More detailed process:
The
database behind the website has a list of all suppliers and tariff types and this
is updated with new tariffs when they are issued by the suppliers. These are shown
on the price updates page.
The calculation
is carried out in two steps.
Step 1: Establish the amount
of kilowatt hours used.
When you enter your existing supply details, you
can either enter A) the amounts you pay, or B) the kilowatt hours that you use.
A)
If you enter the amounts you pay, the calculator first of all "back calculates"
the amount of kilowatt hours that this would buy from your existing supplier using
their current tariffs used in the calculator. (See Note 1 below.)
B)
If you enter the number of kilowatt hours you use, the calculator starts from
this point to work out the future cost calculations.
The first step therefore
is to establish the number of kilowatt hours that are used for each supply.
Step
2: Calculation.
Once the number of kilowatt hours are calculated (either
from option A or B above), the calculator then works out what each supplier will
charge you for a year for this number of kilowatt hours.
This is done by
getting each supplier's tariff details from the database and multiplying them
by the kilowatt hours. It takes in to account the tariffs for different levels
of usage and for day and night tariffs in the case of economy 7 meters.
It
also adds on the annual total of the daily standing charges where applicable,
and takes off all the discounts that apply for each supplier.
VAT is included
in all costs because this is part of the cost paid by domestic users.
This
produces a total cost that each supplier will charge for this number of kilowatt
hours for the next year based on their latest tariffs.
Step
3: Results.
Having calculated what each supplier will charge, the calculator
sorts the results from lowest cost to highest cost, then works out what the difference
in cost is compared to the cost you would be paying with your existing supplier.
It
puts all this information in a table and this is what you see when you have clicked
the calculate button on the input page. It also adds the percentage savings at
this point.
Everything happens very fast (in the blink of an eye) and depending
on the speed of your computer, the results are displayed virtually immediately.
At
this stage, you can see the tariff details by clicking on each suppliers "Cost"
figures, and you can see further information by clicking on the information icon
next to each suppliers name.
Step 4: Easy transfer.
There
are links provided to all suppliers application forms or websites so it's easy
to go from the results page straight to the application forms.
Application
forms sometimes ask for meter reference numbers if the automatic process can't
find them in the national database, and there are a variety of pieces of other
information that suppliers need to take new applications.
UK Power earns
a small fee from some suppliers for transfer requests. Not all suppliers contribute,
but this does not affect the results in any way. This fee is paid by the suppliers
and you do not pay anything so this service is free for you to use. The tariffs
are the same wherever you complete your transfer application.
Summary:
The
entire process is designed to be quick and easy and to take advantage of Internet
technology.
We hope you do find the site easy to use and welcome your feedback
to help us make improvements where required.
Thank you for using our website.
The
UK Power Team.
Comments are welcome. Howitworks@ukpower.co.uk
Note 1.
The objective is to obtain a figure for kWh's
to use to work out how much the future costs will be. When there have been price
changes, slight variation in total kWh's used in a year may arise because, when
the current bills are entered, the calculator uses the current or newest prices
available, rather than the actual tariffs that were charged during the past year,
to work out the kWh's. If the old prices were used, the number of kWh's would
be higher (if the old prices were lower than the new prices). This variance, however,
is not material as far as the comparisons for future costs is concerned
because the same resulting number of kWh's is used to work out what each supplier
will charge for future costs, and the savings are shown between the suppliers
future costs. In fact, if the higher usage was used, the savings would be a bit
higher (if old prices are lower than new prices.) It's better to use actual kWh's
used, but by using the amounts paid, this produces the results table showing how
suppliers prices compare with each other for the future year based on latest prices
available.
Comments are welcome. Mailto:Howitworks@ukpower.co.uk
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