Energy standing charges could be scrapped!

[Workingman]

Well, sort of.

Ofgem is proposing suppliers offer one price-capped tariff that includes the standing charge, and another that loads these costs on energy usage charges instead. Customers could choose which suits them best.

Time to get your spreadsheet skills honed and records kept. Deciding which will be best for you will be no easy task as shifting the SC to units (kWh) used (gas and / or electric) will be variable and could be more expensive if you are not aware of your usage.

I consider myself a low user with about 1.65 units of gas and 1.98 units of electricity per day, on average, throughout the year so I will probably be better off paying per unit with no SC, but the devil will be in the detail.

I currently pay SCs of 35ppd for gas and 65ppd for electricity; that's £365 per year in SCs alone. I might be able to reduce that, but it will all depend on how much the unit cost goes up.

[cromwell]

My supplier has been trying to get me onto some kind of variable charging scheme.
Imo it will probably benefit them, not me.
We already have the dearest electricity in the developed world, with another two rises to come in January and April.
Then there is all the new green infrastructure to pay for, new small nuclear reactors, etc etc.
£300 off energy bills my backside.

[Workingman]

There's a real old furore going on in the BBC's HYS about this.

The split looks to be half and half with those who want to keep the SC (but have it capped, somehow) and those who want the SC spread out over the unit costs.saying it is fairer for low users. I guess that depends on the formula the energy companies come up with as they will not want to lose out.

For now I am with the second group, but things could change.

One of the things I could go with is this: Part of the SC is to cover repayment of the £3.8bn debt run up by non-payers and the failed energy supply companies. Ofgem has not done enough to force those people / companies to repay that debt. However, as it starts to come down so should the cost of the SCs.

It could be a third option.