Energy tariff comparison
Compare two energy tariffs on your own usage, including standing charges and exit fees. A lower unit rate does not make a tariff cheaper.
On your usage the alternative works out £67.51 a year cheaper before any exit fee.
What this assumes
- Your usage stays the same on either tariff. Switching supplier does not change how much energy you use.
- Both sets of rates hold for a full year.
- Electricity only. No gas usage was entered, so no gas costs are included.
- A variable tariff is priced against the current cap. Its rates will change, so a comparison against a fixed deal is a snapshot rather than a forecast.
Your rates look expensive for how much you use
Your usage looks unremarkable — it is the rates that are doing the work. Check the comparison against your real annual usage rather than an estimate before acting on it, and take any exit fee into account.
Confidence Moderate — consistent with what you have entered, but not proven.
What this rests on
- On your usage, the alternative tariff works out about £68 cheaper over a year, after any exit fee. (strong)
What to do
Everything worth doing here is free.
Send a real meter reading
Your usage looks ordinary — it is the rates doing the work.
If your bill says "estimated", it is a guess based on what the supplier thinks you used — and estimates drift. Submitting an actual reading replaces the guess and rebills the period against it. This is the first thing to do when a bill looks wrong, because until it is done nobody knows whether the bill is wrong or the estimate is.
- Reduces how much energy you use
- Do it now
- Free
- Evidence: moderate
How to tell if it worked: Read your meter before the change and again a week later, at the same time of day, and compare the two weeks.
Compare your tariff against an alternative
Your rates look high for the amount of energy you use.
Compare annual totals rather than unit rates, and include the standing charge and any exit fee. A lower unit rate does not make a tariff cheaper.
- Reduces what you pay per unit
- A few minutes
- Free
- Evidence: moderate
How to tell if it worked: Once switched, compare the first full bill against the same period a year earlier.
The most useful next check
Re-run the comparison with usage from your bill
A tariff comparison is only as good as the usage figure behind it, and the ranking can reverse between a low and a high usage household.
What this assumes
- Your usage stays the same on either tariff. Switching supplier does not change how much energy you use.
- Both sets of rates hold for a full year.
- Electricity only. No gas usage was entered, so no gas costs are included.
- A variable tariff is priced against the current cap. Its rates will change, so a comparison against a fixed deal is a snapshot rather than a forecast.
Worked out by energy rules 1.1.0. Nothing you entered leaves your browser.
A lower unit rate does not make a tariff cheaper
The unit rate is the number that gets advertised, so it is the number people compare. It is one of three things that decide what you pay. The others are the standing charge, which is fixed daily and does not care how much you use, and any exit fee on the tariff you are leaving.
A tariff can win on unit rate and lose overall because its standing charge is higher. It can win on both and still cost you money in the first year once an exit fee is paid. This page works out the total each way, and says explicitly when one of those cases applies.
Why your usage figure matters more than the rates
Which tariff wins depends on how much you use, because the standing charge is spread over a smaller amount of energy in a low-usage home. Two households looking at the same pair of tariffs can correctly reach opposite conclusions.
So use a real annual figure from your bill or online account rather than a guess. If you do not have one, the household energy estimatorwill give you a band to start from — but treat the comparison as indicative until you have the real number.
Exit fees and the last few weeks of a fixed deal
Leaving a fixed tariff early usually costs a fixed amount per fuel. Where the saving is large the fee is repaid quickly; where it is not, switching can cost money in year one despite the new tariff being cheaper.
One thing worth knowing: suppliers generally drop exit fees in the final weeks of a fixed term, most often the last 49 days. If your deal ends soon, waiting may remove the fee entirely. Check your own terms — the period is not the same everywhere.
What this does not do
It does not list suppliers, name tariffs, or switch anything. You enter two sets of figures from your own paperwork or a quote, and it does the arithmetic. There is no commission on the result and no supplier is ranked, because none is known to this page.
It also cannot tell you whether the service will be any good. Price is the part that can be calculated; billing accuracy and how a supplier handles a problem are not, and they matter.
Fixed or variable
A fixed tariff holds its unit rate and standing charge for the term. A variable one moves with the price cap, which is reviewed quarterly. Comparing a fix against a variable is comparing a known price against a current one — the saving shown is at today’s rates and is not protected on the variable side.
To see the fixed part of your bill on its own, use the standing charge calculator.