Will npower come back with a vengence?

After a few very turbulent weeks, it seems the dust may be starting to settle around the energy market battlefield. Gordon Brown has promised an energy efficiency plan to help combat fuel poverty, supermarkets are lowering the price of unleaded at their petrol pumps, and children are being encouraged to ‘Green Up’.

Battle is still raging in my household though. And I’m not talking about the battle for the bathroom in the morning…

Oh no, this is much bigger. It’s a battle of the “giants” no less, with reigning champion British Gas clinging on for dear life, while npower, the competitive newcomer, claws its way in to our home, with promises of cheaper gas and electricity, and paperless billing.

It all started a few weeks ago. The news of price increases and bigger bills was a much talked about topic, in the press and in our household.

Naturally we were keen to see how much we could save by switching.

Using EnergyChoices comparison service, we decided that our best bet would be to switch to npower, who promised to save us up to £400 on our annual bill. Hurray!

Switching was really easy; we did it there and then online, and it only took a few minutes.

A welcome pack from npower a week later told us everything we needed to know about the switch. Our household was one of happiness and relief – we had managed to avoid the price hikes! Double hurray!

But our happiness did not last long… A week later I received an email from my housemate:

Yo Becca,
I had phone call from British Gas today and they asked me why we left.
They want to give us a better deal - 15% off!
They also said that npower had a price increase a few weeks ago, and now British Gas is only 3% more expensive than npower. Please can you check this?
If this is true… what do you think we should do?
Should we go back to British Gas?

Evidently battling it out for our custom, British Gas is trying to win us back with its own promises of cheaper gas and electricity. It’s no surprise really – until the npower switch day, we had been a long-standing loyal customer, always paying our bills on time and in full. And like many households, we hadn’t even considered switching, or thought about how much we could save by changing suppliers.

So, what to do? Well, after much deliberation, we decided to email npower with British Gas’ proposition, asking whether they could match it, or offer us a better deal. If they can’t then we may well switch back to British Gas, and opt for their Click Energy 5 tariff, an online tariff which allows you to input your own meter readings.

In the words of the ever authoritative John Anderson: “Contender ready! Gladiator ready!”

Let the battle begin…