I wish I hadn't followed Martin's advice not to fix my energy deal

k3lvc

Just has similar with BG - paying £224pm and currently £180 in credit - want to increase DD to £404 but can't provide estimates/justification (long standing BG customer with Smart Meter). First online chat brought it to £301pm and a subsequent phone call to £229pm

I'll put aside some money in case wrong but a massive unjustified difference

Alnat1

You could always ask Octopus to change to variable monthly DD. You pay the exact amount of each months bill in full by DD, usually a couple of weeks after the bill is issued.

This means your account is never in credit or debit but you do have to be sure you can manage the much bigger monthly bills in winter.

facade

Spoonie_Turtle said:

Is that accounting for the very high rates offered on the fix?  They don't account for the £400 regardless.

Latest from Octopus is that there will be a £66.666 reduction in your DD for the Winter 6 months, so the monthly bill is the same, but £66.666 of it is paid by the £400 handout.

(e.g. your forecast is £2400 for the year equating to £200 a month by DD, for 6 months they only take £133.333, rather than splitting the remaining £2000 into 12 equal debits of £166.666)

pochase

k3lvc said:

Just has similar with BG - paying £224pm and currently £180 in credit - want to increase DD to £404 but can't provide estimates/justification (long standing BG customer with Smart Meter). First online chat brought it to £301pm and a subsequent phone call to £229pm

I'll put aside some money in case wrong but a massive unjustified difference

You are aware of the upcoming increase in October of about 75% plus further increases in January and April predicted?

When was you last bill, the £180 on it's own does not mean much with a 6 month billing cycle.

k3lvc

pochase said:

k3lvc said:

Just has similar with BG - paying £224pm and currently £180 in credit - want to increase DD to £404 but can't provide estimates/justification (long standing BG customer with Smart Meter). First online chat brought it to £301pm and a subsequent phone call to £229pm

I'll put aside some money in case wrong but a massive unjustified difference

You are aware of the upcoming increase in October of about 75% plus further increases in January and April predicted?

When was you last bill, the £180 on it's own does not mean much with a 6 month billing cycle.

Yes - last bill was yesterday and £229pm allows for last years usage at current rate + 50% increase. I'll also put aside £100pm but I'm damned if I'm lining BG pockets with an extra £175pm with no justification from them

Chrysalis

I think for the poorer one year deals martins advice was right, but a few did have access to more competitive deals, and any 18+ month deals were probably worth taking.

Spoonie_Turtle

facade said:

Spoonie_Turtle said:

Is that accounting for the very high rates offered on the fix?  They don't account for the £400 regardless.

Latest from Octopus is that there will be a £66.666 reduction in your DD for the Winter 6 months, so the monthly bill is the same, but £66.666 of it is paid by the £400 handout.

(e.g. your forecast is £2400 for the year equating to £200 a month by DD, for 6 months they only take £133.333, rather than splitting the remaining £2000 into 12 equal debits of £166.666)

That's an excellent explanation of it, much simpler than I could ever have attempted

pochase

Chrysalis said:

I think for the poorer one year deals martins advice was right, but a few did have access to more competitive deals, and any 18+ month deals were probably worth taking.

I think the problem was more that many did not want to take more than 1 year, especially the 2 year EDF fixes due to their high exit fees.

They start to look very good considering todays predictions/

Tristan74

Spoonie_Turtle said:

Is that accounting for the very high rates offered on the fix?  

It is, I have recalculated the whole years bill based on the new rates they are offering on the fix and the only way to get to their monthly amount is to up y annual usage by 60%

double_dutchy

What I take from this thread is that you can't make decisions based on the DD amounts that a supplier quotes (I know this is old news for most regular posters on here).

You need to calculate future costs (for 12 months or whatever) based on an accurate prediction of your future energy use and the actual kwh unit costs for gas and electric (and standing charges added in). Then you can make a valid comparison between SVR and fixed rate (or any other rates you might choose to compare).

In this expensive energy market knowledge is your friend.