What does this MSE warning mean?

NoelNoel

It's time for us to switch and I'm  minded to move our dual fuel to Yorkshire Energy, which has a good price and an average 5-star rating from 65 reviews on MSE's Cheap Energy Club, which is a good and trusted resource.

But the Club warns: "Important: While it has a good service rating, it's a small company which hasn't been around for long." That sounds good enough. But still, that pesky warning...

Can anyone please advise what this warning actually means? Is it a standard caveat, or what sort of problems might a company generate for a user? What is the worst that can happen with a new supplier? If the company goes broke, can I for instance get cut off without gas and/or electricity or does some industry scheme guarantee my supply? Has any company failure ever done that to anyone?

Thanks.

Gerry1

They've been going for almost two years, so not that new.  More likely to be that they don't pay commission to the CEC !

Neon Reef is also completely absent from the CEC, despite its claims to show all suppliers, so the CEC's Holier Than Thou claims are starting to look a bit tarnished.

I had no problems with YE, I left purely because they were beaten on price by Gulf and Neon Reef, and they repaid my credit very rapidly.

You won't be cut off if any energy company goes but you'll see from this forum that getting your credit back isn't always quick and straightforward.  Best to send and keep meter reads monthly and ask for any excess credit to be returned and / or the DD to be reduced accordingly.

[Deleted User]

It simply means it's a new company.  That may concern you if prefer long established and stable companies  like British Gas. Or it may not.

You won't be cut off if it fails.

NoelNoel

Many thanks, Gerry1 and zx81... extremely helpful and enlightening. I'll take a look at Neon Reef.
Incidentally, I've just been parallel checking over at Compare The Market and they gave me a much cheaper quote for another company -- except having told them what KwHs I used last year, when I looked at the details their "cheap" quote was based on cutting towards 1,000 KwHs off my electricity usage and 2,000 KwHs off my gas consumption -- how do they know I'm going to use 16% less gas next year?

I switched the cheating damn meerkat off straightaway, and won't go back.

Gerry1

NoelNoel said:

Many thanks, Gerry1 and zx81... extremely helpful and enlightening. I'll take a look at Neon Reef.

Neon Reef are a sister company of Utility Point, who don't exactly have a great reputation, but I've had no problems so far.

NoelNoel

I tried to use Neon Reef's own web quotation system, but it was a bit weird, so I tried to do their live chat -- that was last night, but despite repeated attempts up to a moment ago it is "still loading", I have therefore emailed them the details and asked for a quote, and it'll be interesting to see how long their reply takes. But as they don't publicise any phone number I think I can't trust their customer service, should I ever need it. Which prompts me to check out the web pages at Yorkshire Energy and see if they are any better before I decide where to switch. The next best price without any warnings is from a big company -- Scottish -- but I'd like to switch to a good newcomer if possible to keep the pressure on the big guys.