MSE News: 2 million Shell energy and broadband customers affected as businesses are put up for sale

MSE_Clare

Millions of Shell broadband and energy customers could be moved to a new provider in the coming months as the supplier has announced plans to sell these parts of its business following a "strategic review" – though there's no immediate change to your services and you should keep paying your bills as normal. 

Read the full story:
Two million Shell energy and broadband customers affected as businesses are put up for sale - what's happening
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kuepper

I was just about to switch my broadband to them as they've offered me 6 months free broadband on 18 month contract at £17.99 pm, could that not be honoured if they're sold?

[Deleted User]

Hardly a surprise since this was signalled to the markets about 6 months ago. 

MattMattMattUK

MSE_Clare said:

Millions of Shell broadband and energy customers could be moved to a new provider in the coming months as the supplier has announced plans to sell these parts of its business following a "strategic review" – though there's no immediate change to your services and you should keep paying your bills as normal. 

Read the full story:
Two million Shell energy and broadband customers affected as businesses are put up for sale - what's happening
If you haven't already, join the forum to reply.

MSE News: 2 million Shell energy and broadband customers affected as businesses are put up for sale

Should you really be using sensationalist headlines when the reality is that nothing has currently happening, nothing is happening until the point where that part of Shell is sold and even then nothing might change? At the very least it should include the caveat "could be" or "might be", rather than presenting it as something which will impact customers. 

CSI_Yorkshire

"2 million Shell customers might, at some point in the future, have a different badge at the top of their bill"

bristolleedsfan

"The company has assured its customers that their services will not be affected during the sales process"

prowla

I'm sensing negativity here, but this is news and is relevant; both to the customers and the UK energy market in general.

[Deleted User]

prowla said:

I'm sensing negativity here, but this is news and is relevant; both to the customers and the UK energy market in general.

Mergers and buyouts are happening all the time and are hardly great news. SSE sold its customer base to Ovo as it wanted to concentrate on generation. Then there was NPower and E.oN. Shell indicated to the markets that its retail supply company was losing money and it would be carrying out a strategic review with a view to a sale. 

FWiW, if I was with Shell Energy and on a standard deal, I would probably switch. Taking over customers en masse can take time and become a little messy. Consumers don’t know who to approach if there is an issue, for example, with a meter.

TheElectricCow

prowla said:

I'm sensing negativity here, but this is news and is relevant; both to the customers and the UK energy market in general.

The news is fine, it’s the reporting of that news which is the, increasingly all too common, problem here. Especially from a supposed “consumer champion” outlet such as MSE.

Headlines that are misleading, inaccurate, clickbait, fearmongering, etc. are not beneficial to consumers and serve only to drive web traffic to articles, typically with an end goal of profiting one way or another by stretching the boundaries of what is factually correct and truthful.

Headlines like this are not written in good faith and often can cause panic or distress amongst the public, all to the benefit of the news provider of course.

Opening with “2 million customers affected” is, debatably, technically correct, but the reality of the situation is there’s no immediate effect on anyone and even when the sale does go through the impact should be minimal for anyone in contract with them. It’s an intentional misrepresentation of the situation to cause concern where none is warranted.

[Deleted User]

kuepper said:

I was just about to switch my broadband to them as they've offered me 6 months free broadband on 18 month contract at £17.99 pm, could that not be honoured if they're sold?

You may wish to have a look at the comments at the bottom of this article:

https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2023/06/shell-puts-for-sale-sign-over-uk-broadband-isp-shell-energy.html

[Deleted User]

[Deleted User] said:

prowla said:

I'm sensing negativity here, but this is news and is relevant; both to the customers and the UK energy market in general.

FWiW, if I was with Shell Energy and on a standard deal, I would probably switch. Taking over customers en masse can take time and become a little messy. Consumers don’t know who to approach if there is an issue, for example, with a meter.

I'm not with Shell but my in-laws are with litle interaction needed on my part for online account management.  Meter readings have been lifted automatically on schedule since they moved to their current address.  I'll be suggesting that they give it some thought as to what they want to do.  I know if I was in their shoes I'd be inclined to move to a supplier of my choice and soon during the summer months.