Was it really worth switching?

BUFF

Admiral_Barbarossa said:

That is hassle free, unlike the latest on to go bust!

I never had any hassle with Zog & had good (albeit fairly basic but that is all that I needed)  service which is why I am genuinely sad to see them brought down by the failure of another company having done all the right things themselves - they certainly were not fly by night. I can't say that I had the same hassle free service with BG, EDF, Eon or Scottish Power.
By switching over the years I have saved many thousands of pounds & will end up on an SVR tariff that probably isn't much difference to that which the Big 6 were offering me as a fix at the time that my renewal was due.

Admiral_Barbarossa, how long does your fix last for? The fewer suppliers that survive, the less competition & the higher likelihood that they will in the future offer fewer tariffs & increase their margins. There is therefore a higher chance that we will all end up on very similar tariffs to each other but at least I had 20 years of savings.

QrizB

Admiral_Barbarossa said:

I have used uswitch for the last ten years to get very competitive in contract deals with my big six supplier that are within £20 a year of moving to a fly by night one! In recent years, my deal has not been beaten by any offering on the uswitch site with a month of contracting.

I agree with molerat:

molerat said:

If you have been using USwitch you have not been getting the best deals, you have been getting the best deal they are offering which only includes suppliers that give them a hefty finders fee.

@Admiral_Barbarossa you've either got a very strange usage pattern or you've not done a proper full-market comparison. Which supplier are you with and what's your current tariff?

Admiral_Barbarossa

Thanks for all your comments! There appears some note about whole market, while I have said I use uswitch. I find uswitch the easiest site to start a compare, then look at other versions, including the mse one! Currently the mse version does not have my current fix on it.

For those interested in my tariff, it is Scottish Power Exclusive Fixed December 2022 B1 that was available on the uswitch site in early September this year, marginally above the then SVR rate! This increased my previous DD from £75 to £97, though I had received my annual refund of £240 from my previous fix! The SVR at the time would had been £94! I have not used the WHD in these prices, which smaller providers do not offer!

With the increases floating at the time, though not reflected on the comparison sites, I took a punt that the price cap in April 2022 would rise significantly, as oil prices were rising! Sop in the six months through to the next price fix, I would be around £18 worse off for fixing!

I could had waited until my pan dropped off and hit the SVR in December 21, but because I took a punt in September, I am sure I will save by the end of 2022 around £400 in the current market!

So there, I am not point scoring, perhaps in some instances I have paid about a decent night out with a steak and a bottle of red! But then in the whole picture, I have had no hassles!

As for uswitch, they do have offers every so often for my big six hitter! The choice to punt is when to take them up!

As for the others, Peoples Energy (Failed!) used to pop up on my Farcebuck and I would message them if they could beat my rate! They were never able to do so! Utility warehouse do not bather to give a quote but want you to sign up for everything! I did look at bulb, and yes once they were cheaper! But was it worth it just to save that night out and bottle of red?

QrizB

Admiral_Barbarossa said:

For those interested in my tariff, it is Scottish Power Exclusive Fixed December 2022 B1 that was available on the uswitch site in early September this year, marginally above the then SVR rate!

Interesting. For my region, that tariff shows gas at 4.124p/kWh with a 16.44p/day SC, and electricity at 18.869p/kWh and 16.44p/day SC.

I switched at roughly the same time as you. I moved to Zog for gas at 3.2096p/kWh and 26.25p/day SC, fixed for 2 years. Over a year, an average customer using 12000kWh/yr would save about £74 on the Zog tariff.

I can't do quite the same comparison for electricity (I'm now with Octopus on an EV tariff) but on the 7th of September Neon Reef were offering 14.35p/kWh and 25.73p/day. The same average customer using 2900kWh/yr would save ~£97/yr on the NR tariff.

So your fix was £170/yr more expensive than choosing those two tariffs, which may not have been the cheapest on the market at the time.

(Both Zog and NR have since gone bust, but that's not really the point. A similar comparison could probably be done for September 2020, but legacy tariff info might not be so easy to find.)

Astria

I've used uswitch in my comparisons each year, but I've never used them to actually switch, and I'm pretty glad because most years this meant I got a switching bonus (typically between £50 - £100) when signing up direct instead of using a third party comparison website, plus I always seemed to get better deals than uswitch was offering - I'm assuming this is because uswitch only offered deals from companies which gave them appropriate referral fees. So for me it was very much worth doing each year. Yes, some of these companies have since gone bust, but that's not really a big problem as you just get moved to another provider automatically, so it's no fuss. When I was forcibly moved from GNE to EDF, they even kept my GNE tariff (well, actually they made it even cheaper...) so no problems there either.

