New reports have revealed that millions of UK businesses are still not taking advantage of available savings on their water.
From April 2017, commercial customers in England have been able to choose the best retailer for their needs, regardless of where their premises are located. This was a radical move away from the previous practice, where companies received their water and sewerage services from a single provider located nearby.
Deregulation effectively brought the market inline with the energy sector.
This new-found ability to pick and choose their supplier opened new ways for businesses to save on water expenditure.
However, recent reports published have revealed that only 10% of businesses have took the plunge and switched suppliers, meaning millions of pounds worth of savings are still being flushed away.
For the 90% of you that still haven’t switched, we’ve decided to give you the lowdown on how much other businesses have saved, where the market is likely to end up and how to find out how much you could save.
How much have others saved?
Overall, Ofwat estimates that £8m in savings have been made across the UK already since deregulation.
How much you can save on your water varies drastically.
The two key things taken into consideration are:
- Your location within the UK (England, Scotland, Wales etc)
- Whether you have switched suppliers since deregulation.
If you’re yet to switch, the good news is that you’re likely to see the largest percentage of potential savings. Those of you who have already switched can still make savings on a new deal, but don’t be expecting the kind of drop in expenditure you saw last time.
From our experience, businesses in England switching for the first time tend to experience savings around the 6% mark (this drops to as low as 1% if you’ve switched previously).
When casting your eye over Scottish water deals, you can see straight away that the savings are quite different. A more mature market, first time switchers can see savings as high as 50-60%! And even if you’ve already switched, you can still benefit from 5% in savings each time your contract comes up for renewal.
To give you an insight into what kind of savings are available, here are three real-life examples of businesses we’ve worked with in England and Scotland (sorry Wales and Northern/Republic of Ireland, you’ll have to wait a little bit longer until deregulation washes up on your shores).
Business Water Savings: Where is the market likely to go?
The best way of accurately forecasting how the market will change is to look to Scotland, where the water industry was deregulated back in 2008. Like we stated earlier, businesses in Scotland are now beginning to experience savings of between 50-60% when they switch supplier for the first time, due to the market being more mature
England is not there yet, but a real downward pressure on tariffs is likely to feed into lower prices for business. This means the current market will only become competitive once more firms begin to engage with suppliers. This is the only way we’ll start to see savings passed on to customers increase.
How much can I save?
Finding out how much you could save on your water bill has never been easier.
All you need to do is submit your SPID () number and email address below and our team will be in touch within 24 hours to confirm how much you could save, to the penny!
If you’re an existing GAS customer, simply give us a ring on 0800 130 3514.