Who does not want a good deal, especially for big items like gas and electricity? I recently discovered that UK’s popular price comparison site uSwitch is not that accurate when it comes to domestic gas and electricity. Here are my tips in finding the best deal:
1. ONLY use uSwitch for initial search as it compares prices based on general average consumption pattern. It is not accurate enough.
uSwitch ask you for your post code, current supplier names, current method of payment for the bills, current plan names, your usage in the form of the cost of your last bill for example, how you heat your home (by gas or electricity?) and what you cook with. They then give you a list of companies and tell you how much you will save if you switch.
However, uSwitch do not analyse how big your property is and nor do they analyse your energy throughout the year. This makes a big difference, especially when your case is not the same as an average household in your area, which uSwitch has assumed you to be in its analysis. e.g In my case I live in a flat but my area is dominated by 4 bedroom family houses. Through calculation, I discovered that uSwitch recommended the wrong plan and provider for me.
Hence I recommend you
to just take a few company names from the top of the list and follow step 2 to do a bit more research yourself.
2. Understand how UK energy suppliers charge. The 2 most common ways of charging are:
A. With threshold but no standing charge
When the energy usage is below a set threshold per year, e.g 625 kWh, consumers are asked to pay a certain per unit price. Above that threshold, they have to pay another price (which is usually lower).
B. With standing charge but no thresholdConsumers are asked to pay a standing charge per day. There is no threshold and the per unit charge is lower than option A.
3. Find out the unit price details of your shortlisted companies.
This information is easily be available online these days.
4. Find out the unit price details of your current supplier
Your can find the price you are charged currently from your bill. But most importantly, check to see if they have new offers!
5. Establish which way of charging suits your property type and energy usage.
Generally speaking, if you do not use much energy, option A is a better choice for you. If you have a big house and use a lot of energy, option B suits you more. Of course there is only one way of finding out- by calculation.
It is easier than you think! I did mine in 5 minutes.
8. Dual Fuel
Generally speaking, you get better discounts when the same company supplies both your gas and electricity.
7. Price fix
I know most price comparison websites recommend price fixing but I am sceptical about this. The per unit prices for the price fix deals are generally higher- in my case I found it costing over 30% more per quarter. These days the price fixing period is usually around 12 months only. I am not sure if it is that much of a bargain anymore.
8. Other bits and pieces that will save you money:
A. Paperless billing- you can usually get a percentage off the total bill.
B. Direct Debit discount
9. Exit charge
Some deals come with an exit charge. This means you will be charged if you leave the policy before a defined date. Beware!
10. Customer Service
If you can afford a little more, choose a company that has a better system and better customer service. This saves you time and money in long run. I had experience during with a company that failed to do a simple transfer for 2 months. It was a total waste of my time, energy and thus money. It is not worth it!
What is your experience with uSwitch and energy suppliers? Please feel free to share!
Winkypedia 
Hi,
I work for uSwitch, so I was very interested to read your blog post, and wanted to reply to some of the points you raise.
You say that we do not factor the size of your property into our comparison – I just want to reassure you that this is not the case.
When you do a comparison, in the first instance, we ask how much energy you use at the moment, either in kWh or pounds spent. This is the most accurate way to compare because it’s based on the actual energy you use in your home over the course of a year.
If you don’t have this information to hand, we ask a range of questions about your home and lifestyle (including size and type of home, people living there, insulation, heating and cooking methods etc) to build an estimate for your energy use for the year. The estimate will take into account the fact you use more energy in the winter because it’s colder.
We never assume that you live in certain kind of home just because of your postcode.
Also, if it reassures you further, we are accredited by the Consumer Focus Confidence Code for price comparison sites. This means you can trust our results, because we stick to industry rules and standards and are given a yearly assessment by Consumer Focus to make sure we’re up to scratch.
Lauren (editor at uSwitch.com)
Thank you for your comments.
In the ‘Gas and Energy Consumption’ page on uSwitch’s website, there are five options for consumers to choose when they fill in the form, in terms of gas or electricity usage: monthly spend (£), annual spend (£), annual consumption (kWh), last quarterly bill (£, stating which month the bill is) or ‘no details handy’. uSwitch should have told me that if I wanted to get an accurate recommendation, I NEEDED to choose the ‘annual’ option. I pay quarterly so all I took the data from my last bill and indicated the month, as requested. I was not asked by uSwitch at any point how I spend my electricity or gas in the other 3 quarters of the year. To me, an assumption has been made by uSwitch in getting a full picture of my annual consumption.
If the customer choose the option ‘no details handy’, they are asked by uSwitch ‘how good is your home insulation?’ and the choice of answers are: ‘good’, ‘average’ and ‘below average’. I am a Chartered Architect and I am familiar with insulation but even I am not aware of an obvious definition to this.There is no obvious guideline near this question to show how these 3 grades are defined by uSwitch neither. This ambiguity leads to inaccuracy in consumption and thus affect recommendation.
uSwitch also ask questions like ‘how frequently do you cook?’ and there are only 2 answers to choose from ‘Most nights’ or ‘less often’. It is so vague- it clearly can only depict a rough consumption pattern of a household.
In my case, following uSwitch’s recommendation based on my latest quarterly bill, I switched supplier (and thanks to the energy suppliers mix ups over meter numbers etc it was no easy task). However after I switched it was discovered that the new supplier would cost me more over the year, so I had to switch back to my original supplier.
Hence it is no surprise that uSwitch’s recommendation can only be used as a reference but not fully trusted because there are so many rooms for error. Hence, this is what I recommended in the blog.