Youtility vs. Wonderbill

ambrozote

Hello,

I came across these two apps/services to track your bills and switch to better deals.

• Youtility
• Wonderbill

(sorry, cannot add links as I am a new user to the forum)
Could not find an article on the web comparing them both in what regards their pros and cons.

Anyone using or used these?
How was your experience?

Thank you in advance.
J

Gerry1

• Why not go to the App Store and Google Play and read the reviews there?

• Youtility is only available on Apple devices. I don't have an iPhone (I don't have more money than sense) so it's not for me.

• Wonderbill is owned by Shell, so guess whose products it'll be plugging.

• Can't really see the point of these apps. For example, Wonderbill uses Energylinx, so you might as well cut out the middleman and go direct. Seems you have to bare you soul to these apps, giving your phone number, login details, date of birth and heaven knows what else, for all your accounts. What could possibly go wrong?

Robin9

If you take control of your own utilities - reading your meters, understanding the bills, keeping your own records - you will get a better understanding of where your energy is going and what it costs.

15 mins a month - a good investment.

EnergyRookie

ambrozote wrote: »

Hello,

I came across these two apps/services to track your bills and switch to better deals.

• Youtility
• Wonderbill

(sorry, cannot add links as I am a new user to the forum)
Could not find an article on the web comparing them both in what regards their pros and cons.

Anyone using or used these?
How was your experience?

Thank you in advance.
J

You may have been a little optimistic if you came he hoping to find a specific artiticle that compared just these two separate auto-switching sites.

There are an increasing number of such auto switching sites coming to market, and indeed one was even on Dragons Den.

The main drawbcaks of such sites is that they are usually funded by the comission they earn from switching you, and that means:

• You need to question their independence
• they are not whole of market
• there is some question over why any supplier would agree to cut their own throat by agreeeing to be associated with such a site that will switch you a competitor is cheaper than them
• They don't usually pay any cashback

There's an MSE article from last year relating to a similar service that Gocompare lauched last year here:
https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/2018/10/automated-energy-switching/


If you use the search function, you may well find similar type MSE articles on auto switching sites

Why not just sign up the the MSE CEC (other providers are available, but I'm not sure they pay possible cashback) that will alert you as soon as a a better deal is available to you from the whole of market allowing you to decide whether or not you wish to switch, and if you do, possibly earn cashbackl if MSE has an affiliate/comission agreement with the particular supplier. :money:

(You can set filters if you like to reduce the number of alerts sent if you like, such as setting a minimum saving to be achieved)

Gerry1

EnergyRookie wrote: »

Why not just sign up the the MSE CEC (other providers are available, but I'm not sure they pay possible cashback) that will alert you as soon as a better deal is available to you from the whole of market

Yes, it's worthwhile to sign up with the CEC, but sadly it doesn't cover the whole of the market, as many forumites have noted. For example Symbio is not included.

Therefore, you still need to do your own whole of the market comparisons from time to time. Even then it's not quite straightforward as you might imagine: you need to check for gas only, electricity only, and dual fuel.

And if you have Economy 7, you need to rinse and repeat to see whether single rate would be cheaper...

And then you need to try other price comparison websites because some have exclusive offers that you've missed...

molerat

Gerry1 wrote: »

For example Symbio is not included.

As it is coming up to panto season .......... Oh yes they are


Why use these auto switching sites, all they are doing is pocketing the cash you could get for spending a few minutes a month

and doing it yourself, they are just taking advantage of the idle.

Gerry1

molerat wrote: »

As it is coming up to panto season .......... Oh yes they are

Hooray ! They've finally been added.

Shame it took so long, they still weren't shown ten days ago.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6064860/symbio-energy-tariff-not-showing-on-cec

pooch

Gerry1 wrote: »

Yes, it's worthwhile to sign up with the CEC, but sadly it doesn't cover the whole of the market, as many forumites have noted.

It does according the commonly accepted definition, in that it includes suppliers & tariffs where there is no commission agreement in place.
Like most other comparison sites, it of course does not include deals that are exclusively available elsewhere (sometimes referred to as collective tariffs), and suppliers/tariffs where the supplier has specifically requested to be excluded from the site. There may also be the odd small supplier/tariff that the site has not yet caught up with, or is missed in error. None of this means they are not a whole of market comnparison service

For example Symbio is not included.

Yes they are, as you have stated here:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=76481030&postcount=5

:cool:

They've actually been on their for ages, but admittedly were not included when they first launched. Apparently, MSE admitted they were struggling at the time to keep up with all the new suppliers and tariffs that were appearing at the time.