UK NEWS

POOR 'FAILED' ON CHEAP ENERGY DEALS

Saturday April 28,2007

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Energy firms have been accused of failing to encourage low-income customers to switch to the cheapest possible tariffs.

Getting both gas and electricity from the same supplier can save the average household £207 per year, according to uSwitch.com.

The price comparison website says more than 1.1 million low income households are on separate tariffs, boosting energy firms' profits by £232 million per year.

It claims a recent raft of energy price cuts will only "chip away" at fuel bills.

Around 360,000 low income households have been with the same gas and electricity suppliers for at least two decades, uSwitch said.

And the average low income household hasn't reviewed its energy supplier for more than 11 years.

USwitch.com director of consumer policy Ann Robinson said energy firms should do more to educate hard-up customers about the best tariffs.

"We are calling on suppliers to help consumers by arming them with all the facts about their current range of tariffs so that consumers can choose which one is right for them," she said.

"Moreover, we would like suppliers to firmly commit to making sure that their most vulnerable customers are on the cheapest available deal."

The price switching firm says the South East has the highest number of low income customers on single fuel tariffs, followed by the North West of England.

FUEL TARIFFS

28.04.07, 2:02am

I moved to Npower last year as they were good but now they are expensive and worse than British Gas. It's not the job of suppliers to give lowest tariffs to poor payers or people with card type meters that cost more to administer, it's the goverment that introduced the system so they should educate the public. I am looking to move suppliers again but hard to get exact prices of each suppliers tariffs, organisations like Uswitch often give out of date data and mislead customers, goverment bodies also mislead, why not force suppliers to issue exact unit costs and stop all this percentage or average savings which are quoted for higher users, I found reading about charges on my water meter I cut charges in half but Anglia Water's sales told me I would be worse off, the next sales person told me I was correct and my calculatios were correct, normal water rates over £300, I was paying £150 on meter then adjusted to So Low Tariff and now only £70. I find same things happening with Gas & Electric sales, I emailed Npower for new charges from April 30th to be emailed back 3 times with dfferent prices each time, I am awaiting a call from them to explain as I said I would complain about their actions.

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