Energy Matters Global and Domestic

[NewcastleFalcon]

Saves me scratching around looking

Here are the thoughts of Martin Lewis as of a day ago, and yes standard variable rate tariffs are the only ones to come under the jurisdiction of the Ofgem price cap.

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/utili ... orth-it--/

REgards Neil

[Gibbo2286]

I've always been 'mean' with the energy usage, always only boiled enough water for the two mugs of tea, put a jacket on instead of turning up the thermostat, likewise with water usage, had a meter fitted and reduced my water bill by 66%.
Shop around every year for the best deal, fixed if possible, I'm currently with Shell who have been excellent in all aspects but at the moment are not offering any 'deals' waiting for the market to stabilise.
They've been very good with the billing dropping the monthly DD without prompting from me when I started to build up too much in credit, they're also are very quick with the feed in tariff payments for my solar panels.

[NewcastleFalcon]

When your fixed deal comes to an end the advice in the article quoted, is to just let it default to a standard variable tariff within the scope of the price cap arrangements. Anything else and you are betting against your supplier, and I wonder in whose favour the odds are. A point also made was that "exit fees" from these fixed deals should some sort of return to normality occur, are heavily stacked to prevent switching out of them should the price drop and have been increased substantially.

Regards Neil

[myglaren]

I am with Scottish Power and haven't a grump with them. I probably do pay too much though.

Are you on an existing fixed deal? If so prepare for a shock when it ends.


So plan of action
Buy a washing line, and ponder whether to ceremoniously cut the plug off the tumble drier

Not on a fixed deal. Have been with them for decades except for a brief fling with Eon that was a waste of effort.
Rarely use the tumble dryer, no need as I have plenty of space and options for drying washing and prefer to have it out in the garden when possible.
Tumble dryer is seriously ill, the condensate pump just gurgles.
Dishwasher, also rarely used, packed up a couple of weeks ago. May fix it one day, then again.But not bothering with either until the new parts arrive for the washing machine. Been on order for almost four months.

I make efforts to be parsimonious but not with any great deal of success.

[RichardW]

OFGEM is already softening up for a big rise in the cap - like 60% - in October, taking 'average' bills (however they work that out) to something like £3,200 pa. We're already at that, so I am bracing for >£5k pa There must be a significant proportion of the country for whom that is unattainable - I really don't know what is going to happen, mass not paying of the energy bills? If 2/3 of a company's customers refuse to pay, it can't take all of them to court, so someone is going to get hung out to dry...

[bobins]

That's exactly the scenario where 'smart' meters can be used to leverage the customer into paying. Whilst it would be entirely the last resort for the energy providers to remotely switch off a customer's gas / electricity supply, they could use the implied threat of that as a stick to beat the customer into paying. I can imagine them using a threat of limiting the amount of hours of energy you use during the day in order to get you to pay up a bit or dramatically reduce your energy usage. Welcome to the future

[Rp0thejester]

You guys have made my day!! Got up to date on the posts and you all reminded of....

, one of the funniest films ever btw.

[Rp0thejester]

I imagine this is Newcastle and Mick in real life, https://www.google.com/search?q=grumpy+ ... Ndzwk,st:0 no offence meant

[NewcastleFalcon]

Energy Matters Global and Domestic Page one post one of the thread

Weighty matters indeed....news, views, information, and debate with random off-topic meanderings and humour if we are lucky, lets see.

Still what the thread is all about today as it was when the thread kicked off in 2019. In the 60 pages so far we have covered every aspect of the topic title, with excellent contributions along the way. Pleased that some of our postings have provided some entertainment and hopefully some information and opinion as well.

As ever new followers and contributors welcome, a few have come forward to add their experience so far of the current focus of the thread, the huge increase in the cost of domestic gas and electricity, which for many is likely to prove to be unaffordable.

The vast majority of homes, over 70%, are now on a standard variable contract which comes under the price cap arrangement – pretty much everyone who isn't on an existing fix. The general advice as of now is to move or do nothing and default to a standard variable contract when your existing fixed price contract expires.

Any energy saving tips welcome, join in if you can

Regards Neil

[Gibbo2286]

Energy saving tip, get smart meters fitted and USE them to your advantage.
As for the conspiracy nonsense ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,I give up.

[bobins]

Perhaps you can come up with a good reason why the meters can be switched off remotely, Gibbo ?

[mickthemaverick]

You must remember that the conspiracy theory works both ways. Yes there are those that believe the providers will use the smart meters to control their customers more and even as a threat for non payment etc, but there will also be customers clever enough to design their own smart meters and replace the supplied one so that the customer can control the usage data sent back to the provider. I have no doubt that such units will be available online (they may already be I guess!) for the less scrupulous customer to take advantage of!!

[myglaren]

A bit like one of my former neighbours (bought a GS from him) that had a set of pipes that he would fit to bypass the gas meter a couple of weeks after it was read, so it showed some use but not much. Then reinstate the proper pipes a week before the meter reader was due.
They did catch him out with a surprise reading as they could see that he used very little gas in comparison to his neighbours.
Snidey smart reader bodges will no doubt suffer the same as statistical comparisons are easier now and will soon be flagged.

[mickthemaverick]

I've not come across that gas ruse before Steve, sounds rather iffy to me as gas is not good when leaked!! However I have come across a fair number of people with rigged electric meters from straightforward bypassing with removable shunts to tapping the neighbour's supply where two meters were back to back in adjacent terraced houses. Also we did discover a tap from a street light feeding a very large workshop/garage to the side of a 5 bed detached house in Moor Park which is a very expensive area!!

[bobins]

I think I covered the smart meter regs and specs wayyyyy back in this thread somewhere, but to summarise....
Smart meters were/are an EU 'thing'. The main reason given that customers could monitor and moderate their energy usage as appropriate - although in practice I only think a tiny percentage of smart meter users make use of this. Smart meters and the associated tech and contracts also have the ability to have 'demand led pricing' - less expensive energy when it's plentiful, expensive energy when it's in high demand or there's a shortage. Part of the design spec was also to allow remote switching of the meters to moderate usage - although there was no explanation of how this would/could be achieved.
Each country could determine if they would roll out smart meters and, IIRC, Germany declined to do so - I think the fact that customer's usage could be remotely monitored was politically unacceptable and played a part in why the German govt. declined to roll them out. As a sweeping statement - 'German's don't like that sort of thing' !
Somewhere out in Youtubeland I think there's a video from 'BigClive' where he dissects a smart meter to look at its innards.