Reject your gas & electric price rises.

Scottish Power is the most recent company to announce a price rise. Their consumers will see gas prices go up by 2pc and electricity prices by 8.9pc wef 25 November 2010. British Gas is already increasing its prices by 7pc on 10th December, while Scottish & Southern Energy have planned to raise gas prices by 9pc on 1st December.

Other utility providers are expected to follow, except for EDF Energy, which has announced a price freeze on all standard tariffs until March 2011. Customers who face energy price rises next month could enjoy their current lower prices for most of the winter, simply by using a little-known regulatory rule enforced by Ofgem; customers are able to reject their supplier’s price rises while switching to another energy provider.

The old prices will then apply until the switch goes through, buying customers up to several months’ grace on their current tariffs.

Under current Ofgem rules, energy companies cannot enforce their price rises if a customer rejects the rise within 20 working days of receiving a letter about it. At present, energy companies are sending letters about price increases up to 65 working days after the increase has been applied. Essentially once customers have informed the supplier that they reject the price rise, they must make arrangements to switch suppliers within 15 working days.

Depending on how long it takes suppliers to inform customers about prices changes, this entire process could last as long as 20 weeks, during which time customers could continue to enjoy their current energy prices, including British Gas’s cheapest Websaver tariffs.

British Gas said it had already begun to send letters to its customers warning them about the changes. However, it added that it had so many customers that the letters would take a while to be sent out. Scottish & Southern also said it had sent letters to customers.