Everyone with one type of electricity meter is being urged to spend £1 today in order to save money, based on advice from everyone’s favourite money saving expert Martin Lewis.
As you probably know, energy rates changed today, with an average 12-14% price drop for energy customers. It means the cost of everything from running heating to cooking, watching TV or boiling the kettle just got 12-14% cheaper from today.
That’s good news for anyone on a variable tariff, or any kind of tariff that tracks energy prices, because you will instantly benefit from cheaper energy rates than you’re currently paying (even though they are still higher than they were a few years ago).
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But if you have one specific type of electricity meter, you could end up paying more than you need to, Martin has warned in the past during previous price changes.
He said that there is a £1 trick to avoid this though, and by spending a simple quid to top up, you can force your meter to change to the new, lower price instantly.
Speaking on his BBC Radio Sounds The Martin Lewis Podcast, Martin said: “For those people who have non-smart electricity prepayment meters.
“If you’re on a prepayment meter and it is not a smart meter, and only electricity here.
“A peculiarity of those meters is that the rate is dictated by when you top up.
“So what I would suggest you would do on that meter is you use your energy this week without topping up, or if you do need to top up, you only top up a little bit.
“And then on [Monday] you top up.
“It doesn’t matter if you’ve got loads of electricity credit and you don’t need to top up, just top up it with £1.
“Because the act of topping up on [Monday] for most non-smart electricity pre-payment meters, that is what triggers your meter to know you should now be charged the lower price.
“So of course we want to do it as soon as possible, so as soon as possible you are being charged a lower price for the electricity you use.
“If you were to leave it a few days, you would pay a few more days than necessary on the higher rate.”
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