al4x1

a sceptic might suggest the price rises are to make sure they cover enough to make up for any windfall tax. So ultimately we pay the windfall tax which sounds suspiciously like that fat ******* no one wanted to run the country getting his hands on yet more of our hard earned cash.
For those who fixed a while back what prices did you fix at? as once again the companies aren't stupid they won't just loose money knowingly so I'd be betting you were paying above the odds to start with and probably with the price increases the rest will be catching up with you now.

Their fixed prices till 2011 are staggering

Tier 1 is 7.62p
Tier 2 is 3.82p

Compared to mine at the moment of

Tier 1 - 3.87
Tier2 - 1.98

So mine can double pretty much before I loose and were they to fall back I gain all the way, seems like a no brainer to me with wholesale prices falling and pressure on the companies not to profiteer

f1_fan

iTrader: (9)

Or maybe it is just a greedy privatised energy supplier in a cartel with other suppliers that knows it can charge what it likes and there isn't anything any of us can do about it. Far more likely than any windfall tax protection scheme I think.

al4x1

Maybe its that simple!

phil_wrx

iTrader: (2)

i see a windfall tax coming in

speedking

3.717 / 2.100 in Dec 2005, until 2010

That was a 2.8% premium over the standard price then. The story was that by committing to a long term deal BG could purchase the gas at the time at a cheaper rate. Therefore not everybody's gas is bought at the same price.

Janspeed

iTrader: (1)

Everyone fart into bottles, or simply buy a dozen cows.

al4x1

so mine is just about to go over that in that bearing in mind my rates are after the last 25% increase so was paying well under the BG price, horses for courses really but BG aren't known for giving money away. Makes people feel better thinking they are being and fixing but much like fixing mortgages you often end up paying a premium to do so.

mshill

iTrader: (4)

No wonder these companies have such huge profits, this country is becoming an absolute joke!!

Flatcapdriver

Absolute bull****. As Pete Brant has already said, there isn't sufficient storage in the UK. There's plenty of gas, in fact the UK almost has enough to cover its own needs but the reason there is price distortion in the market is that France, Germany and others have been reliant on foreign suppliers for so long that they have a decent storage and a robust infrastructure to distribute.

The UK has probably the best infrastrucure in the world but it doesn't have sufficient storage which is why the French (and others) achieve better market rates - they can buy more, either on the sport market or hedging mechanisms.

And do you know why the UK has such low levels of storage? Simple NIMBYISM at work. Everyone wants cheap gas but they get uppity during planning.

Just Google 'Canvey Island campaign, LNG' to get a flavour of the self righteous types who then complain about the cost of gas.

lozgti

So,the whole thing seems to be storage really.We are paying for incompetance?

Anyway,they can sod off.Our plan is simply to use as little as is ultimately possible.Gas/Electric etc

Have the government realised yet that no one has any money left ? Next year will see no one putting the gas and electric on and a load of untaxed family cars littering the streets.

We seem to be going backward this nation.A real 1970's job

al4x1

there won't be untaxed cars littering the streets thats for sure, while scrap is worth money they'll be removing them and crushing them pretty fast

TelBoy

Yeah, down 69%, you're spot on!!

speedking

So come 2010 do you think that I will have paid more for my gas than if i hadn't fixed? I don't. Still

Flatcapdriver

No. There are other factors in play such as a dramatic jump in wholesale prices, particularly over the last six months and moving forward but as ever on Scoobynet, its better to jump to conclusions rather than accept simple facts.

lozgti

Didn't the price of gas fall off a cliff the day they announced the 35% rise?

Coupled with the fact gas is linked to oil prices but shouldn't be and oil prices are coming down?

Anyway,jumpers and bobble hats for us from November

ChrisB

Too right - extra sessions on the Wii come Winter in our house!

Gordo

Why's it a joke for companies to make profits??? Surely a successful economy is what we want - it creates jobs, wealth and ultimately funds your pension. Don't forget that the so called 'get rich' shareholders are generally large investment funds (pensions, insurance etc) which all ultimately come back to you one way or another.

Also, don't be sucked in by the media. They love headlines like "outrageous £1bn profit" and yet, given the scale of a business, the capital it has tied up and the risks it takes, £1bn profit isn't actually that great. If it was 1/10th of the size and only made £100m profit the press would ignore it - so what's the difference?

Windfall taxes are the current shout and are a knee-jerk socialist reaction to success. They completely ignore:

- that introducing such stupid taxes merely drives these businesses abroad, such that the treasury loses in the long-run (and we lose jobs overseas)
- energy markets are cyclical. it's not long ago that BP and the rest were making hardly any profit (losses in real terms on the capital employed). I don't remember anyone clamouring to re-imburse them from the public coffers!
- A lot of the profits are made overseas
- These businesses need to take long-term views, investing in risky exploration and R&D in order to drive profits. Of course they should see strong returns - in order for them to keep taking the risks and to remain competitive. If they don't then people don't buy shares / invest and they can no longer survive.
- messing around with individual industries in this way is a very damaging form of intervention in capitalist markets. people (rightly) rail against tariffs and quotas, but don't seem to mind windfall taxes
- it typifies the British mentality - we hate to celebrate success.

Rant over.... back to the day job

Gordo

rb5_336

Solar panels on the roof heat the water and ship it back into the boiler, meaning less gas needed to get up to normal temps

H2O Solar - Home

With £3.5k investment, at current (well 2 month ago heating costs), they reckon ~£500 annual saving. With prices of gas rising, this should save even more money / pay itself off even quicker. Plus we're doing our bit for the environment...

stuart n

Just discovered that british gas prices where i live will rise 43.8%,

J4CKO

iTrader: (1)

I can see that this isnt going to add up over the next year or two, massive price rises on everything but wages, I know people that were struggling before, they are buggered now.

I earn good money and have no mortgage but am worried about whats round the corner, people will start doing daft things to make ends meet.

My energy bills are already 160 a month, might as well call it a round £300 then.