Bord Gais Reduce Prices

admiralofthefleet

just saw this on rte.te.

from febuary 1st next the price of gas is to be reduced by 10%, bord gais say this will save the average user €120 per annum. this follows a reduction in the price of wholesale gas on the international market.

finally, some good news for irish consumers

Peace

www.unison.ie wrote:

Cut in 34pc gas price hike to save householders €120
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GAS will not go up as much as feared next year after Bord Gais said it will ask for its proposed 34pc hike to be trimmed to 24pc.

That means homeowners will save about €120 a year.

The swingeing 34pc increase will not be needed now that oil prices have tailed off dramatically compared with the level they were at when the increase was granted in October.

Sources close to the State-owned gas company said the company would approach the energy regulator within days with a request for the reduction. It is understood the company board gave approval for such a move earlier this week.

The 10pc reduction would knock about €120 from the average yearly domestic gas bill, which has surged from under €600 in 2002 to over €1,200 last month.

The sources also revealed that the company would conduct a review of its pricing system in the coming year.

The review would also cover the controversial issue of the supply charge that is levied on many bills regardless of the amount of gas used. Gas users have been hit by two major increases in little more than a year.

At the end of last year, prices were bumped up by 25pc, while in October this year the company secured another 34pc increase.

Now Bord Gais is set to ask the regulator to scale this back to 24pc, meaning that gas bills will fall by an average of 13pc.

The company sought the price rises because of the huge increase in the cost of gas on international markets.

Linked directly to oil, gas was trading as high as 66c per therm during the months of July and August, when oil touched a record US$78 per barrel. A source said that part of Bord Gais's problem was that, at that stage, it was forced into taking action to protect its supplies and had to "hedge" ahead for the coming months.

Since then, prices had fallen sharply, from about 66c to around the 44c per therm.

This meant that the company was making substantial savings on its purchase of supplies to cover the coming spring and summer periods.

Rather than delay a reduction for consumers until October next year, Bord Gais has apparently taken the decision to move now. If it had not done this, it would have to wait until October next year before reducing bills.

As well as cutting prices, in coming months the gas company will conduct a full review of its tariff system, including the unpopular supply charge.

Most customers are levied this charge, although up to 100,000 older customers are on a unit charge only - they pay more for each unit of gas but do not have to pay the supply charge.

According to industry experts, the supply charge helps equalise out the bill over the year, as it is applied in full during the summer months, when fewer units of gas are used.

When it granted the most recent price hike, the Commission for Energy Regulation applied the increase equally to the gas units used and the supply charge. If it had not, the unit price of gas would have had to rise by up to 50pc.

Nevertheless, the supply charge is unpopular with consumers, and sources said that Bord Gais would consider a new tariff structure based only on gas units used.

Pat Boyle

Its not a price reduction, its a reduction of their requested increase. Prices are going up, just not as much as they were going to put them up by.

Paulw

Yeah, they put it up by 34% and then reduce it by 10%. That's great news.

And with an ESB increase coming too.

It'll be a nice new year.

MOH

Be very interesting to see how many people's meters get read during the last week in January, so they can make sure to bill people at the higher rate up to then!

Bit of good news, though they'll still be 20% higher than last September.

From the horse's mouth

admiralofthefleet

Peace wrote:

Its not a price reduction, its a reduction of their requested increase. Prices are going up, just not as much as they were going to put them up by.

their requested increase came into effect on 1st october this year and prices have risen, so it is a reduction in price, hopefully more decreases will follow if the wholesale price stays low

Paulw

The price is not dependant on when the meter is read nor when the bill is issued. You can always read the meter yourself and submit the result. You can even make a mistake reading your meter ... that's if you were being sneaky.

Peace

admiralgar wrote:

their requested increase came into effect on 1st october this year and prices have risen, so it is a reduction in price, hopefully more decreases will follow if the wholesale price stays low

Believe what you want... its still more expensive to heat my home ... so i'll keep calling it a price increase...:(