Energy: Find the cheapest supplier & earn cashback

Chrysalis

sorrera wrote: »

The rush to cap has been "fuelled" by the energy companies warning it will be raising prices in the future.

Martin has naively jumped on this bandwagon and been shouting at everyone to cap now.
Start of July was a record high for wholsale gas prices, it has now fallen back hugely since then (down 31% in July). Look at the commodities page on FT to see the graphs.
http://markets.ft.com/tearsheets/performance.asp?s=us@ng.1

Everyone who has capped recently has done so at the highest possible price, which is great news for the energy companies. Who started this price panic in the first place?

Brilliant use of PR to get millions of people rushing to increase their own energy bills in the belief they are saving money - genius.

I can only agree, going to capped may be worth it if its only 10% or around that more than what you currently paying but the quoted price for me was almost triple which was very unlikely to save me any money and add the tie in factor. But I am seeing here people are just jumping onto capped tariffs assuming they will lose out if they dont.

You are quite right as well that all the current evidence points to falling gas prices next year and possibly later this year.

Quite clever to withdraw from switching sites to make it look like people will miss out but then sell when they ring up direct. This of course also stops them getting the rebates the switch sites offer.

Carl1980_2

Hi,

I am about to rent a house out for the first time and have just seen your articles about gas and electricity prices - can you advise what I should do to get the best deal?

My sister is with E-On and on a Price Protection v16 until Oct 09 - can I still get on this tariff?

Is it worth using comparison sites at all? And are Capped prices to way for me to go?

Thank You in advance

stabler_2

I hope I am wrong but a little warning bell is preventing me from switching to a higher priced capped supplier. By doing so, am I not telling the new supplier that I am willing to pay more for my gas for the next X no. of years? If this statement is repeated by many thousands of others making the same statement, would this not a) allow the supplier/s to feel more confident that their sales are assured for the next X no. of years, and therefore be less motivated to ensure their prices are keen, b) encourage them to try pushing the boundaries further to see just how much buyers are prepared to pay for the same product?

Given the popularity of this website, surely it would be better if we all switched to the lowest or a lower price supplier, or at least away from the highest priced suppliers or suppliers who introduce ridiculous increases?

Felix_the_Cash

Hello, I live in a shared flat and my flatmates are not as money-saving as me! I've been trying to get them to take over some bills, and slowly they are getting there. Also of course I've talked about the benefits of switching, but it's only the big rises hype that has moved them and anyway as usual I've gone ahead and done my research and will get the utilities switched because I don't want to pay silly money.

As we are still on standard quarterly tariffs, switching is a no brainer. I can save £433 with BGclick5 or £100 with EDF capped (both dual fuel). Today I reread Martin's article to try and work out whether or not to cap and saw that the traffic light is RED.

So my questions are these: Is this simply because by the time I switch to an apparently cheaper uncapped deal it may have risen past my current one? (unlikely as I have the standard tariff now) If I choose the capped deal, surely they are bound to supply at the price advertised at the time. Is my assumption correct?

Once the above is clarified, we then just have to bet on the wholesale gas price and whether to cap or not. Any advice on this is welcome.

Thanks for your time.

-Felix

David_Mee

OK - totally confused - I lookd on uSwitch for any capped rates - only ones are EON and British Gas - presume all others are hiking prices - these will cost me 25% more. I then entered normal rates and.... British Gas came out as £80 cheaper than my present bods (Scottish Power) who have yet to raise prices.....

OK, are the British gas rates "old" and price hike is coming and will catch me out or have they already passed on price "hike"?

Totally confused :-(

Niemand

David_Mee wrote: »

OK - totally confused - ...

Martin's advice now is not to switch. See DON'T SWITCH Gas & Electricity.

winalot

is it worth moving to ebico anyway - i am currently on swalec standard rates for both gas and electirc... very confused ! thanks for any advice

brysiewysie

Carl1980 wrote: »

Hi,



My sister is with E-On and on a Price Protection v16 until Oct 09 - can I still get on this tariff?

Version 17 is still available but only to existing customers!

Confusedconsumer_2

DiBz62

Hi, Interested to read your posting on EBICO. Was it in response to my question about them on the Bringing Down Gas & Electricity Bills Thread?

If so, many thanks. Does anyone else recommend them?

tonyhamm

Unfortunately, assuming everything else equal (money supply, inflation etc..) capping is just a waste of money for most people going forwards. There is no reason why the energy market wholesale prices should be this high.

Consumer groups like Energywatch deem the Gas market's (which provides both gas and electricity) prices are currently very artifically inflated.

Energywatch, cites the market is artifically rigged in favour of the suppliers (by artifically indexing gas prices to a much much rarer commodity - oil - in gas supply contracts) a practice which it deems is ridicioius.

Newsnight also point out that 2 of the 6 big suppliers - EDF and E.On, are keep ing UK electricty prices artifically inflated by not piping ('our own' UK produced) gas back to the UK through the huge pipeline which connects us to Europe when our wholesale prices are higher.

Many other factors are latent - eg; inept planning - dispite the UK being a major gas producer, we have nearly no storage facilties for gas which increases our dependancy on big monopoly firms like E.On and EDF, who should pipe gas back to the uk from thier storage when the price of gas is higher.


By capping now you are locking in these artifically high prices! Its a shame that Martin doesn't point out some of what Energywatch have been banging on about as a caveat to people locking in these rising prices!