Name on account change

RonnyJambo

Hello.
I just wanted to pick the brains of the community about a small pickle my girlfriend is in.
She is a private tenant at a house she used to share with a friend, and the utility bills for the property are still in the name of the ex housemate.
All the payments to these accounts for the past year have been made by my girlfriend, and she is very good at doing so. She now finds herself in credit with her energy supplier.
Unfortunately the same energy supplier is now raising the rates, and she is worried she will struggle to pay.
If she was to switch to a new supplier, and open the new account in her name, would this be easy to do?
My assumption is the new supplier would ask for a meter reading, then inform the old supplier that they would be taking over the account from that point. And her ex housemate would receive monies owed to them from the old supplier. The downside to this scenario is that the monies owed to the customer is actually my girlfriends money.
My advice to her was, use the current supplier until you are no longer in credit, then switch once you pass that point, make the new account into your name, and carry on as normal at a cheaper rate. Bobs your uncle.
But I am not a money saving expert.
If you can see any flaws to my plan could you please advise?
Thank you in advance.

Flt._Lt._Biggles

RonnyJambo wrote: »

Hello.
I just wanted to pick the brains of the community about a small pickle my girlfriend is in.
She is a private tenant at a house she used to share with a friend, and the utility bills for the property are still in the name of the ex housemate.
All the payments to these accounts for the past year have been made by my girlfriend, and she is very good at doing so. She now finds herself in credit with her energy supplier.
Unfortunately the same energy supplier is now raising the rates, and she is worried she will struggle to pay.
If she was to switch to a new supplier, and open the new account in her name, would this be easy to do?
My assumption is the new supplier would ask for a meter reading, then inform the old supplier that they would be taking over the account from that point. And her ex housemate would receive monies owed to them from the old supplier. The downside to this scenario is that the monies owed to the customer is actually my girlfriends money.
My advice to her was, use the current supplier until you are no longer in credit, then switch once you pass that point, make the new account into your name, and carry on as normal at a cheaper rate. Bobs your uncle.
But I am not a money saving expert.
If you can see any flaws to my plan could you please advise?
Thank you in advance.

Your g/f is not in credit. From what you say, she does not even have an account yet :eek:

The ex-housemate is in credit ... it seems thanks to the generosity of your g/f. Hopefully the ex-housemate will be willing to refund any money your g/f has donated to the ex-housemate.

What your g/f should do is contact the supplier and explain what has happened, and that she wants an account in her own name, effective from when she became responsible for the property (as per her tenancy agreement, a copy of which she will probably have to provide as proof to the supplier)

Unfortunately, due to the year long delay in doing this, your g/f will probably be charged at the supplier's very expensive standard variable tariff for that period. Compare that to what she could have saved, not just with the existing supplier, but if she had switched earlier.

She lives & learns .... hopefully. :cool:

bonus2010

Your plan sounds good to me. I wouldn't be volunteering exact dates when my ex-housemate left if its some time ago. In saying that I'm not expecting huge amounts of credits to have been built up though...