uSwitch.com

Advantages: Simple-to-use, reliable site, which could save you quite a bit of money!
Disadvantages: You might need to pay your current supplier quite a bit of money too!

Has someone knocked at your door and suggested you could save a small fortune if only you'd allow their employer to supply your gas or electricity? Sometimes they appear in a fluorescent yellow jacket to "check that all's well with your fuel supply and ensure that you're getting your discounts". They tell you about the savings that you can make by signing up with them, but what they never do is show you that they're offering the best deal available. ...
...The simple answer is that you visit www.uSwitch.com and use their calculators to find the best deal. The site has no links with any of the suppliers that you see on the site – in fact it's owned by private investors and company employees, so it's unbiased. There are details of all suppliers too, and not just those who pay them commission, which, I'm sorry to say, is a failing of more traditional brokers. Its income comes from the commissions paid ... Read review

Advantages: Very good for energy users thinking of changing
Disadvantages: A bit more hit and miss for telecomms and TV

Ever since just about every public utility got deregulated, the average householder has been inundated with junk mail, not to mention “cold-calling” phone calls, usually when you are eating, or worse still, foot-in-the-door salespeople, all of whom are singing the praises of some service or other, but in my view, lacking any real hard data to back their claims. Them: “Oh, yes sir, on a house this size, I’d expect to shave £60/year of your combined ...
...happens that I’ve got the last two year’s meter readings handy – perhaps you could be more specific!” Exit salesperson, looking in earnest for someone WITHOUT two year’s readings. Before I get started, I’ll confess that I did change from separate gas and electricity suppliers to NPower for both, but using my readings, not some rule of thumb. The whole deal looked like saving about £40/year at the rates in force at the time of changing. Then British ... Read review

Advantages: Fairly simple to use.
Disadvantages: May not include some tariffs needed for accurate comparison.

USwitch is one of the best known comparison and switching sites for home utilities, particularly gas and electricity. In July 2007 I tested USwitch along with 7 other comparison sites to find whether EDF was still my cheapest supplier for dual fuel. We have a large house using 35000kWh gas and 3500kWh electricity per annum and are on EDF Dual fuel online tariff V4, Our annual bill for this is about £960 per annum. Using USwitch was reasonably straightforward, ...
...put in the nearest thing I could find. USwitch came up with results very quickly, but gave my annual spend as around £1200. From this it deduced that I could save about £124 by switching to Utilita at a new annual cost of £1075. If you have been following this you will have realised by now that Utilita, according to USwitch is actually about £115 MORE than my real EDF bills based on actual consumption. Of the 8 other sites I tried, only 3 included ... Read review

Advantages: Quick and easy to use
Disadvantages: Provides inaccurate price comparisons

As an employee for a major utility company, I checked out this website and used it to compare against another supplier. I entered information into the comparison calculator and also worked out the comparison myself manually. I calculated a difference on annual billing between the two suppliers of £13.27. The uSwitch website claimed savings of £35! I sent an email to uSwitch with the calculations advising them of the discrepancy and asked how could ...
...was almost only a third of their claims? They did reply, saying it depended on usage!!! What? I had entered all this information in, of course it depends on usage. Pathetic! I can only advise people that are looking to compare suppliers not to use this site, as its claimed savings are false. It was strange to notice that the site also carried adverts, and got paid for referred sales to certain suppliers. Not very independent then! Perhaps the claimed ... Read review

Advantages: quick & easy
Disadvantages: Possibly being decieved????

I used uswitch to find the cheepest supplier, which i thought i had and was happy with the company i switched with. Just to check once i'd switched i checked again and what do you know (a cheeper different supplier?????) and not evan a mention of the current supplier they recommended not even in the top ten, so what i did i changed deatils of my current supplier and made one up!!!! and the result even though only changing the name of the supplier ... Read review

Advantages: Wont pollute the environment!
Disadvantages: Not the cheapest around (but not too bad!)

...and helpful. Ecotricity has a small company feel, and you dont wait ages to get through to a call centre in India. U-switch is on www.uswitch.com Payment ------------ You have to pay by direct debit. Some people dont like this, but I dont find it a problem at all. Its a good way to spread the cost of the bills. They estimate how much you would spend a month and take a direct debit monthly. Every quarter you will get a bill and they review if they are taking too much... or too little! I think they can provide a rebate if thay have taken way too mcuh. Like I said before, I have found the pricing to be very competitive indeed. Customer service ------------------------ I havent had any problems at all so havent had to call them, but Ive heard from friends that they are very helpful. I think all their staff are UK based. Website... Read review

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