ACS has welcomed an announcement from energy company Opus on plans to stop the use of rollover contracts.
In an announcement posted on the company’s website, Opus state that will cease offering the automatic rollover contracts to all new customers as of October 2014. All existing customer contracts will stop auto-renewal by Spring 2015.
Opus Energy were included in a panel of suppliers that also featured British Gas and E.ON as part of an All Party Parliamentary Small Shops Group Inquiry on energy, where the suppliers where questioned by MPs on their business practices, including the use of rollover contracts.
ACS Chief Executive James Lowman said: “We welcome Opus Energy’s move away from the use of rollover contracts as a positive step towards a fair and consistent marketplace for all small business customers. However, there remain a number of small suppliers that still use rollover contracts to put their customers onto inflated tariffs and it is up to Ofgem to ensure that this does not continue.”
In a consultation on the issue of rollover contracts published this month, Ofgem stated that they will be monitoring the marketplace over the next six months to see if there is evidence of rollover contracts being used to unnecessarily inflate prices. ACS’ response to the consultation urges Ofgem to implement an outright ban if any evidence of this kind is discovered.
