Energy: Find the cheapest supplier & earn cashback

martinkerr

Just joined up - totally useless - said I spend £250 pa on energy - wrong - I spent £1500 last year!!!!!! - I even went online to my Eon account and totaled up all the Kwhours used - so was using very accurate figures!
off to a decent comparison website instead now - very disappointing

Consumerist

martinkerr wrote: »

Just joined up - totally useless - said I spend £250 pa on energy - wrong - I spent £1500 last year!!!!!! - I even went online to my Eon account and totaled up all the Kwhours used - so was using very accurate figures!
off to a decent comparison website instead now - very disappointing

I personally have no faith that this energy club will ever be any use to me but your result seems really out of kilter. Are you sure you haven't plugged in some wrong numbers somewhere?

Kevfin

Just signed up for martins cheap energy club, really worth doing but be careful, the best deal for me was to switch to smart energy however when I did a bit of research into the company their review score is exceptionally low on moneysupermarket, worth doing a few back ground checks before you jump.

Perry525

I compared Spark new tariff with that of NPower Bill saver August 2013
This site writes that switching to Spark will save me money.
No so! Spark is more expensive, than Npower.

Consumerist

Perry525 wrote: »

I compared Spark new tariff with that of NPower Bill saver August 2013
This site writes that switching to Spark will save me money.
No so! Spark is more expensive, than Npower.

Generally, I would advise against taking too much notice of any declared "savings". Savings depend on which "current" tariff is used for the comparison and I think this is open to error.

What you really need to compare are those tariffs which are currently available to new customers rather than comparing with your current tariff - which is not likely to be available to you at the end of your existing contract.

I would advise comparing annual costs on currently available tariffs and working out the real savings yourself.

harryhound

Perry525 wrote: »

I compared Spark new tariff with that of NPower Bill saver August 2013
This site writes that switching to Spark will save me money.
No so! Spark is more expensive, than Npower.

Presumably you are including Npower's deferred rebate in your calculations?

Basically this says stay with us for a year for the length of you contract and we will then give you a kick back.

It has been know for such tactics to be made illegal in USA, but it seems fair enough to me.

However at the end of the contract/year when Npower decide to up the price or bung you on the standard variable rate (ie expensive), it is yet another hassle to take into account and you will end up paying a month or two at the increased rate, if you are not exactly on top of the rules and the T&C's, and you might miss out on a bargain rate being offered by a competitor.

Consumerist

According to my understanding of Ofgem's <Retail Market Review>, tail-end "discounts" are to be banned in favour of discounts being spread out over the year.

Just as interesting, it is proposed that customers on fixed-term tariffs will be given a 42-day switching window during which prices will be held and no termination charges will be allowed if switching takes place during this window.

Sounds like a real step forward for energy customers - assuming I understand the proposals correctly.

Wywth

Perry525 wrote: »

I compared Spark new tariff with that of NPower Bill saver August 2013
This site writes that switching to Spark will save me money.
No so! Spark is more expensive, than Npower.

Which site? :huh:

The article mentions at least 8 different independent, accredited sites.
Have you checked using any others?
Surely you don't think they could all be equally incorrect do you?

Consumerist

Wywth wrote: »

Surely you don't think they could all be equally incorrect do you?

As it happens, all energy-comparison sites and energy suppliers "Quote" calculators are equally wrong when assigning some customers' energy regions.

All RM and SS postcodes, for example, are in the London gas region and the Eastern electricity region. As far as comparison sites are concerned, however, these postcodes are in the Eastern region for both gas and electricity. But suppliers will charge according to the correct gas region and customers won't know about it until after a switch.

By my estimation, there are some 1.3 million customers who are being potentially misled in this way but just don't know it.

Wywth

Consumerist wrote: »

As it happens, all energy-comparison sites and energy suppliers "Quote" calculators are equally wrong when assigning some customers' energy regions.

All RM and SS postcodes, for example, are in the London gas region and the Eastern electricity region. As far as comparison sites are concerned, however, these postcodes are in the Eastern region for both gas and electricity. But suppliers will charge according to the correct gas region and customers won't know about it until after a switch.

By my estimation, there are some 1.3 million customers who are being potentially misled in this way but just don't know it.

So you are saying anyone who lives in the Southend, Basildon, Wickford areas, despite being miles from London, are actually in the London region as far as gas supply is concerned?
I didn't know that.

As it happens, that is not the cause of the Perry525's issues because:
(a) the cost of gas does not often vary with region anyway - It doesn't with Spark (at least not between London and Eastern regions)
(b) the cost does vary with nPower, at least on their cheapest tariff for the two regions, Energy Online August 2014.
But it is actually more expensive for the London region
Daily Standing charge: 50.50p (compared to 48.30p in Eastern region)
Unit charge: 3.599p/kWh (compared to 3.501p in Eastern region)
(Applicable discounts remain the same between regions)