Energy bills are rising yet again – by even more than we last heard. This time the extra increase is being blamed on inflation and rising wholesale costs.
In April, energy regulator Ofgem will introduce a new price cap, 6.4 per cent higher than the current cap, meaning the annual bill for a household using a typical amount of gas and electricity will rise by £111 per year, or £9.25 per month, to £1,849.
But of course these caps only last for three months, so the regulator is actually saying the average bill for those three months (April to June) will now by £462.25 – up from £434.50 between January and March.
Between October and December 2024, the average bill was £429.25, and between July and September it was £392 (the only time the price cap has fallen in the last year; it decreased from £422.50 for the three months before that.
Buy Cruel Britannia in print here. Buy the Cruel Britannia ebook here. Or just click on the image!
So while we were all initially told that our average bills for the year from July 2024 to July 2025 would be £1,568, in fact they will have cost us £1,718. That’s a difference of £150 – £12.50 per month.
If you’re already on a shoestring budget, that’s a lot of money to lose – especially when the loss comes without warning.
And there is another layer to this, being that the amount we actually pay depends on how many units of gas or electricity we use.
This Writer recently revealed that I am on an extremely tight budget – and this means I have tried to restrict my energy costs to £15 per week. That would come to £450 in the 30 weeks since I arrived in my current residence – around £197 per quarter. But in fact I have overspent that meagre budget during the winter months.
(At the time of writing I cannot get onto my electricity supplier’s – I don’t have gas – website so I can’t see what my actual payments were. I wonder whether this is deliberate, rather than the fault that is being claimed…)
Another layer to this is that standing charges are rising for gas but falling for electricity. The BBC’s article tries to treat this as a plus, but it has been included in calculations of the average bill. Without the standing charge change, the bill for three months would be £468.73 – and for a year, £1,874.93. That would have been an average increase of 7.9 per cent.
In other words, the standing charge reduction isn’t saving you any money; it just means the rise isn’t as much as it might otherwise have been.
Looking at it the way I have, above… Doesn’t it seem like a big con?
We were told the bill would be one amount, back before July last year, and it is in fact coming in at £150 more. We’re being told one of the standing charges has dropped, but the bill is still higher. And the energy firms are still raking in the cash – making fortunes while we struggle to scrape together the payments.
Money Saving Expert Martin Lewis says we should moved to fixed-deal tariffs, but I wonder if even his usually-excellent advice is good here.
Bills came down last July – and are expected to fall again in July this year – so would it not be better to wait until then, and get a fixed deal based on that rate? Hindsight suggests it would have been better to get a fixed tariff in July last year than before or since; the initial bill might have been higher than the variable rate but it would have provided protection against rises of the size we have seen since. The same might be suggested now.
Either way, energy prices remain a scandal and will continue to do so until the UK decouples the cost of clean, green energy generated domestically from the international price of fossil fuels, and buys none of its fuels from abroad.
Even then, corruption being endemic in my country these days, I doubt it will happen until suppliers can find a way to rip us all off – aided and abetted by the regulator and the government of the day.
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Energy bills are rising yet again – by even more than we last heard
Energy bills are rising yet again – by even more than we last heard. This time the extra increase is being blamed on inflation and rising wholesale costs.
In April, energy regulator Ofgem will introduce a new price cap, 6.4 per cent higher than the current cap, meaning the annual bill for a household using a typical amount of gas and electricity will rise by £111 per year, or £9.25 per month, to £1,849.
But of course these caps only last for three months, so the regulator is actually saying the average bill for those three months (April to June) will now by £462.25 – up from £434.50 between January and March.
Between October and December 2024, the average bill was £429.25, and between July and September it was £392 (the only time the price cap has fallen in the last year; it decreased from £422.50 for the three months before that.
Buy Cruel Britannia in print here. Buy the Cruel Britannia ebook here. Or just click on the image!
So while we were all initially told that our average bills for the year from July 2024 to July 2025 would be £1,568, in fact they will have cost us £1,718. That’s a difference of £150 – £12.50 per month.
If you’re already on a shoestring budget, that’s a lot of money to lose – especially when the loss comes without warning.
And there is another layer to this, being that the amount we actually pay depends on how many units of gas or electricity we use.
This Writer recently revealed that I am on an extremely tight budget – and this means I have tried to restrict my energy costs to £15 per week. That would come to £450 in the 30 weeks since I arrived in my current residence – around £197 per quarter. But in fact I have overspent that meagre budget during the winter months.
(At the time of writing I cannot get onto my electricity supplier’s – I don’t have gas – website so I can’t see what my actual payments were. I wonder whether this is deliberate, rather than the fault that is being claimed…)
Another layer to this is that standing charges are rising for gas but falling for electricity. The BBC’s article tries to treat this as a plus, but it has been included in calculations of the average bill. Without the standing charge change, the bill for three months would be £468.73 – and for a year, £1,874.93. That would have been an average increase of 7.9 per cent.
In other words, the standing charge reduction isn’t saving you any money; it just means the rise isn’t as much as it might otherwise have been.
Looking at it the way I have, above… Doesn’t it seem like a big con?
We were told the bill would be one amount, back before July last year, and it is in fact coming in at £150 more. We’re being told one of the standing charges has dropped, but the bill is still higher. And the energy firms are still raking in the cash – making fortunes while we struggle to scrape together the payments.
Money Saving Expert Martin Lewis says we should moved to fixed-deal tariffs, but I wonder if even his usually-excellent advice is good here.
Bills came down last July – and are expected to fall again in July this year – so would it not be better to wait until then, and get a fixed deal based on that rate? Hindsight suggests it would have been better to get a fixed tariff in July last year than before or since; the initial bill might have been higher than the variable rate but it would have provided protection against rises of the size we have seen since. The same might be suggested now.
Either way, energy prices remain a scandal and will continue to do so until the UK decouples the cost of clean, green energy generated domestically from the international price of fossil fuels, and buys none of its fuels from abroad.
Even then, corruption being endemic in my country these days, I doubt it will happen until suppliers can find a way to rip us all off – aided and abetted by the regulator and the government of the day.
Vox Political needs your help!
If you want to support this site
(but don’t want to give your money to advertisers)
you can make a one-off donation here:
Be among the first to know what’s going on! Here are the ways to manage it:
1) Register with us by clicking on ‘Subscribe’ (bottom right of the home page). You can then receive notifications of every new article that is posted here.
2) Follow VP on Twitter @VoxPolitical
3) Like the Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/VoxPolitical/
Join the Vox Political Facebook page.
4) You could even make Vox Political your homepage at http://voxpoliticalonline.com
5) Follow Vox Political writer Mike Sivier on BlueSky
6) Join the MeWe page at https://mewe.com/p-front/voxpolitical
7) Feel free to comment!
And do share with your family and friends – so they don’t miss out!
If you have appreciated this article, don’t forget to share it using the buttons at the bottom of this page. Politics is about everybody – so let’s try to get everybody involved!
Buy Vox Political books so we can continue
fighting for the facts.
Cruel Britannia is available
in either print or eBook format here:
The Livingstone Presumption is available
in either print or eBook format here:
Health Warning: Government! is now available
in either print or eBook format here:
The first collection, Strong Words and Hard Times,
is still available in either print or eBook format here:
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