Price Cap - Just announced

[swifttwist]

From £1971 to £3549. 80% rise. I have no words.

New figures:

Electricity
£0.52 per kWh
Daily standing charge: £0.46

Gas:
£0.15 per kWh
Daily standing charge: £0.28

Businesses are not under a price cap so utility companies can charge whatever they like. A business local to us said their quote has gone from £3k to £13k per year on electric alone. That’s not sustainable without a hike in prices which, understandably, customers who are cutting back won’t want to pay.

I’m also really worried about schools. I’ve heard of schools being quoted annual prices in excess of £150k with no increase in their budgets from central government/local councils. How are they going to find the extra money? Switch off the heating so kids work in coats and scarves? Stop updating facilities? No new books/equipment?

The BBC discussed this back in June www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m00193tg

You think that because people buy coffee out of the house they can 'afford' higher energy bills??
firstly, spending £5-20 a month on coffee is hardly comparable to £100-300 increase in energy bills and secondly it's outrageous to assume that because people have any disposable income to spend as they like they can therefore assume to have it spent for them on basic essentials!
it's none of your or anybody's business how people spend their disposable income, and outrageous to imply they shouldn't complain about losing it to energy bills or have the right to have any at all!

Eh? I am meeting a friend today for a coffee at our local Nero. I’ve not been out like that since July. I hardly think two cups of coffee and possibly a bit of shortbread over 2 hours means we can afford a hike of hundreds on our electricity come October.

If it is people wfh across the world, these high energy prices may be here to stay long term.

I didnt send the BBC link

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-58558645

Coffee and cake is my alternative to a night out. Maybe once every month, sometimes less. I get dressed up and enjoy it immensely, I do without cake if I'm skint or feeling unwell.

It depends, but all those coffee shops aren't kept going by people going every few months.

Some people use them more like twice a day, not twice in a blue moon, that's the type of people being referred to.

The same people as during the pandemic who couldn't believe how much money they had because they weren't doing their normal day to day things.

Sitting in nero right now and prices are insane, £3.20 for a flat white and £4 for a savoury pasty. I'm away from home and a coffee addict so no choice unless I want caffeine withdrawals.

There's a Greg's next door so I shamelessly bought a much cheaper pastry from there and hid in the corner of nero with my flat white and Greg's pastry.

We will have to afford the price rises but then there is no money to do anything else and everything will be more expensive and unsustainable in the long term.

I live slap bang in an area with Heidi, Costa, Coppa Club, 5 independent coffee outlets, Pizza Express, 3 wine/ food bars, 3 hotels/pubs, 2 actual restaurants MoMA and ASK and a café, and every single one is buzzing and has been in business for many. years. I'm talking about an area either on or within a 3 minute walk from the short High Street. There is still money being spent on going out out. The Coppa Club is doing very brisk business indeed.

Come back and tell us what it looks like in three months when everyone’s having to pay their heating bills.

Yeah, well…

People will have to take sandwiches or rolls to work or travel mugs for hot drinks.
My dh does this as the sandwich lady was getting on for a fiver a day ( he works four days )
20 pounds a week is a lot for a roll and drink etc
That all stopped, but you still have to go out and buy the food to make the packed lunches of course and that's all gone up in price too

Places will be busy now though, last week of school holidays, bills haven't bitten yet as no one has their heating on or using tumble dryers, well I hope they aren't. Ovens aren't on as much in the summer either as people have cold food more.

Throughout history, in times of recession the sales of alcohol and chocolate rise.
It's how humans generally cope when everything's bleak!

A bit like people going out for coffee. People need a treat or comfort in difficult times.
"Cheaper" treats might replace going out for expensive meals, holidays, days out etc, it's all relative.

Yes I think so but so grim

I just don’t think they care. They know people are already cutting back, cancelling gym memberships and not spending son much.

If we knew what he’ll was coming ( if any) then maybe people wouldn’t panic so much.

They must know the private sector - ogyms, beauty salons, pubs and restaurants and the hospitality industry in general will lose money, that jobs would go. Millions of jobs.

It must be cheaper in the long run to help a ( hopefully) short term energy crisis than have millions of people homeless and unemployed?

Finally I've got my head round it all and what it means for our household! I'm not stupid but all the talk made me feel it. Last winter we paid £116 a month. I increased it to £150 and this month I will increase it to £200. We are on standard variable and doing the sums based on our annual usage it means that we'd use £278 a month. They're asking for £285 DD. So they weren't far wrong. The fixed rates are £445... er nope! They underestimate my will power in not being ripped off and it has made me determined to reduce our annual usage. I feel ashamed it's taken this to make me realise that we just use what we use without giving it much thought. I know I can make savings. Wait for full loads of washing. Reduce what we wear. No more using the tumble dryer on a regular basis. Shorter showers for everyone and heating the people not the house. £200 is still a massive amount for us and I worry about my mum and wish I had the finances to help her but we don't. Her energy bills are higher than ours and she has no way of increasing her money. I will try and help in other ways. She can stay with us more and I'll make meals she just needs to reheat. Worrying times

Rishi sunak only wants to help pensioners and low income families ( sky news today ) with energy bills.
I can see the thought process behind this , but it'll really upset those who don't fall into these income brackets , what about them?
Not sure what Liz Truss is proposing apart from 5p from VAT. Called a ' nuclear ' option.
Rishi's team think this will cost 30 billion and is regressive.
Lots of talk, but it feels muddled to me as they know they haven't got the money to do any of it really.

I sat down yesterday and went through our bills in 2021 to try and work out potential costs on the same usage.

Our January bill (most expensive month) was £139 last year, based on the new rates it would be £748

Even our cheapest month (August) goes from £56 to £288

Our annual bill rises from £1,219 to £5,614 - 4 bed detached house, 2 adults (both WFH 3 days a week) and 2 primary school aged kids.

A lot of pensioners have quite a lot of money so blanket help there is not really a good thing, obviously a lot don't and only have small pensions but many well off ones could easily weather the storm. I will soon be a pensioner, already early retired and don't really feel that I will need more help than a middle income family if I was a couple of years older and a pensioner, it needs to be more targeted than all pensioners.

Cavemum , that's an enormous jump and it's clear your trying to cut back on usage and working etc.
Yet it will probably be people in your income brackets that won't be helped next time around ( apart from the 400 already promised )
The figures are eye watering to the economy, but it's sad that people like yourself will have to absorb such a big leap in the price and find it from somewhere.

Means testing everyone will only add to the costs of any further help.
It might have to happen , but many people do hide their wealth away as well so it'll be interesting to see what they would say about doing this.

It's astonishing and utterly Tory that wealthy people like my DM (who happens to be 75) are being considered for help while poorer people with higher outgoings will be left to struggle.

(I don't know why the government are bothering - she'd never in a million years vote for them).

Chucking more money at the energy companies via the taxpayers is not the answer. What are they going to do about energy security? They have wilfully sleepwalked into this. Fucking incompetent idiots couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery.

The average pensioner has more disposable income than the average worker.

This is about giving money to Tory voters and giving (probably too limited) money to those who will literally die without some help.

Working age people other than the very poor are going to get fucked over by the sounds of it.

Please can many more people vote ABC going forwards: Anything But Conservative.