable to switch suppliers and were therefore at a total disadvantage in the marketplace. However, did they take this into account with the new pricecaps? The answer is NO. My correspondence with them and arguments that this was a monopoly situation fell on deaf ears and I was told they could not interfere with tariffs (Doh, what is a pricecap?). Similarly complaints to SP were initially responded to with a "thats the price" response. Citizens Advice suggested formally complaining thru SP's complaints system again. The Energy Ombudsman passed the buck onto Ofgem and so on. Even the media seem uninterested as I've written to newspaper finance pages and even Martin Lewis on his recent TV series. This is surprising to me because even simple extrapolation of the costs involved (ave, increase of £600 per customer X 500,000 customers = £300million per annum!!) shows the effect this overcharging will have in this monopoly situation.

It was only because I wouldn't let it go that SP appeared to take some action and I was given an advisor who we eventually negotiated a more reasonable increase with, however we have had to agree to new T&C's and a limited timescale for the contract. This probably means we'll have to go through the same process in less than 2 years time and so far we have had 7 confirmation letters, none of which actually shows the agreed rates, contract dates or Direct Debit amounts we negotiated..

Come the Revolution....

matelodave

We had an E7 meter which only had a single set of tails - it just switched between high and low rate on the display.

It had an auxiliary contact set to drive an external contactor to switch the storage heaters/hot water to activate the supply during off peak times although when we had it fitted we had both distribution panels (peak and off-peak) connected in parallel as we intended to swap to a single rate - the meter man fitted the parallel block)

The meter was changed in software to a single rate meter when we moved onto a single rate tariff (the supplier sent another bloke out who changed it via the optical port on the front of the meter).

So you cannot guarantee what you'll get if you have a meter change although I guess you'll be hard pressed to get anything other than a smart meter if you want to change.

I guess it would be a good idea to get an isolator fitted between the meter and the tails which would allow your electrican to reconfigure the supplies without having to get the DNO or supplier involved

Thomas_Edison

Part 2 suppliers have an obligation to make a relevant tariff available, while for most this will mean a standard variable tariff which would be a very bad deal.

Suppliers with only 1 tariff like Bulb, Igloo and others I believe would have to offer this.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/energy-market-investigation-restricted-meters-order-2016