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fewkeste

Tafrock wrote: »

Just under 3 months in to my powershop experience. And I must admit I'm quite impressed

At first I bought all powerpacks mainly to avoid having to pay standard prices but now I have built up quite a hefty credit of 111 pounds and paid for my overestimated electricity usage until end of November already so I'm only buying power packs with discounts of 15 percent or more.

Out goes jumbo as that's only 7 percent and the silly little random boosters

However I certainly will be buying all December power packs and have already bought all November and a couple of October

I find it a breeze to use. Statements and weekly updates are clear and simple to understand. After 2 months I have already saved 42.02 off standard electricity prices even with buying the jumbos etc which I won't be buying anymore. If the saving rate continues at this level (and I expect it to be higher as I won't be buying small discount power packs) I would save at least 84 pounds in a year narrowly beating my best quote from other providers. I reckon a saving of 76 pounds annually is enough to beat iresas market leading quote for myself (Though I wouldn't be going anywhere near Iresa anyway).

I'm quite happy with powershop and will be staying with them for the foreseeable future. Though when my gas supplier zog launches electricity supply I may well leave for a duel fuel contract with them as I'm extremely happy to be a 4 year customer of zog

Not at all worried about the credit I've built up with powershop.

I agree with virtually everything you've put in this post. Once a customer has bought the maximum amount of future packs and the monthly simple savers there's no need to bother with the pawltry discount of the Jumbo packs. They are of use for new customers who wouldn't have had the opportunity to purchase the relevant future packs (as they would have had to have purchased them before they joined Powershop!!) I do however buy the silly appetiser packs simply because they are usually 28% discount.

I'm waiting for this month's in-month specials - they normally do two or three per month but nothing so far this month. This is the first month I've chosen NOT to buy a Jumbo pack. Are other customers seeing September in-month special packs yet? I did have the thought that I wonder if buying the Jumbo packs 'unlocks' the ability to buy further in-month specials and that because I've not bought the Jumbo this month I'm not seeing the opportunity to buy other specials. Comments please.

For clarity I'm not talking about the September Simple Saver or the Appetiser Pack (I've bought them) - I'm thinking about the September equivalent of the August Special packs named Quick Fix Special and Women's Equality Special or the July equivalents named Great British Summer Time, First Lady Special and Butter Run Special.

So far nothing has appeared for September.

Also @Powershop rep.
In a previous post you indicated customers could either buy Future Packs to get a good discount OR buy in-month Special Packs to achieve more or less the same discount as buying Future Packs. Well I don't see in-month Special Packs appearing for the similar monetary values or discounts comparable to Future Packs so please explain yourself and those past comments.

fewkeste

neilsedaka wrote: »

Debited. From my experience one has no alternative but to pay a proportion of usage at the standard rate which should in theory be balanced out by purchasing the discounted powerpacks which we are told will end up at the conclusion of the year at an average rate better than Powerhop competitors.

I don't accept what you're saying here. I think by buying all available Future Packs to the maximum value every month, the in-month Simple Savers, the Appetiser Packs and the two or three in-month Special Packs, I think most people should be able to fully cover their monthly consumption WITHOUT the need to purchase Standard Power Top Up packs. The trick is to always buy all the Future Packs on offer then just top up each month with Special Packs. Even if in the summer months you don't need £50 worth of credit, buy it anyway to sit as discounted credit on your account - that's my advice.

fewkeste

fewkeste wrote: »

So far nothing has appeared for September.

Amazing coincidence - less than a hour after I'd posted about not seeing any in-month Special Packs the 'in the money' Special Pack appears. Not a brilliant discount at 10% but it fills a hole at the end of November for me.:)

Tafrock

Quite disappointed with today's special pack discount of 10%. I won't be buying that one. Im already. 126 in credit and payed up for rest of year

I have raised my minimum discount needed now and won't buy any packs that have a discount of less than 20 %. I'm only doing this because I use on average 35 pounds a month and by buying all the future packs that are discounted at 23.5% (you are allowed 5) I'm already increasing my credit by 15 to 20 quid a month. I'm not even bothering with the simple saver for September (15.7%). Of course if the discounts on the future packs start to fall I will readjust my minimum discount again. However I anticipate the discounts on February to be slightly higher than 23.5% but time will tell. One thing I also noticed is the value and cost of my power packs I had not bought at beginning of September adjusted and decreased after my September power review. So jumbo was originally 16.63 but came down to 14.60. Appetiser was originally 1.44 and became 1.26. Simple saver was 7.73 and became 6.78. The value of power they bought also came down so the discount remained constant. I guess they recalculate your daily usage at review time and adjust the regular packs accordingly.

