Pre-Payment Energy Rates.

[shortpaul]

There is a common understanding that payment for your gas/electricity thru a pre-payment meter and a pre-paid "top-up card" is more expensive than other means of paying for your supply ie thru a credit meter with a direct debit arrangement. Why however should this be? Obviously with a credit meter you can benefit from direct debit discounts and other relatively small discounts such as those given for paperless billing. The tariff rate chosen for your supply is not however,as I understand it, not increased because of paying it thru a pre-payment meter. Why then do people seem to think that the pre-payment arrangement is a more expensive one?

[Buenchico]

I've just checked the 'tariff comparison rates'' for electricity on British Gas's standard tariff (using my own postcode). The rate paid by direct debit is 15.17p/kWh but the rate paid by quarterly cash or cheque is the SAME as the 'pay as you go' tariff of 16.10p/kWh. The same seems to apply to those deals where you pay a slightly higher price now but with a guarantee that it won't go up for a couple of years.

[Old_Geezer]

It is immoral to charge different customers differently based on overheads rather than product/service supplied, anyway. Companies that do so, and governments that allow it, should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.

[ummmm]

I moved into a house with a prepayment meter. It cost a fortune. It turned out the meter had been set to collect a debt.