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Big six suppliers Eon, EDF and SSE are “banning” existing customers from taking their best deals.
The Big Deal claimed that this practice results in families being charged £300 more than they should be and has called on the government and Ofgem to investigate.
SSE and Eon currently offer the two cheapest one-year fixed tariffs on the market, costing £759 and £760 respectively. But existing customers are unable to take the deals.
The Big Deal co-founder Will Hodson said: “Banning your own customers from taking your cheapest deals is a new low for the big six. It’s customer discrimination and sees millions of ordinary families paying over £200 a year more than they should.
“This kind of behaviour is disgraceful. We urge the government and energy regulator Ofgem to investigate, take action and halt this behaviour.”
A spokesperson for Eon told Utility Week: “We constantly review our portfolio and Eon Saver is a promotional tariff we are offering at this time. Earlier this year we offered a one-year fixed tariff (Eon Energy Fixed 1 Year v19) to all customers which was at the time the cheapest energy tariff available in Britain – based on national average consumption with payment by fixed monthly direct debit and paperless bills.”
According to the recent Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) probe into the energy market, 70 per cent of SSE, Eon and EDF customers are on their standard variable tariff.
But EDF argued that around 42 per cent of its customers are on a fixed tariff, and that this figure is even higher for vulnerable customers, with more than 60 per cent on a fixed deal. A spokesperson for the supplier added: “We know that too few customers are benefiting from the full power of the intense competition between suppliers. This is because they are not making an active choice of tariff or supplier. We are responding by working with price comparison websites to find different ways of reaching new customers.
“We work hard to make it easy for our customers to choose the best deal and be in control of their energy bills. Around 42 per cent of our customers have actively chosen to be on our fixed Blue tariffs, compared with an average of a third for our major competitors.”
SSE added that the new tariff was only an introductory offer in response to the industry changes from the CMA report.
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