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Bulb energy - UK's biggest green supplier - becomes Octopus energy

I've been with Octopus for a few years now -- think they're very good. For example, I'd built up a load of credit, emailed them last weekend and they'd refunded me by Wednesday. (They do leave a bit of the excess credit in as a buffer but they're very clear about that and I believe you can change your DD amount quite easily.)

Oh, and when I first switched to them, they were proposing a DD that was higher than I'd been paying (apparently they base it on a standard three bed house or something). I contacted them, told them what I had been paying and they adjusted it downwards with no hassle at all and said if I got back to them after a few months and did some meter readings, they could adjust as necessary.
 
platinumsage said:
I’m paying 2.068 p/kWh for gas from EDF. I got a quote from Ecotricty before switching and they wanted 4.284 p/kWh. I could almost build my own wind farm with that difference so it didn’t give me a good impression of them. Perhaps I was unlucky and chose a bad time to get a quote or something.
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Gas is a funny one though. The standing charge often ends up being a large part of the bill, so price per kWh isn't the whole story. With the 'leccy the standing charge is usually a tiny fraction and not so important.
 
Chz said:
Gas is a funny one though. The standing charge often ends up being a large part of the bill, so price per kWh isn't the whole story. With the 'leccy the standing charge is usually a tiny fraction and not so important.
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I just checked and the standing charge is just under a quarter of my gas bill, same with electricity. Ecotricity are definitely taking the piss with their rates for me. I don't really get what their green electricity credentials are either. It's all very well saying they buy 100% renewable leccy, but they can only do that if other customers are paying for gas and nuclear, because the grid can't run on wind and solar alone right now.

On the other hand I see they doing something involving making gas from grass, which sounds interesting.
 
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We must just be terrible on the electricity then. My standing charge is about 1/10th the total bill! Whereas with gas it's about 1/3 of the bill.
 
Chz said:
We must just be terrible on the electricity then. My standing charge is about 1/10th the total bill! Whereas with gas it's about 1/3 of the bill.
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For years we've spent the same on gas and electricity each year. I guess it depends a lot on what you use for heating and cooking, and whether you're growing weed in the attic.
 
Sue said:
I've been with Octopus for a few years now -- think they're very good. For example, I'd built up a load of credit, emailed them last weekend and they'd refunded me by Wednesday. (They do leave a bit of the excess credit in as a buffer but they're very clear about that and I believe you can change your DD amount quite easily.)

Oh, and when I first switched to them, they were proposing a DD that was higher than I'd been paying (apparently they base it on a standard three bed house or something). I contacted them, told them what I had been paying and they adjusted it downwards with no hassle at all and said if I got back to them after a few months and did some meter readings, they could adjust as necessary.
Click to expand...

I'm with Octopus & this thread prompted me to check my account - just requested a £90 refund by pressing a couple of buttons & also reduced my payment amount by £12 a month :thumbs:

Their website advised me to have a week's balance in hand at the end of March, and it was really easy to see what my yearly usage was (I've been with them a couple of years & request a refund about once a year) & be reasonably confident that it's ok to nudge my DD down a bit.
 
I was with Tonic, very low rates and green and all, but they went bust, and also were a bit duff about giving my in-credit money back. Mind you I have only (after two years, maybe more) just got my cheque from southern electric (who I was with before) for over payment. Been moved over automatically to Scottish Power who are so far proving to be a bit shitty. I don't think I am locked in, but they are being quite cagey about it. I didn't sign up to them, so surely I can't be?

Thinking of going with Octopus.
 
SheilaNaGig said:
Yes.
I told them I only wanted eco firms and they switched me over right away (obviously they ran it past me first...). It really was dead easy, and their system will check my tariff for me in ? 12 months. Or sooner if I ask them to.

So far, Green is taking about half what Bulb was taking from me.

But that’s because by Bulb insisted I pay twice what I was paying, as I said up-thread. Which is why I left them.
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Correction:
The new Green contract runs for a full 12 months on this tariff (which is really good) and that’s the reason lookaftermybills won’t be looking at things for he 12months. It’s not a standard thing, just what’s happened with this particular account.
 
I was going to switch to Octopus, but now doesn't feel like the best time, given both bulb and Octopus might be out of business by next week.
 
i'm octopus. What happens if/ when your energy supply company goes bust do you & your account get 'bought' by a surviving one?
 
moose said:
I was going to switch to Octopus, but now doesn't feel like the best time, given both bulb and Octopus might be out of business by next week.
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I'm with Octopus, and didn't see anything about them being at risk but it might have moved on since I looked.
 
bimble said:
i'm octopus. What happens if/ when your energy supply company goes bust do you & your account get 'bought' by a surviving one?
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OFGEM have a system to transfer customers to other suppliers. No idea what it means in terms of transferring tariffs - I'm on a 12 month fixed deal for green energy with them.
 
bimble said:
i'm octopus. What happens if/ when your energy supply company goes bust do you & your account get 'bought' by a surviving one?
Click to expand...
Ofgem hand it over to another supplier, who will get in touch. At that point, you can decide to go on to a supplier of your choice, switch to a different tariff with the new supplier, or just don't do anything...but that might leave you on a disadvantageous tariff.
 
I think, based on observing their behaviour, Bulb have been at risk for a couple of years. As reported in this thread, I think they've been deliberately overbilling customers (i.e. increasing payments beyond predicted usage so the customer ends up in credit) to establish more operating cash, which isn't a great sign. They also seemed to simultaneously over-expand their customer base and cut back their customer support. I suspect they're quite exposed to this crisis, which does affect all suppliers but will break the smallest and most fragile first.

I think Octopus are bigger than I'd thought. I've not heard anything about them being at risk. Possible though.
 
I should probably be looking into finding a replacement calor bottle for the cooker though, its been the same one for over two years which seems amazing in itself & now is probably a bad time to run out.
 
Don't most suppliers get their customers to build up credits in their accounts? I'm sure I've had it from a couple of them. It doesn't bother me at the moment with interest rates being nonexistent.
 
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