Electricity, gas, internet, mobile and insurance: bills charged month after month that almost nobody reviews. These markets reward new customers and penalise those who stay put — we explain where the overspend hides and how to check your savings for free in 1 minute.
When we think about the cost of our home, we think of the mortgage or the rent. But there is a second block of expenses that goes far more unnoticed: electricity, gas, internet, mobile and insurance. They are bills charged to your account month after month, year after year, that almost nobody reviews. And that is the problem: these markets are designed to reward the new customer and penalise the one who doesn't move.
The "loyal customer rate" doesn't exist (the opposite does)
Energy, telecom and insurance companies compete aggressively to attract customers with entry offers. After the first year, those conditions dilute: the rate renews upwards, the discount disappears, the insurance premium rises "due to general claims experience". None of them calls to tell you a better rate is available. The result is systematic: the longer you go without reviewing a contract, the more likely you are paying too much for exactly the same service.
Where the overspend hides, bill by bill
With electricity, the classics are a contracted power higher than your home needs (you pay every month for capacity you don't use), old unoptimised rates and extra maintenance services added one day and still there. With gas, the same happens with service fees and off-market prices.
With internet and mobile, the pattern is paying for a package contracted years ago — when prices were different — while the same companies now sell more data and faster fibre for less money to new customers.
And with insurance (home, life, car) the silent rise at every renewal is the norm: few premiums go down on their own, even when the market has. Reviewing a policy at renewal can mean paying considerably less for the same cover — or discovering you are paying twice for duplicated cover (for example, the life insurance tied to your mortgage plus another one of your own).
The problem is not knowledge, it's time
None of the above is a secret. The reason almost nobody fixes it is that comparing rates is tedious: dozens of companies, offers changing every month, small print, lock-in periods. Doing it properly for electricity, gas, phone and insurance can take hours — and you would have to repeat it every year, because today's good offer is tomorrow's expensive one.
Our solution: the automatic (and free) savings check
At Signem we work to make living in your home cost less, and not only on the purchase or the mortgage. That is why we offer our clients a household savings analysis service: in under 1 minute, fully automatically, it checks whether you are overpaying for electricity, gas, internet, phone and insurance, comparing your conditions with the real market.
The check is free and without obligation: you decide whether to switch or not. And it has an advantage we especially like: if a better rate than yours appears in the future, it alerts you so you keep saving without having to compare again every year. In other words, it turns a heavy, recurring chore into something that does itself.
Check your savings here — free, no obligation, in under 1 minute.
One last note: savings also count when selling or buying
If you are thinking of selling your home, optimised utilities and a decent energy certificate are selling points. And if you have just bought — or are about to — the best time to contract electricity, gas and insurance well is the day you move in, not years later. If you are at either of those moments, at Signem we support you through the whole operation: the property side, the financial side, and the monthly bills too.