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"Britain plans to limit its energysuppliers to a maximum of four tariffs on gas or electricity toimprove transparency and help customers find the cheapest dealin the government's latest attempt to tackle rising prices forconsumers.    The government announced on Tuesday that energy supplierswill have to offer customers their best value tariffs, includingone fixed and variable rate option, and scrap discounts forcustomers receiving both electricity and gas from one supplieror based on payment methods.    &amp;quot;Bill payers will no longer face the impossible choicebetween hundreds of tariffs; each customer will have a maximumof four tariffs for gas or electricity per supplier toconsider,&amp;quot; said Energy Secretary Edward Davey, adding that allsuppliers have to make these changes by the summer 2014.    Britain's six largest energy suppliers are EDF Energy, Centrica, SSE, Scottish Power, E.ON and RWE npower, whocurrently provide varying numbers of tariffs (see table below).    Davey clarified remarks initially made by Prime MinisterDavid Cameron one month ago which caused confusion within theenergy industry and the government, as well.     Britons see climbing energy prices as the biggest threat totheir standard of living over the coming year, according to aYouGov survey published in October. UK inflation is already setto rise further this year due to recent gas and electricityprice hikes by energy suppliers.      &amp;quot;You have to keep shopping around but at the moment they[the suppliers] all seem to be putting them up. There'snot a lot of difference between them,&amp;quot; said Suzanne Shawcross, a53-year old London resident.    The government is encouraging consumers to switch theirenergy supplier to secure the cheapest tariffs, but many say theprocess is tiring and confusing.    &amp;quot;All this switching is not as straightforward as they say.It's a terrible fiddle to go online and get figures to compare,&amp;quot;said 76-year old Jennifer Pulham, a retired teacher.    The new rules announced on Tuesday are subject to aconsultation period.        COMPETITION    The government says its proposals strike the right balancebetween engaging consumers in the energy market and maintainingincentives for energy suppliers to compete.    &amp;quot;Our objective here has been to work to help hard-workingfamilies who often struggle to pay their energy bills and that'swhat our proposals are designed to do,&amp;quot; said a spokesman forPrime Minister Cameron.    But experts have voiced concerns that reducing the amount oftariffs will hinder rather than help competition and preventconsumers from shopping around.    &amp;quot;Fewer tariffs to choose from means the companies have gotless to compete on because they're not competing on the qualityof the product because ultimately they're providing acommodity,&amp;quot; RBC analyst John Musk said.    At the same time, energy bills will continue to rise becauseunderlying factors such as costs for social and environmentalprogrammes and more expensive wholesale products will be passedon to consumer bills.    &amp;quot;These costs all have to be passed on (...) and they areaccounting for at least half, if not more than half, of recenttariff increases,&amp;quot; said UBS analyst Stephen Hunt.           IMPACT ON SUPPLIERS    Offering a reduced number of tariffs is unlikely to biteinto the balance sheets of suppliers as the business ofsupplying energy is only marginally profitable, analysts said.    &amp;quot;If they are forced to switch some customers to lowertariffs that's not going to mean lower profitability for them ingeneral,&amp;quot; RBC analyst John Musk said.    &amp;quot;I don't think these companies are making a lot of money onsupply anyway.&amp;quot;    Energy suppliers said they were supportive of efforts tocreate a fairer and simpler tariff regime.    &amp;quot;However, it is important to recognise that in the UK, we dohave some of the cheapest energy prices across Europe and costsare also driven by factors outside of our control,&amp;quot; a spokesmanfor RWE npower said.     Number of tariffs offered by UK's top energy suppliers Centrica         6 EDF Energy       2 E.ON             5 RWE npower       8 Scottish Power   6 SSE              3"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://in.reuters.com/article/britain-energy-bills-idINL5E8MK8MR20121120>