Defectors back with British Gas

By ROBERT LEA
Updated:

 

BRITISH Gas is retaining its 70% stranglehold on household gas supply five years after deregulation of the market. Customers are turning back to the former monopoly supplier despite official figures showing its bills are generally higher.

Figures out this week from British Gas, part of Centrica, the AA road service and Goldfish credit card combine, show that it still supplies 14m households out of a total 20m because, of the millions who switched gas supplier since competition was introduced in 1996, nearly 2m have returned. The company claims that more than half of customers switching gas supplier for a second time are going back to it.

British Gas managing director Mike Alexander admitted they are not doing so because of price. Figures from Ofgem, the energy regulator, show that for an average-sized house with gas central heating, major competitors such as Powergen, npower and Eastern Energy are undercutting the average quarterly British Gas bill of £317 by between £35 and £63.

BG in £622m Egypt deal
INTERNATIONAL gas exploration and production group BG today signed a $900m (£622m) contract to construct a plant in Egypt to liquefy and export natural gas from the country from 2005.

In partnership with Edison, the US energy group, BG Group is building the plant near Alexandria to take advantage of the 10 trillion cubic feet of gas it has discovered under the sea in the Western Delta area.

BG, the international arm of the former British Gas, has signed a contract with the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation and construction of the plant at Idku is scheduled to begin in the first quarter of next year. Exports of frozen liquefied gas around the Mediterranean and to the US will follow in three years.

Most watched Money videos