Tomato Energy goes bust - here's what you need to know

matelodave

silvercar said:

Missing from the article, If you’re eligible for the warm home discount from the government (£150 towards electricity bills) how will this get paid? It says it gets paid to your supplier you had on 24th August '25 which for a Tomato customer would be an issue.

I think that after the number of companies that have gone bust over the past few years the issue or transferring WHD will be sorted out without panicking people into inundating the suppliers with spurious phone calls.

woodulike

As a Tomato customer I'm concerned about how much I will have to pay to whichever supplier we are transferred to and how quickly I can switch to a sensibly priced tariff.  As an all electric houshold our bills will be very expensive if we have to pay the price cap prices for long.

I have been with Tomato for over a year, have had no issues and had no idea they were struggling.

ConcernedBrummie

woodulike said:

As a Tomato customer I'm concerned about how much I will have to pay to whichever supplier we are transferred to and how quickly I can switch to a sensibly priced tariff.  As an all electric houshold our bills will be very expensive if we have to pay the price cap prices for long.

I have been with Tomato for over a year, have had no issues and had no idea they were struggling.

Fairly certain it's 3 working days the minimum it can take a supplier to switch your supply. 

So do you research now ready to contact whichever supplier to go with and request they take over your supply once the SOLR is picked and processed.

MattMattMattUK

woodulike said:

As a Tomato customer I'm concerned about how much I will have to pay to whichever supplier we are transferred to and how quickly I can switch to a sensibly priced tariff.  As an all electric houshold our bills will be very expensive if we have to pay the price cap prices for long.

It depends what you mean by "price cap", were you on their E7 tariff, "Lifestyle" their ToU tariff or one of the others? If you were/are on E7 then when moved via SoLR you will be out on another E7 tariff. ToU is slightly different and in most cases there probably will not be something identical, but depending on your usage pattern there will be other options and something similar, possibly even cheaper.

woodulike said:

I have been with Tomato for over a year, have had no issues and had no idea they were struggling.

The writing has been on the wall for several months now, they were in trouble even as far back as the start of the year, were facing ongoing losses and the unwillingness of investors to throw more money down the drain appears to have got them to where they are.

silvercar

ConcernedBrummie said:

woodulike said:

As a Tomato customer I'm concerned about how much I will have to pay to whichever supplier we are transferred to and how quickly I can switch to a sensibly priced tariff.  As an all electric houshold our bills will be very expensive if we have to pay the price cap prices for long.

I have been with Tomato for over a year, have had no issues and had no idea they were struggling.

Fairly certain it's 3 working days the minimum it can take a supplier to switch your supply. 

So do you research now ready to contact whichever supplier to go with and request they take over your supply once the SOLR is picked and processed.

MattMattMattUK said:

woodulike said:

As a Tomato customer I'm concerned about how much I will have to pay to whichever supplier we are transferred to and how quickly I can switch to a sensibly priced tariff.  As an all electric houshold our bills will be very expensive if we have to pay the price cap prices for long.

It depends what you mean by "price cap", were you on their E7 tariff, "Lifestyle" their ToU tariff or one of the others? If you were/are on E7 then when moved via SoLR you will be out on another E7 tariff. ToU is slightly different and in most cases there probably will not be something identical, but depending on your usage pattern there will be other options and something similar, possibly even cheaper.

The concern people have is not how long it will take for people to move from SoLR to a new supplier, but how long will people be stuck on the price cap until they can move. For people with all electric households or who have EVs this is particularly concerning. For EVs alone this can triple the cost of charging the cars.

EssexHebridean

silvercar said:

DodgyDave88 said:

Serves you all for going with a supplier with such a ridiculous name 😂

For an energy company, is tomato any different from octopus? 

Both are edible, in fairness...  

As for

Peter999_2 said:

QrizB said:

Peter999_2 said:

Great, another rise in standing charges thanks to a reckless company going bust.

If they've only got 15k customers, there isn't much scope for them to cost us a fortune.

If they somehow cost £1k for each customer they had, that's only about 60p for each electricity account holder to find.

The standing charge is currently 60p a day for me and it was 20.8p just 5 years ago.     £30 a year goes to pay off the debts of companies that go bust.   It is a scandal that nothing every seems to done about - suppliers continue to go bust and we continue to pay their debts.

Actually if referring to the debt related to the companies that failed during the energy crisis that debt has long since been paid and cleared from the SC - you may want to listen to Martin's chat with the CEO of ofgem as it's quite informative on that. 

Qyburn

silvercar said:

The concern people have is not how long it will take for people to move from SoLR to a new supplier, but how long will people be stuck on the price cap until they can move. For people with all electric households or who have EVs this is particularly concerning. For EVs alone this can triple the cost of charging the cars.

Another way to look at it would be to remember how much you saved while you were with Tomato. Offset that against a few days on SVT until you get back on an EV tariff. Just by the way when I signed up for "Go" it was instant, and applied from the start of the day I selected it.

silvercar

Qyburn said:

silvercar said:

The concern people have is not how long it will take for people to move from SoLR to a new supplier, but how long will people be stuck on the price cap until they can move. For people with all electric households or who have EVs this is particularly concerning. For EVs alone this can triple the cost of charging the cars.

Another way to look at it would be to remember how much you saved while you were with Tomato. Offset that against a few days on SVT until you get back on an EV tariff. Just by the way when I signed up for "Go" it was instant, and applied from the start of the day I selected it.

It would be good if it only took a few days to move from the SVT with whoever is the SOLR to the new provider. Personally I saw the writing on the wall with Tomato, so chose to go elsewhere when looking for a new EV tariff in the Summer. Even then it took a few days on the new suppliers SVT before I could move to the EV tariff. So the timescale is from yesterday (?) to however long it takes to be established enough with the SOLR plus a few days to move away and another few days to get onto their desired EV/ TOU/ Smart tariff.

Smith2001uk

Just for info for anyone, i moved away last month so i don't get any hassle.

I moved to Eon Next Drive for the low rate at 12-6am. I was told i had to go on the normal capped tariff, wait until my first bill and then i could move over. Fine i thought but when i was on the App on the first day, i selected move tariff and was able to select the following day for Next Drive. Had cheap rates ish since. May help someone who may have listened to Eon CS agents and cost them a little bit more

silvercar

Smith2001uk said:

Just for info for anyone, i moved away last month so i don't get any hassle.

I moved to Eon Next Drive for the low rate at 12-6am. I was told i had to go on the normal capped tariff, wait until my first bill and then i could move over. Fine i thought but when i was on the App on the first day, i selected move tariff and was able to select the following day for Next Drive. Had cheap rates ish since. May help someone who may have listened to Eon CS agents and cost them a little bit more

Same experience here. It took just 48 hours before I was on the eon next drive tariff.