Switching in Northern Ireland

CluelessNI

Following the recent articles on switching I explored the options in Northern Ireland. None of the comparison sites appear to cover this region. It is hard to imagine there is only one supplier. Any advice or comments are welcome.

Terrylw1

Hi,

NI is a different market to England, Scotland & Wales and their regulation is different. NI has been playing catch up on the mainland market for years.

So, at this stage mainland Suppliers may not be licenced to operate as Suppliers in NI.

There was certainly no domain data available outside of the mainland last year although I'm not up to date with offland regs now. Will see what I can find out.

Terrylw1

This will help you understand who is licenced to operate in NI

http://ofreg.nics.gov.uk/Second%20Tier%20Supply%20Licensees.htm

http://www.nie.co.uk/marketopening/

So, some have gained a licence but the comparison sites may not have caught up. I'm guessing that you may need to use each Suppliers noline qoute function instead for the moment.

tightasabulls

Oil:
* firmus energy’sprice compared to oil this month works out £153 lower per annum for a typical 3 bed semi-detached house (disregarding boiler efficiency differences).

(The average price for 900 litres of oil is £379 compared to£352 at thebeginning of the month)


Economy 7:
** firmus energy’sgas price compared to economy 7 is £203 lower per annum (the differential has increased from £115 with electricity price rises this November)


LPG:
*** firmus energy’sgas price compared to LPG is now £358 lower per annum (versus £290 at the start of the month given a price rise of 3p/litre for LPG)

thetope

if you're a domestic customer, you have no choice for electricity (NIE) or natural gas (Phoenix). you do have a choice of suppliers for heating oil or (i think) LPG.

Terrylw1

As per the links, some Suppliers e.g. Npower now have a licence to supply in NI. So, worth having a look into whether these England, Scotland & wales Suppliers have arranged to purchase energy from the local distributor.

Jeluidonne

As usual we get the rough end of the stick in Northern Ireland, NIE spent millions in facilitating the opening of the Electricity supply to domestic users, 2nd tier licenses have been bought but none of the big movers in utilities are interest in the NI market because it is so small. Our population is just over 1.5 million and it seems the licence holders do not see it viable to gain a percentage of this as the cost could outweigh the gains...so it looks like we are stuck with NIE and 11.11 per unit