Martin Lewis issues warning as he urges households to act ‘asap’ | Personal Finance | Finance
Money Saving Expert Martin Lewis is warning households over the new Ofgem energy price cap and urging people to take action as soon as possible from today, Wednesday August 27.
Fresh from his three week break, the Money Saving Expert founder has taken to Twitter to urge his millions of followers to act ‘asap’ as the energy price cap announcement is made.
The Ofgem price cap dictates the rate that homes in England, Wales and Scotland will pay if they’re on a standard tariff (ie not fixed). From October 1, it will increase by 2%, rising to £1,755 per year from £1,720, or £35 a year.
That increase isn’t massive in itself but it’s still an increase – and Martin Lewis says you can actually slash your bills by as much as 15% if you take out a fix instead.
Ofgem announced this morning: “Between 1 October and 31 December 2025, the energy price cap is set at £1,755 per year for a typical household who use electricity and gas and pay by Direct Debit. This is an increase of 2% compared to the cap set between 1 July to 30 September 2025 (£1,720).”
The new unit rates will be: electricity 26.35p per kWh, up from 25.73p per kWh, and 53.68p standing charge, up from 51.37p per day.
For gas, the new rates will be 6.29p per kWh of gas, down slightly from 6.33p. The standing charge will rise significantly, up from 29.82p to 34.03p per day.
Martin said before the announcement that not only will you save money if you switch now, you’ll in all likelihood save money well into next year too.
He warned: “THE CAP IS A PANTS CAP, MOST ON IT CAN SAVE NEARLY 15% BY FIXING
“Now we know the Cap is now pretty certain to stay at about its current level, or a little higher, until the end of 2025, it’s easy to compare to the cheapest fixed deals which are nearly 15% less (c£250/yr cheaper on a typical bill) and have guaranteed rates, so you know they won’t rise for at least a year.
“That means switch to a fix and your energy use immediately costs less, and will continue to do so until at the very least the 31 Dec.
“Yet the extremely strong likelihood is you’ll continue to save substantially after that too. Analyst’s current predictions are that the cap will drop slightly in Jan (down 2%ish) then a rise again in April (up 5% ish). Though this is far more crystal ball gazing than the October prediction.”
Martin added: “As your cheapest fix depends on your location, usage, payment type (sadly no fixes are available for non-Smart Prepay tariffs) use our MSE whole-of-market ‘Cheap Energy Club’ to compare and find yours.
“For getting a cheap fix right now not to be worth it we’d need to see pretty immediate and monumental falls in wholesale rates – which no one is predicting. In fact our analysis shows that at every point over the last 18mths you’d have been better off getting the getting the cheapest fix than being on the Cap.
“PS there are innovative time-of-use and EV tariffs its worth looking at as well as fixings, they’re detailed in the energy club, but I wanted to keep this as simple as possible.”
