Cashback Price Comparison Services Discussion

System

Theory has it that it is simple to switch suppliers. I instigated a transfer fron Southern Energy in early October 2003. I have yet to complete the transfer almost 6 months later.
They put objections, hurdles, miscommunications etc
in your way. I have even been assigned a " minder" by the Customer Services Director- to speed things along!
This process has used up loads of my time- budget for it!

System

From Director of Energyhelpline.com

In response to all the comments we are now listing Telecom Plus in an identical way to energylinx.co.uk. That means we now list every supplier except the new one Martin has found for prepayment customers (Equipower and Equigas) which we expect to have added by March 12th.

I would suggest that using a service like ourselves or energylinx does make switching a lot easier as we have government / energywatch approved calculation engines and for all suppiers except Telecom Plus all the applications can be done in a few minutes on the site.

Kind regards,

Mark Todd.

Jackie_Welsh

For clarity Energylinx does not just list Telecom Plus.

Customers can sign up online and we have been transferring customers to Telecom Plus for about one year now.


Jackie
Regulation
Energylinx
04.03.2004

alared

This is the headline that greets you when you visit energyhelponline.com

Here to help you
Save up to £200 on gas
and electricity for your home

I doubt if you have ever saved anybody £200 and it`s only a headline grabber to fool people into thinking they can make massive savings.
All the comparison sites are there to make as much money as they can by pushing the suppliers who are paying them.
I`ve just tapped my details into your site and surprise surprise it could`nt save me anywhere near £200.
But it`s our old friend TP that`s going to save me er,£15,er,£45 or even £76 depending what tariff it decides each month that I`m on.
Oh, hang on when I click on for enquire (for all three tariffs) I`m now told the following:
"Unfortunately TP does not currently support our service
for this tariff"
"We would urge you to consider switching to one of these great deals"
Both can save me £12-50 a year with Southern Electric
(what a con from £200 to £12-50)

Lewis_Gerolemou

Alared, Telecom Plus do not change tarrifs monthly, your previous annual useage determines which one is best for you.

Savings of £200 can be made, especially by householders who are still with their regional suppliers. A customer in my region who spends £700 with British Gas and £300 with Seeboard in a year could save £213 in one year by transferring. A more typical customer with a total spend of £650 could save £138.

I feel it would be inappropriate to say who the cheapest supplier is.

Lewis Gerolemou.
Independent Distributor for Telecom Plus

Smartasss

Lewis Gerolemou, Independent Distributor for Telecom Plus wrote:

Telecom Plus do not change tarrifs monthly

As seems often the case with T+, this does not tell the full story, and it would have been helpful had he taken the opportunity to let us all know the facts:

T+ have a total of 5 different tariffs for gas + electricity. These tariffs are based on your consumption.

Unless you specify which tariff you want, T+ choose one for you, presumably based on their calculation of your expected consumption.

Should your circumstances change for any reason, and your consumption consequently changes, they will allow you to switch tariffs BUT once you have done this, they make you stay on the new tariff for a minimum period of 12 months!

Another "little" matter worth bearing in mind when contemplating which supplier to change to!

alared

Lewis

The point I was making is I went to the energyhelponline.com site,tapped in all my details,TP came out as the most savings with 3 different amounts but if I`ve tried to accept one and wanted to change to TP (god forbid) I could`nt because according to their website
"Unfortunately TP does not currently support our service
for this tariff"
"We would urge you to consider switching to one of these great deals"
Both can save me £12-50 a year with Southern Electric

TP comes out top for savings(allegedly) but I can`t have it according to energyhelponline because your company does`nt support their own tariffs.

Smartasss

Hi alared

When energyhelponline tell you:

Unfortunately TP does not currently support our service for this tariff.

And:

We would urge you to consider switching to one of these great deals

Just maybe they are trying to get a "message" across to you regarding TP!!

Lewis_Gerolemou

Smartasss, T+ do have 5 tariffs, 2 for gas and 3 for electricity. You are wrong to presume that T+ base their calculation on your expected consumption, it is in fact based on actual consumption figures provided by the previous supplier. On the margins of the tariff bands there is very little difference between them in the charge. I imagine if customers could change tariffs at will they would move between them depending on their varying consumption at different times of the year- not practical- adds to cost.

Alared, I understood the point you were making , I can't answer for energyhelpline. In making your point you said "depending what tariff it decides each month that I'm on". My post was a response to that statement

Lewis Gerolemou
Independent Distributor for Telecom Plus

System

Comments regarding post about energyhelpline.com above.

Dear alared et al.,

Thanks for the comments about the save up to £200.

The average savings for energyhelpline.com do vary by source of traffic. People from moneysavingexpert.com like yourself who have already switched will generally be able to save but probably not more than 10-15%. Generally £50-100. So the savings you saw £15-60 with Southern Electric would not be untypical. And would seem quite OK.

Other users who have not switched and have a normal family sized home generally save £150.

We have had many users that have saved £250-500 so far several hundred.

We have even had a lot of people switch and not save money as they are unhappy with the current supplier.

Also as we do business energy we often save people £'000s. We have just saved a group of amusement arcades £17,000 off a £50,000 annual bill.

So I personally don't believe it is misleading.

At least we also showed you how much you can save with telecom plus something Telecom Plus themselves are not able to do as their website does not have the functionality. So, it would seem to me that we helped all round.

But if you do have any ideas for improvement I am all ears.

Many thanks again,

Mark Todd
energyhelpline.com