When do energy prices go up

If you owe money on your account, your current supplier can prevent the switch until you've paid. They must write to tell you they're doing this.

If you pay the balance within 30 working days of them telling you, the switch can still go ahead and your current supplier mustn't increase the price. It's best to stay on your fixed tariff until your contract ends. You can switch suppliers or tariff - but if you look on a price comparison website, you won't find as many tariffs as usual. This is because many energy companies are struggling.

You can switch without paying a fee if your contract ends in fewer than 7 weeks. You can switch earlier if your supplier contacts you and says you can. If your fixed tariff has already ended, you can still switch supplier or tariff. Contact your supplier to ask about their other tariffs or check how to switch supplier.

Check how to complain to your energy supplier. Skip to navigation Skip to content Skip to footer. Customers of the three firms that collapsed on Wednesday, Enstroga, Igloo Energy and Symbio Energy, will learn in the coming days who they will be switched to by Ofgem. Make sure you take meter readings when you are notified of any change to your supply.

Ofgem has confirmed that the default suppliers can only put the customers they inherit on a price-capped tariff. The supplier you are moved to will honour any credit balance that you built up with your old, failed provider. Once you have been switched to the Ofgem-appointed supplier, and any balance transferred over, you can leave at any stage without paying exit fees, although at the moment you are unlikely to be find a much better deal.

Last year, when you may have chosen your tariff, gas prices were low. However, these tariffs can cost more. For example, it might have to buy extra wholesale energy at short notice for new customers. Wholesale energy is pricey at the moment. You can ask the new supplier to put you on its cheapest tariff. Make sure you use Which? Switch to check the prices of tariffs on sale at the moment. Unlike some commercial switching sites, Which? Read tips on how to get the best energy deal.

Those rates your daily standing charge and unit price will be fixed until the end of your contract. Switch to check how your rates compare.

Do I need to take any other action at this point or wait until I hear about transfer scheme arrangements under the government scheme. What happens now? Any credit you have will be protected. You will be moved to a new supplier, chosen by energy regulator Ofgem. It usually takes a couple of days for a new supplier to be chosen, and a couple of weeks to be transferred.

As far as I am aware I am in credit on my account but I am not sure by how much. I have no way of checking if what I am offered by the new supplier is the right amount.

Some failed suppliers take their website services offline. Check back again later, or on another day. Choose from Broadband, Fibre or Fibre Plus. We try to avoid increasing our energy prices, but sometimes it's not possible for us to absorb all the extra costs we're faced with. Energy prices are made up of a number of different costs with the biggest one being the wholesale price.

That's the price we pay to buy energy from companies that generate it. Rising gas costs are the main thing behind this increase.

When gas prices rise, electricity prices usually rise too because a lot of electricity is created by gas-fired power stations.

And although some energy is generated from renewable sources like wind and solar, there's only one market to buy energy from. So rising prices in one area of generation impacts the whole market. There are many reasons why gas prices have gone up. The long cold winter in Europe led to low levels of gas storage, and there's been a big surge in the demand for energy as things re-open after The energy regulator Ofgem set the maximum price we can charge customers on Standard and Pay As You Go prepayment variable tariffs.

This is known as the energy price cap. Every six months they review the cap based on all the underlying costs that energy suppliers need to cover, including wholesale prices. If Ofgem decide the cap needs to change, we'll review our tariffs and may raise or lower our prices. Because of the large increase in wholesale prices, Ofgem announced the cap would go up on 1 October Our prices also changed from this date.

The cap runs from 1 October to 31 March , when it will be reviewed again by Ofgem.