Congratulations and cautious optimism for UK businesses
An Open letter to UK businesses from James Constant, CEO of Business Juice
Dear Editor,
Over the last 18 months we have been working hard with Ofgem, DECC, the energy suppliers and fellow intermediaries to attempt to improve the experience of the energy market for businesses.
It has been a long, hard road, with plenty of debate, dispute and diligent protecting of interests. We have been fortunate enough to find a receptive audience for change both amongst the business community and also constituency MPs who have recognised the issues of ‘unfair objection practices’, ‘automatic rollovers’, ‘lack of contract transparency’ as some of the biggest cash flow and competitive issues facing their businesses.
In recent weeks we have been honoured to be asked by Downing Street to support them in their understanding of, and push for improvements. This we have done and we are absolutely delighted to see both the support from inside the heart of Government for the needs of businesses and the response from forward thinking energy suppliers in reacting to our findings and stakeholder concerns.
So hearty congratulations are due to:
- Number 10 Downing Street for their desire to push for a voluntary solution to benefit UK businesses
- E.On for their call for an “industry-wide approach to ending automatic rollover contracts for SMEs” and
- BGB for being the first energy supplier to announce that they will no longer sell contracts with automatic rollover clauses
This is fabulous news for the business energy customer.
But the onus is now on the business customer to engage with the market and ensure they are negotiating the right deal for them to make optimal use of this newly found freedom offered by suppliers.
We hope to see the remaining suppliers follow BGB’s lead and to recognise the value in providing transparent information, competitive and innovative deals to win and retain customers on merit and not through opaque contractual clauses.
We at Business Juice believe that this is as big a development in the business energy market that has been seen since the opening of competition and is an opportunity now for all suppliers to grasp and deliver a genuinely competitive and accessible market for all comers.
A good news story on a beautiful summer’s day, well done to all concerned, now let’s make the change count.
James