to not want our neighbour ''going over'' our energy bills ....

[Laiste]

DH has had a text message from a neighbour. A nice chat to in the street neighbour, but we're not close. DH reads it out.

They are wanting to ''make a little money'' and ''need 'guinea pigs''. They ask if we would we be prepared to go and ''watch a presentation''.

I'm thinking god, ok, as long as it's not too long. It's going to be oils or tupperware or something. Then DH continues; ''We'll go over your energy bills together and see where you can save money ...''.

Will we heck!

How would you reply?
(if you didn't want to go)

And, as an aside, how do they make money out of this?!

I used to be with UW when I rented and they were very cheap and great to deal with. Unsure what they are like now. It could save you money but I think you would only need to provide the units you use in a year and the price to see if they can beat it

Not quite correct. UW offered to change lightbulbs to LED for ALL customers - existing ones - quite a few yrs ago. It's just a standard part of the deal.

OK - but do you mean 'change' as in supply replacements or as in actually send somebody around to everybody's home to remove the old ones and then screw in the new ones? Not just for disabled or elderly/frail customers who live alone but for everybody?

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll Yes, he's fully signed up to the cult! I had to block him on FB as he kept messaging me to try and get me to sign up. Just classic MLM stuff. He also goes on these UW 'away day' things which are really bizarre.

Yes, for everybody. I would hope they sent a qualified electrician round as some light fittings can be very dodgy. My late husband was a sparky and was rather pleased that his actual qualification was an electrical engineer. Hence my referring to engineers.

Yes, for everybody. I would hope they sent a qualified electrician round as some light fittings can be very dodgy. My late husband was a sparky and was rather pleased that his actual qualification was an electrical engineer. Hence my referring to engineers.

You really think everybody should get in a qualified electrician every time they need to change a light bulb?

Neither of us want to be in a position of finding ways to say say no to someone we don't know well, (when at their house)

Yea that's a deliberate sales tactic, go through your bills so you feel obliged and are halfway in already. Using friendship as fodder for financial gain.

Look- zero reason for you to say yea to this intrusive request to "go through your bills" as a guise of 'helping you'
You're an adult you can do this yourself
If she wants to help you she can text 'UW (or whatever provider) has unit cost or x y z' Then as an adult you can decide yourself. The rest is just sales pressure pitch. Very easy to say 'no Thankyou' to.

I had a pushy friend who kept trying to sales strategy me into buying services from her and replied to my "no thanks" with "but you'll benefit, as ..."
i repeated "No thanks" a few times then exasperated sent "no means no" and "Idc" (I don't care) when she wouldn't stop.

If friends bring it up iRL, just say "no we don't discuss our private bills with neighbours/ friends... don't mix business with friendships. " or "no thanks we don't want to (discuss this)"

It's a few years ago now - but I do seem to remember they offered to do it if you couldn't - I'll see what I can find

If you look on energy switch websites you can see what anyone pays monthly by putting their address in so the likely know what you pay monthly anyway. I discovered this by accident after putting in my neighbours house number by mistake. I’d like to ask them how their yearly bill is just over £600 whereas ours is over £4K. I’d like to know their secret 😂.

Ah, that's a bit different, then - the way it was phrased, I thought it sounded like they were insisting on going into everybody's houses, just to change lightbulbs - and then who knows what other high pressure initiatives once they were inside your house.

Even so, with disabled/frail/vulnerable people, I wonder how much they were deliberately targeting people without family, friends or advocates - if a vulnerable person doesn't have anybody they can ask to change a few lightbulbs for them, does that mean they also don't have somebody to look through the proposed deal with them and make sure that they are acting with agency? Do they make it crystal clear that the LED bulbs are widely available and not only something you can get through them?

We inherited UW when we moved to our current house (almost 8 years ago) and they have been fine and nowhere else has ever been cheap enough for me to feel tempted to switch during that time. But I assume it was the previous owner who went to a presentation, etc - I wouldn't have done that!

If you look on energy switch websites you can see what anyone pays monthly by putting their address in so the likely know what you pay monthly anyway. I discovered this by accident after putting in my neighbours house number by mistake. I’d like to ask them how their yearly bill is just over £600 whereas ours is over £4K. I’d like to know their secret

There isn't a mysterious wire coming out of your meter that seems to point off in their direction, is there....?!

You are right, though - it's nothing short of a scam imho to insist on strongarming your way into somebody's home and making a lengthy 'presentation' to them, rather than just telling them your prices and asking them to contact you if they're interested in switching to you.

If your prices are clearly the lowest, what would you have to hide by just saying what the prices are and waiting for the bargain-hunters to come to you? If you feel the need to 'present' and 'explain' your prices for a quite straightforward, transparent market commodity to justify to a customer why they should go with you, it's pretty much a guarantee that the prices don't speak for themselves and you're obviously hiding something. When supermarkets roll back prices or have promotions, they don't feel it necessary to go through your monthly baked beans consumption with you before they consider you're able to choose their offering or that of a competitor.

Ok - found this. It was a service for existing customers before a certain date. Lifetime replacement of any bulb that failed. Looks like replacements sent through post but no info on original fitting as scheme no longer in place.

If you left UW within 2yrs you had to pay costs on sliding scale / unless you moved house. I think I read that right.

So I'm guessing it was a lure to join them, but applied to everyone already on their books, unlike most lures for new customers 🤷‍♀️

As someone else said, they were never the lowest tariff - but always pretty good and customer service (every time I've had dealings with them) excellent. You don't need to use one of their reps to sign up, you can just do it.

You are right, though - it's nothing short of a scam imho to insist on strongarming your way into somebody's home and making a lengthy 'presentation' to them, rather than just telling them your prices and asking them to contact you if they're interested in switching to you.

Well said .., and...

When supermarkets roll back prices or have promotions, they don't feel it necessary to go through your monthly baked beans consumption with you before they consider you're able to choose their offering or that of a competitor.

Another classic comment from @WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll

So well put! 👏👏