Fix or not? I know it's been asked loads

LADYXXMACBETH

I was moved to British gas from People's energy. I'm currently paying £228 a month for my DD and they are saying it's not enough. I'm going to have a deficit of about £800. I looked at EDF which with my usage worked out as a fixed rate of £380 a month and British gas have quoted me £315. Do I switch ? 
I use 6500kwh a quarter of gas and 1500kwh on electricity. 

Verdigris

That's pretty heavy usage. Is the quarterly figure averaged for the year, or is that the heating season consumptions?

LADYXXMACBETH

It's what I've used in the past 3 months. I have a newish boiler that's serviced every year and I set my thermostat to 15 degrees. I have a three bed home with me and 2 boys living in it. I'm home all the time so can't really turn the heating off during the day. 
Not sure what to do really about getting my usage down. We use it. 

Verdigris

Not so bad as it first looked. Your consumption of gas, at least, will be much lower in the warmer months.

As your consumption would still appear to be above the averages used to calculate the cap, you need to look for the deal with the lowest kWh price for each fuel, a higher daily charge won't impact very much.

QrizB

LADYXXMACBETH said:

I looked at EDF which with my usage worked out as a fixed rate of £380 a month and British gas have quoted me £315. Do I switch?

It's impossible to say for sure without details of your annual consumption and the tariffs you're considering, but it's more-likely-than-not that you'll be better off staying on BG's capped variable tariff rather than trying to fix.