Updated October 2021
Updated October 2019
December 2018
From a personal experience, OTM have tried making some pretty stupid changes over the past few months and the backlash from customers has caused U turns. About a month ago they introduced a change to the DD, where people pay a hiked up payment for the winter months and a reduced amount for the summer months or that’s what they tell us.
They are saying that they want people to pay up front for the (estimated) energy used but have tried to do this by the back door and have not been open and honest about it.
People generally pay a DD where the expected energy use for the year is estimated and broken down into equal monthly payments, this means that most people should be in credit, come the winter months – bit of a no brainer! This means that people are already paying up front for energy!
For the past month, OTM appear to be ignoring emails and webchat messages and are hell bent on grabbing hiked up DD payments; even creating additional DD’s with higher amounts. They seem to have enough staff to keep sending out changes to DDs with even higher amounts but so far they appear to be only taking one payment, using a new mandate.
This suggests to me that they are in financial trouble and are unable to pay their way. All things considered, it would seem that the senior management at OTM don’t understand the business and should be replaced by those that do; preferably by people that also know that customers are the business!
People on a “varied plan” can swap to a new supplier quite easily but those on a “fixed plan” will have to pay £50 to leave, even though OTM have broken the terms of the contract!
I don’t think OTM have shot themselves in the foot again, this time they have blown the foot off!
The “Direct Debit Indemnity” scheme operated by the banks is a useful tool!
UPDATE OCT 2019
We have had our ups and downs with OFTM, which resulted in us cancelling the DD but it seems OFTM put their brains into gear and stopped the ridiculous hiking of DDs. We agreed a monthly amount (based on actual meter readings that we record in a Spreadsheet) and for the past few months, we have had no problems. They are still the cheapest supplier in our area so at the end of our fixed “whack” tariff, we decided to renew and are now on the Fix D tariff. I think they have got their house in order but I’m still watching them like a hawk 🙂
Update Oct 2021.
We are saying goodbye to OFTM but wish them well. We have had no problems for the past couple of years and have been happy with the fixed tariff. The current “Fuel Price crisis” appears to be giving OFTM the opportunity to “milk” the situation. In our case, our fixed tariff was due for renewal, we expected increases of up to 30% in fuel costs but OFTM want to increase our monthly DD by 150% – an extra £170+ per month. That spoiled our day 🙁 When we recovered from the shock, we looked at the figures that OFTM wanted for a new fixed tariff and they give the following prices.
Electric daily charge 25p per day, an increase of 28%
Electric use per KWh 30p per unit, an increase of 18% (that’s not bad)
Gas daily charge 26p per day, an increase of 31%
Gas usage per KWh 8p per Unit, an increase of 251% (that is diabolical)
we did some digging and trawling on the t’interweb and found “Utility Warehouse” (UW). They could offer us a variable tariff with no contract for about 40% more than we are currently paying, not brilliant but the best we could find. Variable tariffs appear to be the best bet at the current time. OFTM is not the gas supplier of choice!
While we are in the process of swapping over to UW, OFTM have put us on the “One Green Flex 9.0” tariff and had they offered us this, we would have probably stayed with them!
Electric Daily charge 0.26825p
Electric Unit rate 0.18236p (a reduction)
Gas Daily 0.26123p
Gas Unit rate 0.03254p