Energy standing Charges - OFGEM's inability to address unfair standing charges on consumers

Qyburn

Markus779 said:

The commercial rates have never been cheaper here. . 

So has your electricity always been more expensive, and were you made aware of this when buying?  Is it possible to get your own supply installed, and separate yourself from the shared system?

TheElectricCow

wrf12345 said:

Octopus energy, oddly, offer a zero standing charge electric business tariff, the unit rate is around 32p, not directly comparable to the residential rate as the business rate is usually quite bloated even with a s/c.

Interestingly, based on the rates in my region (Eastern), that tariff would only be better value for users with a consumption between 3572 and ~3800 kWh. Any lower and you’re not eligible for the tariff, and any higher would see you pay more than sticking with the regular tariff paying a SC.

I suppose if you had a business with predictable and consistent enough energy use patterns to land your annual use within that 228kWh range it certainly would save you up to £11.32 for the year. Otherwise you’d simply be paying more for the privilege of “not having a standing charge”.

RD_Kryten

My only concern with getting rid of standing charges is that in the long run it will end up costing me more.  I don't use very much energy as it is and I only heat the room I'm in and wear jumpers and gloves around the house (heating my body etc) all my light bulbs are LED and everything (apart from my fridge-freezer) is turned off over night and during the day when I'm at work.

A lot of the time my standing charge for gas is more than what I use, especially during the summer.

The reason for my reservation is I still remember when BT was the only company doing directory enquiries.  They used to charge a flat fee of 40p no matter how long it took and in my experience they were always 100% correct no matter how vague you were with your query.  Then they let any old Tom, !!!!!! and Harry do it and overnight it costs for the service shop up exponentially!  They said competition would mean it would be cheaper but it was the exact opposite.

BROKEN

My Standing charges reduced on my next fixed period, brilliant news, oh yeah my unit rate jumps by 5p a unit instead. Government reduce energy bills by £150 in Novembers budget to start in April 2026 brilliant news. Oh yeah OFGEM raise prices by £108. 

So if we were already paying to fix the energy infrastructure why the hell are we paying again to fix it from next year. Nothing changes at all does it. Just wrap yourself up in your blanket and drink hot drinks. (Buy a big flask like I did 🫩

Scot_39

BROKEN said:

So if we were already paying to fix the energy infrastructure why the hell are we paying again to fix it from next year. Nothing changes at all does it. Just wrap yourself up in your blanket and drink hot drinks. (Buy a big flask like I did 🫩

Low users weren't paying for it to be fixed for years - why Ofgem increased electric SC over 2 years by £103 extra iirc 2022 to 2024.
But didn't do the same for gas - which is part of the new £108 figure too.

And its not all replace or maintain old - certainly for electric its brand new too.

Partly to link renewables to markets (*)

But also increasing capacity - 24m gch replacements and 30m ice replacements need more power delivered - in many areas = more new pylons, more cables on existing, more or bigger local transformers, even some - possibly many larger and older -  home supply  fuse and street cable upgrades etc .

(*) Some of it entirely unnecessary due to bad policy and planning - like the £6bn for egl1/2 - and likely nearer £12bn+ for egl3,4 and wl2 - thanks to renewables policy focussing on wholesale CfDs and not cost to deliver.  Possibly made far worse  nimbyism in south as far as onshore wind - defacto banned for near a decade.
With around 15GW installed and 6GW extra as of Aug ast year wind generation planned in Scotland - the 5 new - only 2 in progress authorised by Ofgem as of late last year - plus existing wgl -  6 hvdc links in total will allow upto around 12GW to be delivered south to the only realistic market for their output - over distances of 100s of miles with no existing grid capacity in place to do so before licensed and built (in many but not all cases).
And until all necessary new network capacity built - not just those hvdc links but nationally on land and sea  - to support new farm locations- we face in short term more of the near exponential growth in network curtailment costs - due to a lack of integrated planning - saw the former NG ESO  increased forecast for £3bn grid thermal curtailment by 2030 in 2024.
As we see and pay for new farms built without local demand and grid capacity, pay them £100,000s in curtailment, pay for gas generation as well as we can deliver that, and have to then build the needed grid capacity or pay curtailment for decades under current contract terms oh and of course burn gas and other fossil fuels the renewables were meant to prevent.
https://wastedwind.energy/2025-12-09
 £1.36bn this year and counting.

Seagreen in 2024 Scotlands at the time biggest - possibly still (c1.1GW theoretical) wind farm a classic example.  Sees 71% curtailment.

The costs of such past mistakes - despite many warnings about the costs that were coming - and sadly can expect to see more of the same in current auction round in an atrempt to hit 95% by 2030 -  now coming back to bite us with a vengeance - in nearly all our electricity bills for certainly the next 5-10 years.

Qyburn

When I first took an interest windfarm developers had to foot the bill for their grid connection. For example I knew one that had to pay £100k (or it might be £100k more) for an 800kW turbine rather than 600kW.

Since then it's changed and developers don't pay for network upgrades (reinforcement as they call it).  Presumably this is now rolled into the costs we all pay. And it means there's no incentive foe developers to choose sensible site to suit the existing network, if they build somewhere that needs a pile of reinforcement or extensions that's someone else's problem.

Scot_39

Qyburn said:

When I first took an interest windfarm developers had to foot the bill for their grid connection. For example I knew one that had to pay £100k (or it might be £100k more) for an 800kW turbine rather than 600kW.

Since then it's changed and developers don't pay for network upgrades (reinforcement as they call it).  Presumably this is now rolled into the costs we all pay. And it means there's no incentive foe developers to choose sensible site to suit the existing network, if they build somewhere that needs a pile of reinforcement or extensions that's someone else's problem.

Sounds like another move towards the establishments "green washing" renewables pricing - the isolated focus on wholesale CfDs that appears to have prevailed for a decade - to make renewables seem attractive to the general population when comparing against other wholesale costs.

But of course they typically already have the grid infrastructure in place - so no added costs for network (in the £10s bns) to deliver to us - or anywhere near the same in network balancing / curtailment. 

Do you know roughly when the change occurred ?