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Post by bracknellboy on Jan 14, 2023 8:11:06 GMT
Bulb was one of those, and the government did the same after taking over. Why is this £6.5bn Bulb blowout still in the dark? (FT, November 23 2022) It seems a special kind of genius to take on a corporate collapse caused by failure to hedge out commodity price risk — only to fail to hedge out commodity price risk, sending the bill for your bailout soaring.Must admit I'm struggling to understand why the tax payer needs to get involved in bailing out failed energy companies. All the government needs to do is set up a transitional arrangement whereby if your supplier goes pop you are automatically transfered onto an emergency (expensive) tariff until you sort yourself out another supplier.
If you chose to buy your energy from a cheap supplier with a Mickey Mouse business plan, why should everyone else suffer?
they didn't bail it out.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 14, 2023 8:24:10 GMT
buy EDF shares and benefit from your views i wouldnt. nor me
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Post by overthehill on Jan 14, 2023 10:43:00 GMT
Bulb 'bail out'.
"The repayment of the £1bn hedging costs package over time, combined with the up-front sale price and share of profits, could mean that Bulb's failure ultimately costs taxpayers less than £2bn, according to one source."
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mrk
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Post by mrk on Jan 14, 2023 11:14:36 GMT
Bulb 'bail out'.
"The repayment of the £1bn hedging costs package over time, combined with the up-front sale price and share of profits, could mean that Bulb's failure ultimately costs taxpayers less than £2bn, according to one source."
Source? The £6.5bn figure was the OBR estimate. Likely to be an overestimate now given the falling prices. However it's also been reported that Octopus is to receive up to £4.5bn of state support to back Bulb takeover. The question is: why isn't there more transparency, given the huge sums involved?
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adrianc
Member of DD Central
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Post by adrianc on Jan 14, 2023 12:31:03 GMT
Bulb 'bail out'.
"The repayment of the £1bn hedging costs package over time, combined with the up-front sale price and share of profits, could mean that Bulb's failure ultimately costs taxpayers less than £2bn, according to one source."
Source? The £6.5bn figure was the OBR estimate. Likely to be an overestimate now given the falling prices. However it's also been reported that Octopus is to receive up to £4.5bn of state support to back Bulb takeover. The question is: why isn't there more transparency, given the huge sums involved? Because it's still ongoing, the total cost won't be known for years, and it'll depend heavily on what happens to energy prices between now and then. octopus.energy/press/octopus-energy-completes-acquisition-of-bulb/
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keitha
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2024, hopefully the year I get out of P2P
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Post by keitha on Jan 14, 2023 13:47:56 GMT
I've seen bulb customers complaining on social media that they want to stay with bulb not move to Octopus, as "Octopus Tariffs are more expensive" yes because some are still on cheap tariffs that are below the current wholesale cost. Bulb has gone bust it is a Norwegian Blue, you can't stay with a defunct company.
I have to admit to being an Octopus evangelist. My Go tariff costs 7.5P 0:30 to 4:30 & 40.04 the rest of the time with a standing charge of 47.88P, as I have a battery I charge that at cheap rate and also run the dishwasher etc. Biggest daily cost this winter £2.50 most under £1 today the bill so far is 82P, but my battery is charging from solar and is full, I'm currently exporting 900 W.
Solar and Battery cost me £7,500, I also have a £2,300 investment in the second Ripple wind farm, the idea being that I am self sufficient in Solar for 8 Months, the return on the Windfarm should cover the other 4 months.
Any excess I make will be ploughed back into further green activities, Possibly an A2A heat pump for the Lounge
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mrk
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Post by mrk on Jan 14, 2023 14:59:10 GMT
Because it's still ongoing, the total cost won't be known for years, and it'll depend heavily on what happens to energy prices between now and then. That's fair enough, but would still be nice to know how much it has costed so far, since it entered special administration on 24 November 2021.
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Post by overthehill on Jan 14, 2023 15:12:54 GMT
Bulb 'bail out'.
"The repayment of the £1bn hedging costs package over time, combined with the up-front sale price and share of profits, could mean that Bulb's failure ultimately costs taxpayers less than £2bn, according to one source."
Source? The £6.5bn figure was the OBR estimate. Likely to be an overestimate now given the falling prices. However it's also been reported that Octopus is to receive up to £4.5bn of state support to back Bulb takeover. The question is: why isn't there more transparency, given the huge sums involved? This was jul2022 so things might have changed.
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Jan 14, 2023 15:27:13 GMT
Because it's still ongoing, the total cost won't be known for years, and it'll depend heavily on what happens to energy prices between now and then. That's fair enough, but would still be nice to know how much it has costed so far, since it entered special administration on 24 November 2021. It's entirely possible that a figure can be produced for the government direct support period, now that the ownership has actually changed. But give 'em chance - it's been less than a month, with Xmas and NY in the middle... Whether that's actually a meaningful figure in the long term is another question entirely.
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keitha
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2024, hopefully the year I get out of P2P
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Post by keitha on Jan 14, 2023 16:23:58 GMT
www.bbc.com/news/business-59409595so a £1.7 billion initial payment in November 2021, the Administrators said then £2.1 billion to keep it running until April 2022, So my guesstimate would be about £3.4 Billion, or about £120 per household in the UK. the other question is how much of bulbs customer credit was lost because any loss of that is also added to everyone's bill. Yes I know that they are supposed to keep customer funds separate but ...
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Post by Deleted on Jan 14, 2023 16:48:45 GMT
"but......."
but what? They have to keep customer's credit seperate. (.)
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Post by bracknellboy on Jan 14, 2023 16:57:21 GMT
This was jul2022 so things might have changed.
at the time that the final "takeover" (more like an paramedic crew handing the contents of an ambulance over to A&E), Octopus made a statement that the earlier often stated demand of £1bn was never true. whether the subsequent payments to take it over or more or less than that I guess time will tell.
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keitha
Member of DD Central
2024, hopefully the year I get out of P2P
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Post by keitha on Jan 14, 2023 17:01:47 GMT
"but......."
but what? They have to keep customer's credit seperate. (.)
they are required to keep it separate but I'd lay bets that many of the failed companies didn't, in the same way Companies should keep Employees Tax and NI separate, yet time after time you see on administrators reports £X owed to HMRC, for pity's sake they take this money from employees wages it should be kept separate to day to day monies.
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Post by martin44 on Jan 19, 2023 22:13:21 GMT
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Post by overthehill on Jan 21, 2023 9:45:31 GMT
Smart Meters allow remote switching to a pre-payment meter. I'll bet that has come as a shock to many people. No doubt highlighted in bold in the harassing rollout fiasco !
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