From today, 10th December, British Gas’s prices will cost 7% more for gas and electricity adding an extra £80 on to the average annual standard dual fuel bill, which will increase from £1,157 to £1,237 as a result. (Centrica announcement issued 12/11/2010. Bill sizes based on a medium user using 3,300 kWh of electricity and 20,500 of gas on a standard dual fuel plan paying on receipt of bill averaged across all regions. )

But you don’t have to put up with high bills.  Let us help you, If we cant find anything better it will not cost you a penny.

The awards dinner is being held at The Langham Hotel, Central London on Thursday 25th November 2010.

Warm regards,

Shawn ColesManaging DirectorEdge Business Media

Previously known as the Carbon Reduction Commitment

The CRC Energy Efficiency scheme registration process closes on 30 September 2010 (the first phase). Last year the Environment Agency, which supervises the scheme, sent out letters informing all users of Half Hourly (HH) meters that they needed to register, irrespective of the usage. To date there are many companies who have not yet registered.

Not so well publicised are the fines that can be charged for failing to register.

Registration is mandatory for almost ALL organisations that had HH meters in 2008; they will have to provide how much half hourly metered electricity they consumed in the calendar year 2008. The few exceptions are on climate agreement schemes.

If the 2008 usage was above 6,000MWh* in 2008 (across all their UK meters) businesses will have been required to registered as Participants and be recording usage since April 2010. This equates to a spend of about £500,000 per annum. Group companies need to aggregate their usage and report at group level. Participants have to pay to register.

If usage was between 3,000MWh* and 6,000MWh* you need to make an information disclosure and disclose consumption records for 2008. No payment is due.

If the usage was below 3,000MWh* in 2008 there is no further action needed other than making an information disclosure, and no fee to pay.

*           1 Megawatt-hour (MWh) is 1,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) so 3,000MWh = 3 million kWh   

Site. http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/business/topics/pollution/117652.aspx

Failure to register before 30^th September 2010 will lead to civil penalties:-

·       For companies below 6,000MWh a fine of £1,000 for missing the deadline

·       For companies over 6,000MWh a fine of £5,000 plus £500 for every DAY late, plus publication on non-compliance

Businesses will be automatically contacted each year to register any new HH meters. It is recommended businesses join the CRC Mailing List to avoid potential penalties arising in the future.

Site. http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/business/topics/pollution/105760.aspx

Should you require any further information on the CRC scheme, or help on utilities procurement and reducing energy usage please contact us.

2. Deviation from agreed Contract tariffs.  What was signed for is not what is necessarily charged.

3. Even if the Tariffs are correctly listed they may be transposed.  We recently discovered that the standing charge was incorrectly applied to another charge resulting in a £55,000 excess for one month alone.

4. If Notice of Termination isn’t correctly provided, and a contract is rolled you will probably pay around 30% more than the current market rate.  You can’t go to another supplier so why should the supplier give you a keen price?  Well that’s their logic I suppose.

5. If you don’t have a contract you will pay between 80 and 120% more than if you had a contract.

We are increasingly finding that energy suppliers are over charging businesses via incorrect meter reading, incorrect data entry etc.  National newspapers are reporting secret gas bill hikes (Daily Mail 28/09/09). Examples of overcharging we have found over the last few months include:

•      £26,000 of overcharging due to basic typing errors
•      £3,500 because the suppliers computer system didn’t recognise that the meter goes back to zero when it hits 100,000
•      £13,000 for six years of double charging