Overcharging for paying quarterly

may2022

Gerry1 you have summed it up well, excellent post.

Robin9

In years gone by there were real extra costs associated with PP - remember the old 50p coin  meters that had to be emptied, special visits to reset the charging rates.   On the benefit side that was money upfront for energy.  Credit meters read quarterly , then billed and paid on receipt of the red bill and all that admin meant the suppliers had to borrow as they bought from the grid

Section62

Gerry1 said:

All in all, there's probably a good case economically for charging people the exactly same rates regardless of payment method (don't Octopus already do this?), quite apart from the social justice element.

Ebico made a big point of making their credit meter rates the same regardless of payment method, which was one of the reasons I switched to them.  I'm not sure they still do though as it isn't obviously stated on their website that I could see.

On the other hand there is plenty in the way of precedent for service/goods suppliers to offer discounts to customers who are easier to deal with and/or pay promptly.  The energy companies aren't entirely out of line offering discounts to people who shun paper billing and pay using the lowest-cost method.

Astria

Gerry1 said:

All in all, there's probably a good case economically for charging people the exactly same rates regardless of payment method (don't Octopus already do this?), quite apart from the social justice element.

It's something about which dozy Ofgem should have ruled, making the rates the same for all methods of payment.

I wonder how many people would switch from DD to POROB if the prices were exactly the same? This would cause a significant increase in the costs of handling such payments, which would then be charged back to us via another increase in standing charges.

I wouldn't personally as that's how I'm billed anyway - I submit a meter reading, I'm told how much they are going to take, I make sure that amount is in my bills account and they take the funds sometime later.