Bulb placed into special administration - What now?

Bulb Energy, which started in 2015 and was one of the first providers to offer renewable energy at affordable rates, has gone into special administration due to the spike in wholesale prices.

This means that for now the insolvent company is continuing to run as normal whilst administrators are brought in and the company sold at the appropriate time - if it can be. Customers will be transferred to another provider.

Is it better to go with a bigger supplier or a smaller one at the moment? Should Bulb customers shop around or wait and see what happens?

Have you got any advice for forum members affected by this and the collapse of other energy firms?

 

[Moley]

I'm with OVO. I only found out a couple of weeks ago. Been with SWALEC (part of SSE) for years but apparently that's now part of OVO.

 

[jimshall]

Was moved from Symbio which went bust a few week ago to EON. Tarriff almost doubled to 24.1p but has been reduced to 20.4p recently. It was 12.6p with Symbio! Also the daily standing charge has almost trebled to 32p. I wonder how much it actually costs to produce and supply renewable energy at the moment....

 

[DMenace1000]

Which energy firm are you with? Perhaps it's worth doing a poll for this to see what firm electricians and plumbers are with.

Octopus Energy. (1st yr-fixed pmth).Pretty Good so far

 

[Dartlec]

Another Bulb user here - mainly because I got the £50 credit when switching way back.

Naturally my old 'smart' meter didn't properly work for ages, but they do seem to have finally sorted it.

Will wait and see what happens, not much point moving now as I doubt anyone is keen to take on new customers until they see how bad the Winter gets...

Waiting to see if a grant will pay for a new boiler (upgrade from E7) so I can stop using oil filled radiators and wearing a woolly hat in the kitchen!

 

[oracle]

Which energy firm are you with? Perhaps it's worth doing a poll for this to see what firm electricians and plumbers are with.

Utilita but would switch for better deal when the dust settles

 

[R-fur]

Been with Octopus for a few years now, no issues, fingers crossed.

 

[Resu]

I've been with bulb for years, on their vari-fair tariff which has served me pretty well before now. Referrals have been good too. Currently on 20.82p/kWh & 27.38p standing charge. Gonna stick just now and see what happens.

 

[rapparee]

Power NI

Used to be NIE before they separated

 

[volts-amps1]

I'm with British Gas, but may have to shop round in the new year.

 

[Jymbob]

Was moved from Symbio which went bust a few week ago to EON. Tarriff almost doubled to 24.1p but has been reduced to 20.4p recently. It was 12.6p with Symbio! Also the daily standing charge has almost trebled to 32p. I wonder how much it actually costs to produce and supply renewable energy at the moment....

The problem is that there's a weird thing in the UK and EU where (crudely) the unit price is based on the most expensive production route at any given time, so even if there's enough energy for 90% of the UK from wind and sunshine it gets charged at the same price as the gas-generated stuff which is ludicrously high right now.

It's supposed to keep things competitive, but it's woefully out of date, hindering development of clean fuel solutions and is basically the cause of this whole pricing surge.

 

[Algarve Sparky]

Edp eletrodomésticos here in Portugal, often referred to as the most expensive in Europe, but of recent times that has levelled out when compared to the UK.

What I like they still have electricity showrooms like it was in the UK years ago,where you can walk in and pay the bill, buy a cooker or complain if you need too.

They operate that same as what was the old MEB or MANWEB did with a full contract service and maintenance packages as standard.

But with excess of 42 billion in assets, EDP are about as solid as a company can be ! not bad for a Government formed company in the mid seventies.

 

[Zerax]

I’m with British Gas and have been for some time.
Last months payments have shot up thanks to our hot tub, so I will be shopping around when the prices settle.

I'm looking forward to the day when there's a specially high tariff for hot tubs & patio heaters... and a specially low one for lighting and cooking !

 

[Zerax]

Octopus here too... 5p for 4 hrs a night, then 13.8p for the rest of the time... with 25p/day charge... can't complain with that. I average about 9.5p/kWh as I push as much as I can into those 4 hrs. Deal ends in May... so not looking forward to the new rates... rumour is it'll be something like 5p/23.8p... might need to finally install those batteries !!

 

[overskilled]

Which energy firm are you with? Perhaps it's worth doing a poll for this to see what firm electricians and plumbers are with.

Avro, just been moved to Octopus, prior to Avro was with GBEnergy till they went bust, then Cooperative energy as they honoured the GB Energy deal before jumping to Avro
Annoyance is that I asked Avro to refund some of my overpayments and they made various excuses about needing meter readings before they could do it this being about 2 weeks before they went bust...so they knew full well the writing was on the wall and likely didn't want to give a refund...know my payments are safe but whole thing stinks tbh...

 

[Fullerbull]

Which energy firm are you with? Perhaps it's worth doing a poll for this to see what firm electricians and plumbers are with.

Octopus (was Avro!!) Used to be with Scottish Power but their incompetence over several years was just breath-taking, so left for Avro. Within a few months Avro collapsed and I was moved to Octopus. Really sympathise with brianmoooore - I can guess what he is going through!