British Gas customers should treat its latest price rise with the contempt it deserves

The energy provider's excuses are as leaky as a Thames Water pipe

The rise apples to both gas and electricity, and follows the 12.5 per cent increase imposed last September (Reuters)

You’d think British Gas would have worked out that kicking its customers in the teeth, while blaming everyone but itself, isn’t working out too well as a business strategy.

But apparently not. The UK’s largest energy supplier – a status that the company is doing its damnedest to rid itself of – has decided to hike prices by an average of 5.5 per cent for the 4 million or so customers on its standard variable tariff.

The rise apples to both gas and electricity, with the average dual fuel bill set to come in at £1,161 after its imposition. It follows the 12.5 per cent increase in electricity prices imposed last September.

You may, by now, be familiar with the standard unvarying excuse that the company trots out in an attempt to explain actions like this: a shrug of the shoulders and a “not our fault, guv”.

The announcement was accompanied by a link to a YouTube video featuring Iain Conn, the boss of British Gas owner Centrica, who cried some crocodile tears for his customers claiming to feel their pain.

He went on to blame half the increase on government policies such as half-hearted efforts to encourage green energy and smart metering, along with VAT. The other half was laid at the door of increasing wholesale energy costs.

But wait! There was, in addition, a new verse to the same old song. An ace in the hole to add some ballast to Mr Conn’s bluster. The British Gas boss also pointed to the recent price increase that regulator Ofgem announced for capped pre-payment meter tariffs charged to mostly poor and vulnerable customers. The same forces were, he said, responsible.

The problem with that argument is that it is about as leaky as a Thames Water pipe, because Ofgem isn’t responsible for the prices Centrica sets for its customers. Centrica is.

Instead of exercising its financial muscle and the business acumen of its highly paid executives, with a view to competing more closely with the rivals who have, despite all this, found ways to knock £300 or more off the top of its prices, the company has preferred to fall back on excuses and window dressing.

Look no further than the replacement of the standard variable tariff for new customers, with an emergency tariff that looks very much like it, for an example of the latter.

That these explanations haven’t been finding much favour with British Gas customers was evident in Centrica’s most recent results, in which it had to ‘fess up to a mass exodus. That looks set to continue for the foreseeable future.

Ironically Centrica could be said, with its behaviour, to be doing more than any regulator could to encourage a genuinely competitive energy market. Its customers would be well advised to take advantage of that and treat its excuses with the contempt they deserve.

There is no reason to pour their money into its coffers, as five minutes on a price comparison website would make clear..