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Industry players, Big6 suppliers and Uswitch were quick to criticize the price cap of domestic standard tariffs promised by Tories election campaigners.
Suppliers claim that only free competition will drive prices down but also worry about billions being lost in revenues needed for investments while Uswitch is worried that consumers would become too complacent to switch.

In our opinion the government would be right to protect the 70% of loyal customers currently paying over the odds as it’s clear competition is not working efficiently.
While some consumers will no longer be in a rush to switch suppliers (loosing money to Uswitch) the majority of the 30% switchers would certainly continue to do so while lowering the prices for the other 70%.

P272 is now entering it’s final stage.

By 1st April all MD supplies with AMR meters must be converted to HH.

While OFGEM intends to take action against failing suppliers, it does recognize that some new contracts will be within their initial 45 day period before the change can take place.

Any MD contract now quoted as HH will require a MOP contract charged by one supplier as £265 per annum on a 5-year contract.
However this relative small charge may be more than compensated by a much lower standing charge as long a no capacity charges are being added.

UK Power Networks (UKPN), the owner and operator of distribution lines and cables across London, the South-East and the East of England, seems to have the answer.

As ELN reports the company now offers the option of texting people affected by power cuts to give updates about the expected duration of the failure and to keep them in the loop regarding the progress of repairs.

The service includes a 24-hour priority helpline to help customers deal with any particular problems they’re facing.

It aims to cater to vulnerable electricity users by offering them tailored support such as home visits, hot meals, advice and even by keeping their friends and family updated with how they’re doing.

People can even sign up to UKPN’s Priority Services Register, which will provide them with a pack of helpful items such as a plug-in-the-wall torch that automatically switches on when there is a power cut, a glow stick and a place to store emergency medical information.

To sign up to the text update service, users can text POWER and their postcode to 80876.

Fortunately powercuts in this country are rare and usually short.

Following billions of Dollars investments the Leviathan gas field located about 100 miles off the coast of Haifa is set to start deliveries by end of 2019.
Whether any of that natural gas will ever reach the UK or not; the additional capacity on the world market will undoubtedly put pressure on gas & energy prices.

OFGEM published last year’s complaint’s figures and was pleased to note that total complaints went down from 5m in 2015 to 3.5m in 2016.

While this is certainly encouraging and proves that most suppliers are taking customer service seriously, there is still no room for complacency.

Looking at the graphs on

https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/consumers/energy-supplier-comparison-data/compare-supplier-performance-complaints

in particular bigger supplier’s have come down from unacceptable high numbers of complaints in previous years, some smaller ones actually feared worse towards the end of last year.

However it’s not just the number of complaints received that matters, but how they were handled and how long it took to be resolved and how many had to be referred to the ombudsman. Big 6 suppliers resolved at the end 2016 between 50 – 74% by the end of next working day while by the medium sized supplier this varied between 24 and 89% and one of the small suppliers resolved as little as 16% but the same supplier only received 48 complaints per 10’000 customers.

Suppliers need to work harder to get things right the first time and in particular need to audit and test their IT systems much more thoroughly. Front line staff need to be better trained to handle complaints quickly.

Alpine Utilities prides itself to assist customers with their complaints all the way until they are resolved to customers full satisfaction.

OFGEM published today it’s price control decision for DCC Data Communication Company the central communications body licensed to provide the communications, data transfer and management required to support smart metering.
Amongst other proposals OFGEM writes: We consider, based on the information provided by DCC, a small proportion of their costs not to be economic and efficient. We have therefore determined these costs as unacceptable costs under the licence. As such we direct that £0.579 million from DCC’s internal costs in 2015/16 are unacceptable and that £79.483 million should not be included in forecasts.

While we are not in the position to comment on the detailed figures, we welcome OFGEM’s efforts to curb operating costs that would be passed on to the consumers.

We have just been informed by Gazprom Energy, the owner of Wingas UK that they will cease to operate Wingas UK as a subsidiary but instead will transfer all Wingas customers to Gazprom Energy by the 1st May 17.

If you have any queries about existing accounts, you should continue to contact WINGAS UK until the customer has transferred to Gazprom Energy: +44 (0) 20 8439 9680 enquiries@wingas-uk.com

If your contract is due for renewal, please send us your details and as usual we will negotiate some highly competitive rates for you.

OFGEM reports that 7.7m switches from domestic customers took place last year, that’s nearly 30% increase from 2015.
Although the number of customers that have switched suppliers is far less because many of them switched both gas & electricity while others switched more than once.
However it clearly indicated that people voting with their feet and that puts pressure on suppliers to reduce prices and improve customer service for everyone.
The average savings from a standard tariff to the cheapest one in the market was on 28th January £230!
5 years ago there were 14 suppliers to choose from, today we have 50!
How about business customers: Although we don’t have accurate figures but it’s clear that many business just automatically renew with their existing supplier or often remain on the expensive variable or even deemed rates.
It’s therefore imperative that business consumers send us a copy of their bills to check if Alpine Utilities can get them a better deal – and in most cases we can!

ELN reports that Leicester City Council and Leicestershire County Council have appointed a local energy supplier that will supply “cheap, reliable energy” to residents.
The idea is certainly commendable as they plan to operate not-for-profit and thereby offering cheap energy and to tackle fuel poverty.
2 other councils are also preparing to set up a similar scheme.
While large companies reap in big profits it remains to be seen whether councils can run an efficient customer service department to lower prices.

Energy supplier npower has announced it is increasing prices for householders by 9.8%.

That would add £109 to the average dual fuel annual energy bill, increasing it to £1,188.

It includes a rise of 4.8% on gas and 15% on electricity.

Obviously this will only immediately affect customers not currently on a fixed rate tariff or prepayment meter (50% = 1.4m customers).

While there have been sharp wholesale price rises in recent months, due to BREXIT, OECD oil production cuts and higher demand due to colder than seasonal normal temperatures, we question whether suppliers have dropped their rates when wholesale prices came down last year.

Customer are encouraged to vote with their feet and shop around for a better deal.