Try our 10-minute energy switch challenge to cut your bill by up to £250

THIS Thursday, millions of us will be feeling foolish as our energy bills soar by £100.

To make sure the April Fools Day joke isn’t on you, take our Sun Money ten-minute switch challenge and save up to £250.

Half the population are overpaying for gas and electricity — as a quarter of us have never switched supplier and another 25 per cent of people’s discount deals have ended.

Many are too lazy to change provider or wrongly believe they will not save money.

Customers being hit by £96 price cap increases next week can switch in minutes and beat the increase.

The average standard tariff annual bill will be around £1,138, the level of the price cap, as most suppliers ramp up prices blaming wholesale energy costs.

But the cheapest discount deal is £916, with Outfox The Market.

It can take less than ten minutes to fill out a switching form online — and you will get moved to a new supplier within four weeks or receive £30 compensation.

Also, set up autoswitch and get changed to the cheapest deal every year by a price comparison company, for free.

MoneySavingExpert’s Martin Lewis said: “The silver lining of the £96 price cap rise is that it shocks people into action.”

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‘We’ll do it again next year’

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LUCY and Jason Swinburn know about shopping around for bargains – as they both work for high street retailers.

The couple, from Swindon, took 12 minutes to save £200 on their gas and electricity using Uswitch to change from Sainsbury’s Energy to an EDF deal for £1,591.

Lucy, 37, who has a six-year-old boy and a three-year-old girl, with Jason, 44, said: “It was so simple as the website remembers our energy use from previous switches – and will remind us to switch next year.”

‘Should’ve done it ages ago’

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DAD Chris Pillings had not switched energy supplier for six years – but will now save £122 after ten minutes of work.

Accountant Chris and wife Rachel, a banking officer, who have two children, used CompareTheMarket, to move from Shell Energy’s £1,136-a-year price to Together Energy’s Green Together 25 £1,014 deal.

Chris, 41, from South London, said: “We should have switched years ago. We were paying far too much with Shell Energy after they took over our previous supplier Green Star Energy.”

‘We blamed lockdown’

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A FAMILY of four switched energy in 17 minutes after discovering high bills were not due to lockdown – but price hikes.

Max and Sarah Veltman saved £84 with MoneySaving Expert by ditching Igloo Energy for a Green’s discounted deal at £1,111 for their three-bed semi in Birmingham.

The 39-year-old scientist, who has two kids with healthcare worker Sarah, 38, said: “We originally thought bills were up due to being at home more, not price rises. So we switched.”

‘It was so quick to switch’

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KIRILL and Valerie Anurov took just six minutes to discover they would save £217 by going green.

The Londoners, who had been with British Gas for 18 months, will cash in by leaving a £1,743-a-year standard tariff to join green power firm Goto Energy’s £1,526 deal.

CompareTheMarket showed them the deal for their four-bedroom house.
Accountant Kirill, 41, who has son George, four, with quantity surveyor Valerie, 36, said: “It’s so quick to switch.”

Don’t get snapped by fake ads

Beat the scammers, by Ashley Hart, head of fraud at TSB

FACEBOOK, Instagram, Snapchat and Google need to raise their game to stop users being caught out online by convincing scams.

The big tech firms carry millions of adverts. But among them are scams, paid for by fraudsters.

Just yesterday, I reported a scam advert on Instagram, which pointed to a dodgy website I also saw in a Google advert. It’s still live. More than ever,

Fraudsters are tempting people in with purchase scams, fake profiles on social sites and investment fraud – promising high returns, freebies and discounts that don’t exist.

My team reports loads of these every week and they’re often left to sit online as traps for unsuspecting web users. Never rush in just because something looks genuine.

Teenagers are also being heavily targeted online to become “money mules”. If you have kids, warn them about the dangers.

Moving money through your bank account isn’t the risk-free gig that’s advertised.

It’s money laundering, ­carries a possible jail term and people’s lives are ­regularly ruined by going down this path.

Online platforms need to do more to stop these adverts, and to stop scammers profiting from them too. You can help.

When you spot a scam like this, report the ad – which you can usually do with a couple of clicks.

In the meantime, we will continue to campaign for these bogus adverts and online scams to be removed – to help keep us all safe from fraud online.

Money makeover

THE impact of the pandemic has prompted Rob Copeland to focus on saving for the long-term.

The 49-year-old care officer lives with wife Suzanne in Macclesfield, Cheshire, and earns about £16,500 a year.

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He says: “It’s been a really challenging past year at work. It made me think about the future – and whether I’m on track for retirement.”

Rob has been contributing to a company pension for about five years.

He wants to retire when he is 67. He hopes this will provide about £1,200 a month in income, but doesn’t know how much is in the pot at present.

His company pays about 5 per cent of his salary into the pension, and he contributes 3 per cent on top.

“But there might be more paid in by the company over time,” he says. “I never paid into a company pension in previous jobs.”

Previously, Rob was self-employed and worked for a wholesale company, where he was not able to access the pension scheme.

He does, however, pay £200 a month into a private pension with Aviva in a medium-risk portfolio, which is currently worth about £120,000.

“I got some pension projections for what this will provide from age 55 – and it’s only about £2,000 a year,” he says.

But he plans to leave this to grow for as long as possible. Rob says he’d be happy with less than he’s currently earning during retirement.

He expects to receive the full state pension, which will form a basic income.
He owns a property outright with his wife, worth about £260,000.

ANSWER, from Sarah Coles, personal financial expert at Hargreaves Lansdowne

IT is sensible of Rob to take stock of where he stands.This does not just mean checking what’s in each pension pot – although that’s an excellent start.

It also means considering when he wants to finish work, and where he wants to live in retirement.

This is a conversation he should have with his wife, so he can consider both their incomes.

If he wants to retire at his state pension age of 67, it seems he’s on track, assuming he needs an income of £15,000 before tax.

The full state pension is worth just over £9,000. His £120,000 pension projection of £2,000 a year seems low.

But it may be based on him taking a large cash lump sum from his pension, or early retirement, for example.

A rough rule of thumb to calculate how much a private pension could produce in income is around 4 per cent. This is £4,800 a year in his case.

If he continues paying the same percentage of ­salary into his workplace pension and retires at age 67, this should generate over £1,200 a year in retirement.

Together with his ­private pension he should hit his target. However, if he plans to retire before the age of 67, he’ll need to set more aside.

He’ll also need more if he wants to take a large lump sum out. But if he intends to downsize to a smaller property, this may help close the gap.

Maddy Tooke, coupon queen

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MY top five freebies this week:

• Colouring calendar from Hobbycraft. Download at bit.ly/hobbycraftcalendar.
• New Topcashback customers get £10 to spend at Hotel Chocolat. Sign up at bit.ly/tcbhotelchoc by April 4.
• Four months of Apple Music, individual or family plan, from Groupon. Sign up at bit.ly/4monthsapple and redeem within 30 days. Remember to cancel before the trial ends or you will be charged the subscription fee.
• Mock driving theory test online from DVSA. Find out more at bit.ly/mockfree.
• Bike health check at Halfords. Book yours in at bit.ly/freebikehalfords.

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This post first appeared on thesun.co.uk