Shopping around

You can tell it's payday.

For a start, I've already had my monthly delivery from Amazon. I have to stop buying books. I buy around 2 a month, yet read only one. But they joke at work that you can tell it's payday when I get my books delivered.

But, more importantly, I've done some of my restless shopping around. This is where I do a frequent check to make sure I'm getting the best deal on things I 'have' to have. Credit card rates; mobile phone packages; broadband etc. It's currently part of my nesting: getting everything nice and tidy.

This season it is my main utilities: electric and gas. I have been with the same supplier for quite a while, and I do regularly keep an eye out for a change in prices. I say change. For a hike in prices. One of the things I didn't really bear in mind is where my very own supplier hikes my prices, but hikes those on different tariffs by less, or releases a new tariff.

I buy online, and I have a dual-fuel account, so I maximise all my various discounts that I can get. But the recent scavange around revealed that my current utility tariff had be bettered by my own supplier.

It's not as simple as it all seems though. This new, cheaper tariff (I was going to call it 'better' but the quality of the gas and electric stay the same, as does the service) was only available for a limited time - until 30th September. So I would have to act quick.

Then there is the checking around. Now, there are various price comparison websites that will do this for you, but they don't necessarily tell you the whole truth. For example, if I switch to a tariff with a standing charge, the unit rate may very well be cheaper but overall the contract ends up costing me more. Or vice versa. And then each different supplier has different discounts that they apply which don't necessarily get factored in. This ends up with me sat with a number of bits of paper calculating my usage per quarter, and what this would cost under the various different tariffs, and what that adds up to annually, and then what discount can be taken off, and then doing everything exactly the same for the gas, and then all over again for each different supplier. For someone as anal as me it is very satisfying.

It's not easy though, if you're not so brainy or as enthusiastic to spend so long in some actually quite complicated calculations then I can understand why people don't change supplier as regularly as they should.

But then to throw a spanner into the entire works; when I contacted my supplier to change they said it would be no problem so long as I gave them my most recent meter readings; but was I aware they had just released some new tariffs which could make things even cheaper? I hadn't been aware. So off I went with another bit of paper...

Turns out it couldn't, that there very quickly expiring tariff was the best value, so I have signed up.

So what next... phone and broadband?