I feel as if I'm in total control of when I can buy power and at what price I pay for it. Powershop is a winner for myself

mjtko

Rule of thumb I'm following now is: if future packs are >= 20% discount, buy them all (i.e. all 5 you're allowed) even if my usage is going to fall under the amount they cover (which it certainly will). Then buy all specials, simple savers etc. regardless of discount to keep them "in stock".

The theory is that this means that in months where future packs become active, the deep discounts of the future pack should cover all my usage (as the most discounted packs are consumed first). When months end up having future pack discounts of < 20%, these should then get covered by my "surplus" of > 20% future packs with any shortfall being covered by my stock of special packs.

While this means that PowerShop are holding some of my money until "refund time" (whenever that is... anniversary? dunno, not sure yet), this seems to be the best way to ensure the deepest discounts are applied over the course of the year.

fewkeste

Tafrock wrote: »

One thing I also noticed is the value and cost of my power packs I had not bought at beginning of September adjusted and decreased after my September power review. So jumbo was originally 16.63 but came down to 14.60. Appetiser was originally 1.44 and became 1.26. Simple saver was 7.73 and became 6.78. The value of power they bought also came down so the discount remained constant. I guess they recalculate your daily usage at review time and adjust the regular packs accordingly.

Interesting - I wasn't aware of that level of sophistication in their systems - impressive. Like you I was unimpressed with the 10% discount offered in the Special Pack but at least it's better than the 7% of the Jumbo.

What I've realised is that it takes 'courage' to pass up on the less attractive discounted Special Packs, knowing/believing there will be better discounted packs available later to fill any holes in your projected consumption profile. The risk of course is that if sufficient Special Packs of an appropriate discount don't appear at some future date, then Standard Tariff Power top up is the fallback scenario.

mjtko

fewkeste wrote: »

What I've realised is that it takes 'courage' to pass up on the less attractive discounted Special Packs, knowing/believing there will be better discounted packs available later to fill any holes in your projected consumption profile. The risk of course is that if sufficient Special Packs of an appropriate discount don't appear at some future date, then Standard Tariff Power top up is the fallback scenario.

Courage -- or the ability to invest in the less attractive packs. If you buy all the power packs, even ones with the less attractive discounts, then they'll sit in your account unused until such time as they're the next most heavily discounted packs, at which point they'll be consumed. Nobody should ever need to buy the standard power top-up in that situation AFAICS (well, not unless their usage spikes hugely for some reason).

The downside is that your money is tied up until a refund of unused packs is possible but there's no clarity on when this would be yet, AFAIK.

fewkeste

The first Future Packs I was able to buy were the August ones. I have since gone on to buy September, October, November, December & January 2018 Future Packs and so I know their associated discounts.

I wish to modify my consumption and projected usage/bills spreadsheet to cover anticipated future costs and I would like to use the historic % discounts offered on Future Packs that were available before August of this year as an initial basis/starting point of my calculations for next year.

Can any customers who joined earlier in the year let me know what the discounts were on Future packs for July, June, May, April, March, February and January if they have them please?

For the avoidance of doubt I understand that for example the Future Pack named 'July' will actually cover the consumption in June and is so named because the accounting period it covers ends in July - so it's the name of the pack and its associated discount that's important to me NOT the specific period it covers.

I have a feeling The July Future Pack discount was 12.8% but I'd like that confirmed along with as many of the previous months as it's possible to find out about.

I'm trying to find a way of calculating:

a. What running discount to date I'm achieving
b. What instantaneous (in-month) discount I'm achieving
c. Projected future discount likely to be achieved.

It's not easy as money paid out for Future Packs has to be separated from current in-month Special Pack purchases. It's very difficult to know/calculate on an ongoing basis (independently of what PS says) how well I'm doing compared to the 20-22% supposedly achievable figure.

I'm no dullard when it comes to spreadsheets but any tips on how to proceed will be welcomed (I'm talking about the approach to extracting/separating actual 'to date' spend v future credit in pot spend.)

Some posters on here have already cited achieved (disappointing to date) discounts, so I'd be interested to hear exactly what approach they took.

I'm thinking the results will have to be expressed on a 'per accounting period' basis then averaged to give a rolling achieved discount and after a year the actual annually achieved discount.

Boohoo

I switched at the start of this month and have bought most of this months fuel.
I have also got November and Decembers at 20% discount but i don't see any for October apart from standard rates.
Have October's deals been and gone or will i have to pay standard rates?

Powershop_UK

Hi Boohoo!

The Future Powerpacks are always available for you to purchase two months in advance (so the October ones are no longer showing). Various Special Powerpacks will be available for you to cover any October usage on the first calendar day of the month so you shouldn't need to worry about having to pay Standard rates!

Hope this helps.