Admiral_Barbarossa

QrizB said:

Admiral_Barbarossa said:

For those interested in my tariff, it is Scottish Power Exclusive Fixed December 2022 B1 that was available on the uswitch site in early September this year, marginally above the then SVR rate!

(Both Zog and NR have since gone bust, but that's not really the point. A similar comparison could probably be done for September 2020, but legacy tariff info might not be so easy to find.)

But that £170, around £15 a month saved you £30 against mine before they went bust! Then the hassle of being slung onto a SVR and tryuing to fix now, this year has proved possibly expensive and hassle some! My investments soon make up that £15 a month! My WHD not paid by these ex suppliers wipes out most opf that £170!

Thanks fopr answering though, but the question now should be. How long should someone stay on the SVR, with the market being volitile?

QrizB

Admiral_Barbarossa said:

QrizB said:

Admiral_Barbarossa said:

For those interested in my tariff, it is Scottish Power Exclusive Fixed December 2022 B1 that was available on the uswitch site in early September this year, marginally above the then SVR rate!

(Both Zog and NR have since gone bust, but that's not really the point. A similar comparison could probably be done for September 2020, but legacy tariff info might not be so easy to find.)

But that £170, around £15 a month saved you £30 against mine before they went bust! Then the hassle of being slung onto a SVR and tryuing to fix now, this year has proved possibly expensive and hassle some! My investments soon make up that £15 a month! My WHD not paid by these ex suppliers wipes out most opf that £170!
Thanks fopr answering though, but the question now should be. How long should someone stay on the SVR, with the market being volitile?

The thing is, there were probably similar annual savings to be made the previous times you chose to remain with SP too. You might have been missing out on £150-£200 in savings every year. But I'm not offering to go back through 5+ years worth of legacy tariffs to find examples!.

The next Ofgem cap will be calculated and announced in February, to take effect from April. Wholesale prices can be expected to drop at around the same time (if they don't we're all in trouble). February-to-April is the window to look for a switch.

[Some suppliers (notably SP) are offering customers with soon-to-expire fixed rates a loyalty rate that's close to the current cap (see example here). SP might think that these prices close to the current cap are a sustainable long-term rate, or they might just be trying to get people off legacy fixes and onto lower-lossmaking ones.]

Astria

Admiral_Barbarossa said:

But that £170, around £15 a month saved you £30 against mine before they went bust! Then the hassle of being slung onto a SVR and tryuing to fix now, this year has proved possibly expensive and hassle some! My investments soon make up that £15 a month! My WHD not paid by these ex suppliers wipes out most opf that £170!

Thanks fopr answering though, but the question now should be. How long should someone stay on the SVR, with the market being volitile?

Regardless of your investments and other income you are still wasting that £15/month that you could have saved. If you don't care about your energy prices (due to your investments and other income) then why switch at all? Just stick with the one provider. 

and where's the hassle in being slung on a SVR? If your fix is up it doesn't matter what provider you are wish, you will be on SVR unless you fix and most fixes are more expensive and so not worth bothering with.

Personally I'm not on the SVR, although it is a variable tariff with EON with no exit fees, it's cheaper than their SVR. I will stay on it whilst it is worthwhile for me, no point moving until there is a better offer, and I don't expect that before next summer.

markin

As a Country its cost us all, the few have benefited likely at the cost of everyone else, especially the elderly and people that didn't use the internet until recently, The big six would have wanted more profit per customer to make up the loss.  Bulbs 1.7M customers at £300 each will cost us all £510M? on are power bills, plus all the customers from the 30 odd other companies.

"So far in 2021, almost 30 energy companies have ceased trading, leaving over two million customers dependent on the safety net provided by the market regulator, Ofgem, to maintain their supplies and protect their credit balances while it moves them to a new supplier."

https://www.forbes.com/uk/advisor/energy/failed-uk-energy-suppliers-update/

 

And then the is the smart meter mess, "That smart meter is not compatible with are system we have to change it" More millions wasted.

Admiral_Barbarossa

Now as I switched last September to a slightly more expensive deal, had I waited until my deal ended in December, I would now be on SVR and paying £600 more this year!

And a few more energy cowboys have gone bust since my last update!