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Npower Business and Npower Business Solutions have revealed none of their electricity customers have chosen to switch early to half-hourly metering to save money on their electricity bills.
The switch to half-hourly charging is mandatory for any customer with an advanced meter in profile class 5-8 whose contracts comes to an end from this month until April 2017, by which time all customers should have switched.
Customers could potentially save money under the new pricing structure and have the option of ending their current contract early to take advantage of possible savings. But some businesses will also see their bills increase as a result of the more accurate pricing regime.
A spokesperson for Npower Business said: “We began communicating with those customers affected in August. So far, we have not seen any customers actively break their contracts so that they can switch early.”
In September Npower Business Solutions director of markets and innovation Wayne Mitchell said Npower would only be communicating with businesses about the change as they approached the end of their contract.
This means many customers are unaware that the option is open to them.
A spokesperson for Npower Business said: “We aim to switch customers only at the point of contract renewal to reduce disruption wherever possible.”
Npower Business will move the first 200 of its electricity customers to half-hourly pricing in November as it starts to transition its customer base to the new pricing regime.
“In line with the supplier migration plan we submitted to Elexon, this month we are expecting to start the process of moving around 200 of our existing customers to be half hourly settled.”
Suppliers are required to submit migration plans for each month to Elexon, the body in charge of overseeing Balancing and Settlement Codes (BSC) for the energy market, to ensure they remain on schedule for the switch-over.
The requirement for submitting plans was introduced when the pricing modification was delayed by a year in June to April 2017.
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