Which energy suppliers let you pay your bill with an American Express card?

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• Willie says:

  19 Mar19 March 07:52

  I was a Bulb customer and have recently been moved over to Octopus.

  I’ve never had a direct debit – just made sure my account has always been in credit.

  Presumably this shouldn’t be an issue moving forward with Octopus?

  • Harrier25 says:

    19 Mar19 March 07:58

    You usually pay the supplier more not having a direct debit set up.

    • Mart says:

      19 Mar19 March 09:00

      Can I ask why this is (re having a direct debit) – is some sort of discount applied? I am with bulb and I can’t see how it would change the amount of energy I use and therefore am charged for?

    • NFH says:

      19 Mar19 March 09:02

      Not with Octopus. You pay the same price irrespective of payment method. This is how it should be.

      I’ve never understood how other energy suppliers’ price differences, which depend on the payment method, comply with Regulations 4 & 6A of the Consumer Rights (Payment Surcharges) Regulations 2012. Even if a difference in the standing charge can be justified, there can be no justification for a difference in the price of the energy consumed.

      • AJA says:

        19 Mar19 March 10:25

        They get around it by offering a prompt payment discount for paying by direct debit. In other words its a rebate rather than charging a lower rate for customers who don’t pay by direct debit.

        The original justification was that it was cheaper for the supplier since they saved money on credit control and manual allocation of cheques to accounts. These days when we mainly pay by bank transfer or enter the amount ourselves in their websites means that those advantages no longer exist but suppliers persist as an incentive for us to sign up to DD.

        Octopus is great though as they charge the same regardless of whether you have a DD or not.

        • Oliver says:

          19 Mar19 March 10:56

          They changed that last year, I wasn’t on DD, had email communication and also on their twitter last year, they started to charge non-dd customer slightly more on the tariff, I end up settings DD for £5 a month and pay the rest with amex.

  • polly says:

    19 Mar19 March 08:09

    Willie,
    Worth comparing direct debit offers tho, and we keep ours to £5/month. We always make sure there’s enough credit via Amex top up,to,cover the next bill. Suits both parties. With them about 4 hrs now. V g customer service too.

• Alan says:

  19 Mar19 March 08:08

  Worst customer service I’ve ever experienced. They decided my gas meter needed to be changed shortly after joining them. Unfortunately, rather than record it as a swap, they decided it was a second meter.
  As there was no second meter, they kept sending estimated bills and charging a standing charge on it, as well as threatening legal action for failing to give access to it (my meters are outside). Despite 15 visits from their respective with clear proof that there was only one, plus clear statements from the company that fitted the new meter, they continued to insist there were 2.
  Took 18 months for the ombudsman to take action, then another 6 months before Octopus actually updated their system. During that time they actively blocked me moving. Moved the day after it was finally sorted.
  Like many of the new disruptive companies, they are great if there are no issues, but they don’t have the scripts to deal with unusual problems

• PeterK says:

  19 Mar19 March 08:12

  Once your bulb account transfers to Octopus you can’t make any payments via the bulb app or website, this is what I now get when trying to login via bulb……

  Your account has been moved to Octopus
  You can no longer access your Bulb account as it’s been moved over to Octopus.

• Nick says:

  19 Mar19 March 08:13

  If you’re an octopus customer, look at their tracker tariff. The unit rate varies daily based on wholesale costs, but massively cheaper than the government unit rate cap. Gas is now around 50% cheaper and electric around 30% cheaper, so some big potential savings.

  • Knobbly says:

    19 Mar19 March 08:52

    Agreed, tracker tariff is exceptionally good – I joined in February.

    I be recently seen reports that there’s a 6 month+ waiting list for it.

  • Thegasman says:

    19 Mar19 March 09:05

    There’s a significant wait to get on their tracker tariffs at the moment. I’m trying to swap for gas but sticking with Go for electricity as can time shift most of my consumption so average unit rate ~9p.

• PeterK says:

  19 Mar19 March 08:17

  Following transfer to Octopus earlier this month, as they haven’t yet taken a meter reading to prepare my first bill nor is the smart meter working until after the first manual reading, I’ve been able to reduce my direct debit down to £10!

• Elliot says:

  19 Mar19 March 08:19

  EDF take American Express I pay using my card online. It is an EDF business contract.would have thought personal would be the same.

  • Kagey says:

    19 Mar19 March 10:17

    Yes! I recently paid into a personal EDF account with my AMEX. I phoned to verify if I needed to pay a certain amount to keep my direct debit to £70 per month. EDF said No. I could pay £5.00 or £500. AMEX was easily accepted. Hit that 3-month target early!!

    • Ryan says:

      19 Mar19 March 11:19

      EDF are annoying that any credit balance refunds go to the original card 🙁 others are better

• Paul says:

  19 Mar19 March 08:25

  Pretty sure I was able to pay EDF using my AMEX but that was back in 2020. I am with a different supplier now so not sure if it’s still the case. I had to argue with them about doing this. I wanted to make my direct debit £5 per month and overpay on the AMEX but they would only let me bring it down to £30.

• NFH says:

  19 Mar19 March 08:30

  I cancelled my direct debit with Octopus as soon as I switched to them 5 years ago. My iPhone reminds me to pay by Octopus bill on my Amex BA billing date every month. I then pay my bill in the Octopus iPhone app using Amex BA via Apple Pay.

  My only criticism is that the Octopus app requires the user to enter the payment amount manually with no option to select the amount of the last bill, but this is minor compared to the advantage of earning Avios so easily.

  • Andrew. says:

    19 Mar19 March 10:08

    That’s odd.

    Mine populates the balance owed automatically. (Android).

  • AJA says:

    19 Mar19 March 10:19

    I think the reason for requiring you to enter an amount is because that payment page is designed to allow you to make a one-off top up payment ie it could be for any amount.

    I think Octopus works well as long as you do just standard things. As others have noted anything out of the ordinary is when you see how they can’t cope.

    We recently refurbished our house and extended the kitchen into what was originally a garage. Unfortunately that meant relocating both gas and electricity meters and required liasing between Southern Power Networks, Cadent and Octopus who own the actual meters. Getting all 3 to talk to each other and turn up on the same day was a nightmare. 4 failed visits when Octopus did not turn up as promised and multiple phone calls where the customer service department plainly didn’t have a clue what to do or how to organise a piss up on a brewery resulted in a strongly worded email to the CEO of Octopus to get his relevant department to do the right thing. The actual gas and electricity engineers from Octopus who eventually turned up were fantastic and they acknowledged that the back office organisation at Octopus is far less organised than the CEO admits. He’s more interested in taking over other failed suppliers and getting their captive customers rather than dealing well with existing customers.

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