British Gas

We have been customers of British Gas for more than forty years now and have no intention of changing. So we are loyal customers, entitled to a bit of a moan from time to time.

The moan being that for most of this time, our direct debit payments have bounced around in a very bizarre way. Despite Deep Blue and Deep Mind, their computers do not seem to be able to manage to do a decent job of forecasting our bill. So this morning we are told that our monthly direct debit goes up by 50% for the year to come, this despite our account being more than £10 in credit at the end of the winter. No mention of price rises that I can find in the pages of waffle they call a bill.

I might add that we have taken their Home Care insurance for quite some time now, and remain entirely happy with that. Good to know that one has a proper service organisation at the end of the phone when things go wrong - as they do from time to time.

Also that the electricity people are just as bad. Pages of waffle from them too. What I think the Tories call the efficiency of the free market in retail energy supply.

While the water people have got a tighter grip on their monopoly and don't feel the need to pad their bills out so much.