Annoyed by Scottish Power price hikes? How to avoid paying exit fees to switch supplier

Is your gas and electricity supplied by Scottish Power? Annoyed by their recently-announced price hikes - 19 per cent for gas bills and 10 per cent for electricity - but don't want to pay their costly exit fees for leaving? Well, you don't have to. I've found a loophole.

Not only did I have to go through the baffling process of switching to move to Scottish Power a few months back, unimpressed with their newly announced price hikes,I face switching again - in order to leave. And to make matters worse, I have to pay a £50 exit fee.

An exit fee isn’t something buried in the ts&cs; gas and electricity companies make exit fees quite clear when you switch to their service.

The fees are typically £20 per fuel but prices vary between suppliers and even between tariffs offered by the same supplier. Scottish Power’s exit fee for my particular online tariff is £50.

But not all is lost as it turns out there is a way to avoid getting stung by these exit fees as you turn your back on energy price rises.

How to avoid an exit fee

Scottish Power had been supplying my energy for less than one month when the rises were announced, so a bit miffed to say the least, I set about leaving and getting them to cancel this exit fee: I was prepared for a fight.

I called the firm’s customer service line and bombared the polite adviser with reasons for why I wasn’t prepared to pay it. When I finally drew a breath I was told that I didn’t have to pay if I switched before 1 August.

“Oh”, I said, stopping in my hot-headed consumer tracks. “That’s good then.” But a few questions later it transpired that it’s not so simple as a fee waiver.

 A hasty move might cost you

According to the adviser, the way to avoid the fee is to call or email Scottish Power and say specifically that you’re leaving because of the price rises.

If I hadn’t called Scottish Power and had just gone ahead and switched, I’d have been charged to leave.

This is great news for anyone looking to get cheaper bills but I have a feeling that its not very well advertised – if at all. And despite our best efforts to contact Scottish Power on a number of occasions to verify this, they failed to respond to our requests.

So if you're not happy with a price rise, call your supplier and inform them that this is the reason you wish to leave, that way when you switch, you shouldn't have to pay an exit fee. 

Make sure you use a comparison site accredited by consumer watchdog Consumer Focus like Confused.com when shopping around for a new gas and electricity supplier.

Comments

[Julie]

I have just had Scottish Power claiming there is a termination fee on my account because I have just switched from online energy 7 to british gas. I have been with Scottish Power since 2009 and have seen nothing on my online information about exit or termination fees. Is this correct?

[Thomas]

I spoke to Scottish Power saying that i wanted to switch to another provider.I as told that instead of moving i could be put on their online option 14 which is not covered by their price hike as i was on online option 12. Any one know if this is any good

[Sarah Stobbart]

I am with Scottish Power on Online Energy Saver nth (possibly 12) and when they wrote to tell me about the price rise I'm sure the fee waiver outlined above was mentioned.

[Thomas]

Yes they will waiver the the fee but if you are on option 12 then 14 is suposed to be cheaper and as i have said is not included in the price rise.when i checked on the comparison site it did come out better then the rest .Is this correct

[Fd702001]

Dont stay with SP regardless of what they offer! They set the precedent of the latest increases and that alone is good reason to leave them. Theyd have to think twice if every customer left and they wont rake in exit fees either so up sticks theres still fixed rates out there!!!

[Peta]

I'm moving from Scottish Power, but, apparently because I checked my new supplier (npower) had contacted them within 15 days I can avoid the penalty - and get £40 cashback. I think jt was about the 3rd or 4th SP advisor who told me I could avoid the penalty. They tried to persuade me to go to their Online (14 I think) as it was only about £4pa more than npower's Go Fix 6 but, though this tariff will not affected by this price rise, they couldn't guarantee there wouldn't be a further rise this year. Npower's tariff is fixed/capped till July 2012. Not sure why Scottish Power's customer since 2009 would be penalised as I thought 'ordinary' contracts were only for 12 months so his/her contract would have ended. I'm no expert but I do change at least once a year!!!

[Liz Angus]

I signed up with Scottish Power at the beginning of this year and the day after they put their prices up ! I think companies should have to advise potential customers that this is going to happen.Then 2 months later they increased my monthly direct debit by £20 ! saying that I was in debt to them ! when I argued that the reason for that was the snow we'd been having and that my usage would reduce markedly with the warmer weather AND that the reason I pay by direct debit is because I am on a low income and can spread the payments over a year .They refused to budge and being unable to afford the increased payments I had to switch companies and pay exit fees plus vat !

[andrew]

the email that scottish power sent me to inform of the price increase makes it clear that you have to contact them first, then you have to make sure the new company takes charge within fifteen working days in order to not have to pay the exit fees