The Times - UK (2022-06-11)

the times | Saturday June 11 2022 63

Money

all year, for 8,760 hours, the hardwired
version would use 87.6kWh and cost
£24.83 to run. Before April it would
have cost £18.22 a year. From October it
could cost about £26.50.
The adapter version would use
105.12kWh and cost £29.79 a year.
Before April it would have cost £21.86.
From October it could be £43.50.

Garden gear
The RAC has predicted that the aver-
age cost of a litre of petrol could soon hit
£2 in what it called a national fuel crisis.
Yet it’s not just motorists who need to
worry: keen gardeners are likely to have
tools such as chainsaws and lawn mow-
ers that also run on petrol.
At the start of October, the average
price of a litre of petrol was 136.92p, ac-
cording to the RAC, so a lawnmower
with a six-litre fuel tank would cost
£8.22 to fill up. On Wednesday, the av-
erage price was 180.73p a litre, a rise of
32 per cent in just over eight months.

cap would average £2,529 over the next

12 months. This would mean you would

pay about £66 more a year by going to

Eon, which could be a small enough dif-

ference to convince you to fix.

Justina Miltienyte from Uswitch said:

“The price cap could change up to eight

times over a two-year fixed deal, so it’s

very hard to predict whether you will be

better off staying on a standard variable

tariff or fixing. It’s a case of how much

you value certainty and what you can

afford to pay. Some households may

prefer to pay over the odds to have the

stability of a fixed deal that will cover

next winter when their energy use will

be higher.

“For most, the premium will be too

high for household budgets to cope

with, so it is probably still more realistic

to stick with the price-capped standard

variable tariff for now. It’s crucial that

you don’t feel pressured into taking out

an expensive fixed tariff if you will

struggle to manage the cost.”

George Nixon

firm Blick Rothenberg, said there were

at least ten “claims farmer” firms work-

ing to encourage buyers to claim

refunds. Most call themselves “stamp

duty refund agents”.

Most refund agents claim commis-

sion and the amount and structure of

that varies depending on the size of

your claim.

Homebuyers can claim for a mixed-

use rate of stamp duty if the property

they buy contains commercial and resi-

dential land, but HMRC believes that

wealthy property owners are being en-

couraged to make bogus claims.

Last week a first-tier tax tribunal

found in favour of HMRC after a couple

who lived in an outhouse on their prop-

erty claimed multiple dwellings relief.

They have to pay an additional stamp

duty bill of £81,250.

“HMRC did not accept that having a

microwave and slow cooker amounted

to a kitchen in the annexe, so argued

successfully that the entire building

was a single dwelling,” said Tim Sto-

vold, head of tax at Moore Kingston

Smith.

David Byers

under the current price cap, currently

£1,971 for an average family. Also

because Ofgem is consulting on chang-

ing the price cap every three months

rather than six, you need to factor in

how much prices are likely to rise by.

The consultancy Cornwall Insight

expects the price cap to be £2,790 from

October to December, then to rise to

£2,818 between January and March. If it

stayed at £2,818 between April and June

2023 then a tariff protected by the price

That means it now costs £10.84 to fill up.

If it hit 200p as the RAC predicted, it

would cost £12 to fill up.

The wine fridge

If you like your chablis or New Zealand

sauvignon blanc so much that you need

a separate fridge for it, that’s going to

cost you a lot more. Even the most

energy-efficient wine fridge available

on AO World, a £700 model from AEG

that holds 46 bottles, consumes

149kWh a year at a cost of £42.23, up

from £30.99 before April. Come Octo-

ber, it could cost nearly £62 a year. And

that’s on top of your main fridge, which

since April costs an average of £94.42 a

year to run, according to the consumer

group Which? It could hit nearly £140

in October.

Perhaps you could squeeze a few bot-

tles in your main fridge instead, or just

put ice cubes in your glass. Jane Mac-

Quitty might faint, but your wallet will

thank you.

Crackdown on stamp duty claims

H

omemovers should ignore

bogus agents inviting them to

apply for refunds on their stamp

duty, the taxman has warned.

Homebuyers are being urged to

claim that their homes are eligible for

lower rates of stamp duty because they

could be considered mixed-use (where

part is used for commercial purposes),

or because they are eligible for

multiple-dwelling relief.

This could mean that they owe 5 per

cent stamp duty instead of 12 per cent

— but many of the applications are

being thrown out by HM Revenue &

Customs.

It said one application for a mixed-

use stamp duty refund claimed that a

bedroom was a separate dwelling

because it had a built-in wardrobe,

which it claimed could be considered a

kitchen if you added a microwave.

Another applicant claimed agricul-

tural relief (available on properties with

farmland) because their neighbour’s

horse occasionally used their garden,

while a third claimed commercial use

because of a garden office.

Sean Randall, a partner at the tax

Get ready: it may be almost time

to snap up a fixed rate energy deal

E

ver since the energy crisis began

last autumn the advice has been

clear: do not fix your energy bills,

stay on a standard tariff protected by

Ofgem’s price cap.

However, with Ofgem last week fore-

casting that the cap could rise 42 per

cent in October to £2,800 for an aver-

age household, fixed deals are starting

to look more tempting.

There are now 13 fixed tariffs avail-

able that charge less than £2,800 for the

average household, according to

Uswitch, with the cheapest working out

at £2,600 a year from Eon.

Ovo is offering two tariffs that would

fix your bills for 24 months, and they

work out at about £2,700 and £2,750 for

the average dual-fuel user — both

below the forecast for the price cap

from October.

So should you go for one of them?

There are many variables, but based on

the information we have now, probably

not. This is because you will be giving

up four months of cheaper energy

£1,971

annual bill for the average household

on a tariff set at Ofgem’s price cap

£2,800

what that bill could rise to if the

price cap goes up 42% in October

Cost of

living crisis

Your need to

know guide

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SATURDAY JUNE 11 2022 In association with

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