Back in the market... the four energy flops
FOUR bosses of failed energy suppliers have returned to the market to sell gas and electricity to households, it can be revealed.
Customers are expected to rush to switch deals after the energy price cap was hiked by £117 last week. Yet The Mail on Sunday found some of the suppliers offering the cheapest rates have links to firms that collapsed with big debts.
Gulf Gas & Power UK, Northumbria Energy, Lite Energy and Saturn Energy are al l l i nked to individuals who ran failed energy suppliers.
Gulf, trading under the famous oil brand which dates back to 1901, offers one of the best deals on the market at £1,015 a year for an average family, according to Energy Helpline. This is far below the new £1,254 cap on variable deals.
But the firm, which operates from the Grade II-listed Bowcliffe Hall, West Yorkshire, is linked to the former owner and boss of bust supplier GB Energy, Luke Watson.
GB Energy collapsed in November 2016 with its 160,000 customers taken on by Co-operative Energy.
Creditors were left £32.3 million out of pocket, including £6 million owed in green taxes and £15.5 million Co-op Energy had to cover in unpaid credits to customers.
On his LinkedIn networking page, Watson claims he is Gulf ’s ‘ cofounder’, though he is not listed on Gulf’s Companies House records.
He has also been referred to as Gulf’s ‘general manager’ in documents published by a partner firm.
Jonathan Turner, Gulf ’s owner and chief executive, said Watson was not the general manager and insisted he had ‘no influence or control as to how my business is run’.
But Turner said he wanted to give Watson a second chance, adding: ‘I was obviously very sensitive to his background.’ The company accounts were ‘more than healthy’, Turner said. Watson did not respond to requests for comment.
David Bird, chief executive of Cooperative Energy, called for tougher rules on former bosses returning to the market. He said: ‘When a supplier goes bust, the tab is usually partly picked up by the new supplier and all other remaining suppliers and their customers. This loophole could be exploited by unscrupulous directors. The introduction of a “fit and proper person” test would help protect customers.’
Gillian Guy, chief executive of Citizens Advice, also called for regulator Ofgem to keep closer tabs on individuals running energy firms.
I n Newcastle, Nort h u mbria Energy has been set up by Tim Cantle-Jones, a local businessman who was part of a group on entrepreneurs accompanying Theresa May on a trip to Africa last year.
He was the former chief executive of Future Energy, which went bust 13 months ago. He was not running it at the time of its collapse, but was still a shareholder.
The company owed £2.3 million to creditors, and its 10,000 customers were transferred to Green Star Energy. Cantle- Jones di d not respond to requests for comment.
Extra Energy, a supplier run by Ben Jones, went bust in November. It owed £15.5 million in green taxes and about £100 million to creditors. Its 129,000 customers were sent to Scottish Power.
Within a month, Jones had a new Ofgem l i cence to run Callesti Energy Supply and had set up a website for Lite Energy. Jones could not be reached for comment.
In September last year, Gen4U failed and its 500 customers were sent to Octopus. The owner, Fareed Hussain Bashir, registered Saturn Energy at Companies House two months later. He did not respond to requests for comment.
Mary Starks, an executive director at Ofgem, said the regulator was reviewing its licensing rules. She said: ‘We don’t just want anybody to enter the market, and in particular we don’t want suppliers to fail with big debts behind them.
‘We are revoking licences at the moment to make sure they don’t get picked up by people we don’t approve.’