topic Re: How to Cut your Energy Bills in The Round Table

How to Cut your Energy Bills

mustard-tree — Sun, 03 Apr 2016 09:40:15 GMT

I had for some time been paying just over £70 a month for electricity.

Wanting to cut my outgoings, I did a comparison, and found a company offering about £55 a month

I liked the look of that, so went through the process of changing to this other company.

Shortly after, I got a phone call from my original supplier, asking why I left.

I told them I had found somewhere cheaper.

He then asked if I would consider returning to them if he found a better tarriff

`Yes` said I.

After some keyboard tapping, he said he had a tarriff based on my past usage which was fixed until March 2018

at a cost of £34 a month.

Seems that for me, the way forward was not to threaten to leave and go elsewhere, but to actually do it.

Might not work for all suppliers though.

Re: How to Cut your Energy Bills

artful_dodgings — Sun, 03 Apr 2016 15:44:27 GMT

Different theme, same outcome. My ISP monthly bill was £38. I rang them and asked if there was a code I needed to get from them to change supplier. Sharp intake of breath from the lady at HQ, followed by, "Are you unhappy with our service, and thinking of leaving" ?

"Yes" I said, "Not so much unhappy with the service, just the price of my monthly bill". "Hold on", she replied, "and I will see if I can do you a cheaper package". Ditto the keyboard tapping as yourself, and after literally seconds, she emerged with a monthy charge of £21.50 for exactly the same package. This is for a 12 month contract. When this terminates, it will then revert back to the original cost (!?!)

No prizes for guessing what I will then do. I'm sure these people in call centres make things up as they go along.

Re: How to Cut your Energy Bills

margaret*e — Mon, 04 Apr 2016 08:04:06 GMT

£38, £70.

I pay over £100 a month.

Re: How to Cut your Energy Bills

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Apr 2016 10:46:48 GMT

£200 here.

We'd been paying the same amount for quite a while when my husband decided to have a look at our energy account. We found out that we owed them in the region of £1900. In the past we would have had a letter in the post about that or at least a lettter at the end of the year telling us if we used more or less on our energy bill and then it was adjusted. But as everything is online now that is not done anymore. We had no reason to doubt what we were paying and were happy enough with it, so no reason to check.

I wonder how long it would have taken them to contact us and how high my arrears would have been by then.

So we paid off a lump sum and the rest is now added to the monthly bill, hence it being so high.

Re: How to Cut your Energy Bills

astrologica — Mon, 04 Apr 2016 18:09:11 GMT

I don't pay monthly for our energy bills. I pay quarterly, with a paper bill. It's not saving me any money, but it makes me feel good because I am a thorn in their side! They are not going to make one penny in interest by my paying for energy in advance, and they are constantly contacting me to try and persuade me to go direct debit. I keep reminding them that they are there to serve me, and that I will pay the bills in a way that suits me. I also have a rolling contract for my mobile phone and have a paper bill for that too. Same with the Council Tax.....I pay that weekly,in cash, at the Council Office. I have an intense dislike of Direct Debit and will not have one. I rather like being a difficult customer!😊

Re: How to Cut your Energy Bills

jd.linklater — Mon, 04 Apr 2016 21:39:37 GMT

£137 per month here for a two bed all electric bungalow, recently dropped from £160.

Re: How to Cut your Energy Bills

Anonymous — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 00:32:32 GMT

My energy bill went up because I had at one point 6 people living in the house. The washing machine never stopped nor the dryer. Showers and a bath for everyone twice a day, 3 televisions, games, computers, lights being left on everywhere, cooking at all hours etc.....

I was glad when one couple left, but the biggest ~~wasters~~ users are still with us.

We'll be saving so much money when they finally leave. Hopefully next year.

Re: How to Cut your Energy Bills

jd.linklater — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 18:05:07 GMT

A shower and a bath every day? What the devil are you doing to get so dirty?

Re: How to Cut your Energy Bills

Anonymous — Tue, 05 Apr 2016 19:46:58 GMT

Well my name is Harry.....and I get to do all the dirty work..

Re: How to Cut your Energy Bills

bankhaunter — Thu, 07 Apr 2016 17:22:21 GMT

When I moved, depite phone calls, it took over a year to actually get a bill.

Re: How to Cut your Energy Bills

5129frederick — Sun, 10 Apr 2016 20:18:00 GMT

Because our electricity and gas come off one bill and because we were so behind with people coming to check the reading in the end they presented us with a four figure bill. I climbed up the wall when I read it - I could have bought a car for that much! They threatened to cut us off completely - something that they can't do regardless of threats. I called their bluff and told them: "Fair do's, do that and you get your company's name dragged through a cheap tabloid with a daily readership of 10,000,000."

"Wait!" He screamed down the phone "I'm sure we can sort something out." He did Ten minutes later an arrangement had been made to install a power key system. It's far from ideal and it'll take us a couple of years before we're on a level keel, but if you just hint at contacting this super, sensational, soar away, Stun newspaper - if you can call it that, you'll find somebody'll get back to you in record time.