Last week, I switched my mum in under 10 minutes flat. Don’t worry, this isn’t a rather public display of parental disownment, I’m talking about switching energy providers.
Ever since I joined MSE last year I’ve been dropping larger and larger hints to my parents that they should review all household bills, as I was pretty sure they’d be part of the two-thirds of people languishing on expensive energy tariffs.
And boy, was I right. Last week I finally sat down with my mum and gently nudged her to join MSE’s Cheap Energy Club, just to see if she could save by switching supplier.
Nine minutes later, she’d joined the club, switched providers and saved an estimated £455 a year on her energy bills.
Here’s how it went down:
- Minute 1: Registered my mum on Cheap Energy Club.
- Minute 2: Scrambled around latest energy bill to work out which tariff my parents were on and what their usage is (surprise, surprise: it was a standard tariff).
- Minute 4: Submitted details to Cheap Energy Club and was told my parents could save almost £500 a year by switching to a one-year fix.
- Minute 5: Almost lost power on the laptop, and just managed to plug it in before it died.
- Minute 6: Went to new provider and started entering details to switch.
- Minutes 7-8: Reviewed all details and submitted the switch.
- Minute 9: Switch in progress!
It really was as simple as that. So if you’ve got a parent/grandparent/aunt/second cousin once removed/friend who you suspect hasn’t checked their energy recently (or, dare I say, if you haven’t yourself), encourage them to see what they could save.
They might be pleasantly surprised.
For full details on how to switch, plus lots more tips and tricks, see our Cheap Gas and Electricity guide.
