I have spent over a decade working as an Energy consultant/broker. Automatic contract renewals are purely a cynical way for energy companies to maximise profits. They are unfair, unethical and have sent a number of businesses to the wall over the years.

Some of the larger business energy suppliers seem to make it up as they go along. They do not stick to the rules and for this reason the market does not work as it should. Who is the loser in all this? The business customer.

Members of the Utilities Intermediaries Association have signed up to a code of practice that ensures they work in their customers best interests or face financial redress. They have also been fighting to remove the automatic renewal process and get better protection for small businesses for a number of years.

Yes, there are some pretty unscrupulous brokers out there, but in my opinion the most unscrupulous people working in this sector are employed by the energy companies themselves.

Why do some suppliers offer better prices to new customers rather than to those who have stayed with them for years and years?

Why does a supplier double a customer’s unit rate because they have missed their termination date by a matter of hours?

Why do they deny having received a termination letter from a customer and insist it should have been sent by recorded delivery, yet the letters they send containing huge price increases are not?

Over the years I have seen customers misled, bamboozled and downright lied to by some of best known power companies in the UK.

Les Simmons, Managing Director – Bluemark Consultants

With continuing commentary from electricity and gas suppliers that they are preparing to increase prices during the summer in line with wholesale price increases, makes me wonder if they share my view that electricity and gas prices are heading for a fall.

As we have seen over the past 6 or so years , energy suppliers are very quick to increase prices yet they seem to react much slower to drops in wholesale prices. If you also look closely at historic pricing patterns , the largest increase usually comes just before a downward trend in prices. This creates a a very healthy profit margin for power companies.

As much as this outrages business consumers and well as domestic customers that is the price we pay for a deregulated market. Power companies are responsible to their share holders , not their customers , and its all about profit. There has always been been talk of price fixing and gentlemen’s agreements between the big 6 and I doubt we will ever now what the truth of the situation is.

The battle for market share does sometimes  benefit consumers , but is their a floor price that some agree to not go below ?

Are business energy prices due for a fall ?