Eco7 reduce Eco Fix 1.0 price further £10 when switching away

Emma6

Here's a tip...

This morning Eco7 sent me a text offering an internal switch to their Eco Fix 1.0 tariff at a reduced price if I signed up immediately to stop the switch from going through.  Might be worth Eco7 customers trying to switch away for a reduced price.  I like to switch away every now and then.  It helps to keep financial accounts straight, and they have to delete most personal data after a while.  Eco7 can vary prices from time to time, so the offer might not be as good as it seems.  Last year, they increased the monthly payments as Winter approached and the promised reduced Summer prices were largely overtaken by increases in wholesale prices.  That said I can always switch away.

The Energy Saving Club recommended I check my tariff.  Found Avro offered the same for £27 less with no exit penalty. On the Energy Saving Club comparison list, Eco7 Fix 1.0 is about the same as the new Avro quote.  My previous customer service experience with Avro was better than Eco7 so I thought time to switch. 

This new special price for Eco Fix 1.0 matches Outfox The Market price that sits at the top of the Energy Saving Club list when I use it. 

My experience is I don't think Eco7 is that great, so I won't be taking up their offer.  The repayment plans vary too widely, but I can handle that.  For me, the main issues was that I didn't really trust their IT competence.   I'm not convinced their data protection is that robust.  It is getting better, albeit incrementally.  For example, I gave up writing to them via their Chat Service as they kept emailing back transcripts with my answers to security questions in clear text, in full, over normal insecure email services.  Completely bypasses web security protections.  Their Chat help desk shouldn't have been asking for full details anyway because they email transcripts.   I like receiving a Chat transcripts so I tried to get them to fix it.  That was a waste of effort over a few weeks on my part.  I stopped using their Chat Service and sent emails without personal info instead.   Minor things too; their usage graphs don't appear to match the meter reading data; might be due to misalignment of calendar months and meter readings but the differences look too big.  Anyway there better ways of spending my time than trying to verify the information shown and debug their systems.   I'll feed this back to Eco7 when/if asked in the hope they will improve before the next time I use them.

Makes me wonder how far Ofgem goes to routinely check that an energy supplier's IT systems provide accurate information and handle personal information securely.   Is it really left to IT savvy customers?