so called 40% price increas ??

meg6005

  I am a single 80 year old pensioner and my energy account runs out at the end of January.
  My Electricity charges have risen from 16.7p /Kwh to 21.6 p / Kwh  a 25 % increase this does not sound to bad does it ?
  My Gas charges have risen from 2.78 p / Kwh to 4.19 p / kwh  nearly 100% increase this seems to be inline with public information .
 Obviously at my age I do not use much power at all so my total bill for Gas and Electricity  is about £325 . Include the (ridicules) daily charges my total is £415.
  My new account ( which I do not have any choice of changing ) is £660 . Gas and Electric charges are £470 which sounds reasonable . Total cost with daily charges of £190 per year brings this to £660 .
 My daily charges have increased by 115 % for Electric and 115 % for Gas. This is a charge increase of £100 per year for no reason what so ever.
 A long time ago the Government regulators suggested that daily fees should be withdrawn . No energy company offered or agreed to accept this.
 instead they now increase it year by year so I am now paying nearly 50% of my energy bill for no Gas or Electric used.
 I really feel all house holds should start a campaign to stop Daily charges all together. We are not all charged the same amount so there is NO standard to compere  it with. How can my daily charge increase from 12p per day to 26p per day when my usage is not changed ?

          Down with daily charges I say .....do you all agree ?  or not

matelodave

Your daily charge isn't related to the amount of leccy or gas that you consume but the cost of installing and maintaining all the cable, meters, pylons, pipes etc and and other stuff that gets leccy or gas from the generator to your house which incurs a fixed cost whether you use it or not

Perhaps you'd prefer to pay for the infrastructure cost by the mile based on the distance from your house to the generating station or some other method which you think might be fairer.

Meaning that if you live next door to the power station you'd pay significantly less than those who live a long way out or even in cities or towns which don't generally have a power station right in the middle anymore. Maybe they should do the same with water and even your telephone/broadband, instead of a standing charge pay by the distance that it has to travel.

I'm just asking as I really don't see a better method of doing it. Just because you dont use much it still costs the same and uses the same infrastructure to get it to your house as it does to the person next door who may use quite a lot more.

Astria

There used to be 2 methods of paying your bill: A standing/daily charge + energy use, or no standing/daily charge but a significantly higher charge for your energy use - typically only used by users with very low energy consumption otherwise it becomes far more costly.

Over the years, the later has been phased out as the group of customers requesting it became smaller and smaller.

Spies

You cant expect them to supply power without the standing charge else how are they meant to fund replacement or repair of the infrustructure?

doodling

Hi,

At the moment the standing charge for current capped rates doesn't reflect reality.  All the suppliers have simply set it to the maximum permitted by the cap because they need all the income they can lay their hands on to avoid going bust as the government is forcing them to sell energy for less than they are paying for it.

If the cap disappeared then I would expect standing charges to fall and the cost per unit to increase.

It remains unclear how Ofgem will recover the costs of their failure to successfully regulate the electricity market (i.e. all the costs associated with suppliers going bust).  That could be loaded onto the standing charge (so that it is spread evenly over all users) or onto the per unit charge (so that those who use more energy pay more).

wild666

I think the Standing charges should be divided by average usage, 3,200 electric and 12,000 gas. Low users would pay less and high users would pay more. On the SVR that would be around 3p on the price per kWh for electric and  0.8p per kWh on gas at the standard variable rates. In summer gas would see less money from the SVR but it would be a lot higher in the winter months as more gas was used.

chris1973

The standing charge is here to stay, those smart meter things are expensive - I think the roll out cost is already close to £12 billion, and then there is the network and infrastructure to run.

[Deleted User]

chris1973 said:

The standing charge is here to stay, those smart meter things are expensive - I think the roll out cost is already close to £12 billion, and then there is the network and infrastructure to run.

You have failed to mention the £2Bn + to replace all the communications hubs.

markin

Budget for at least 50% increase.

tim_p

meg6005 said:

  I am a single 80 year old pensioner and my energy account runs out at the end of January.
  My Electricity charges have risen from 16.7p /Kwh to 21.6 p / Kwh  a 25 % increase this does not sound to bad does it ?
  My Gas charges have risen from 2.78 p / Kwh to 4.19 p / kwh  nearly 100% increase this seems to be inline with public information .
 Obviously at my age I do not use much power at all so my total bill for Gas and Electricity  is about £325 . Include the (ridicules) daily charges my total is £415.
 

Is that both gas and electric for a whole year?
My mother’s electricity bill increased year on year as she got older mainly due to the fact she was less active and felt the cold a lot more. This was in a well insulated, electric only property with storage heaters. 

savers_united

There will always be winners and losers with a fixed standing charge. Those who do not use alot will feel their standing charge makes up a large chunk of their annual bill, those higher users will not notice it much as its dwarfed by the cost of the actual usage.

However in my view its a fair charge for all, we all have meters and cables to the property, these need to be installed and maintained, these costs are rising like everything else. Then we have the new smart meter rollout and those on old meters who still need to get it read, it all costs no matter what your usage you still have access to the same services and would be calling the same number if you had a gas leak or power cut.

Maybe you watch more TV then next door, should their TV license be less than yours?

The standing charge currently is probably too high, but then green levies and failed suppliers are only likely to add to this charge that is shared by all.