Hello, guys, this is a new thing for me and I really appreciate you reading this. I intend with these posts to document everything that happens in my work day and walk you through my day. I’m hopeful that with this, it will enable more people to understand what energy consultants do after they put the phone down and also a bit more about how the industry works.

As I’m not attached to any company or supplier, I have the ability to be neutral. I am hopeful that by showing everyone my way of working I will be given the opportunity by you, to organise your friends & families business energy contracts.

Please note all customers mentioned in this are real however their names have been changed in order to protect their identity. If you happen to read about yourself and are happy to be named then I can do so and will also attach your business information to your name.

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Let The Day Begin – 07/09/2016

Unlike my useless day yesterday, today was much different. I got up an hour earlier and I was on fire. I did some pushups, had a coffee and was ready to save people some time and money.

Wonky Start

The day on the phones started a bit wonky. I decided the first I should call would be Bob. Bob is a great guy who I signed up last year. At the time he was with an energy supplier that operated on a 12-month automatic renewal scheme. His previous supplier required three months notice before the end of the contract if he didn’t wish to renew. Thankfully I managed to call Bob a week before his contract rolled over and switched him to a new supplier.

Point of Benefit: This is really just a dodgy tactic some suppliers use to make a massive profit. They attract the customer in with a cheap deal and hope they will roll over for a year on extremely high prices.

Problem is, last year I contracted Bob to a new supplier who also operates on an automatic rollover service so I’m keen to make sure, he doesn’t get automatically renewed this year. I decided to pick up the phone and give him a call. Unfortunately, it went through to voicemail, so I attempted to leave a voicemail, it went like this; “Hi Bob, its Hamed here from Hamed, oh crap erm how do I restart this voicemail” so I press “#” assuming it will give me the voicemail.options to restart my recording. It  didn’t though,and instead the message was saved and the call ended. I quickly dialled back and blurted out “Hi Bob, think the phone cut out there, its Hamed here, hope you remember me, we did your electricity last year, give me a call when you’re free.”

“You’re The Kid That Failed”

So that went well as my first call of the day. The second person I spoke to was even more embarrassing that my voicemail hiccup with Bob. His names Evan, now me and Evan first spoke back in November 2014. Evan motorbike repair and customization shop, he’s actually a very mature guy with a brilliant sense of humour. As soon as he heard my voice he said: “Ohh you’re the kid that failed last year!” So I laughed and hung my head in shame, admitting this is my third attempt in 3 years to sign him up. First time round in 2014 he signed with me but forgot to terminate with Opus so he was rolled over for a year. Then in 2015, while I was working direct with another energy supplier, I signed him up but the company for reasons unknown to mankind decided not to apply and he was left on out of contract prices for two months. Needless to say, Evan was NOT amused. After a few phone calls in March this year, Evan agreed to allow me one more chance. I like to think I’m on my third strike with Evan so this time around I hope to get it right. Good news I got an appointment with Evan on Monday morning so let’s hope I can deliver.
The plan this year with Evan; it’s simple. Renew him with Opus on a cheaper deal, nice and easy.

Stuart The Gent

To continue my exciting morning I call another one of my clients, his name for this exercise is Stuart. Stuart was in the same boat as Bob last year, he almost got automatically renewed and he wasn’t even aware of it. Stuarts a calm, collected gentleman. He was very concerned about giving me his bank details last year and he took a lot of convincing. Thankfully he eventually agreed and for the last 9 months he’s been with Scottish Power.

I don’t think he knew who I was but probably online health pharm felt too shy to say he had no idea. He entertained me and heard me out. He then asked when exactly his contact was finishing. After I informed him it was on the fourth of January he seemed surprised I had called him with four months to go. He asked when I could call back and I happily offered to give him a ring in a month. Obviously, I’m a firm believer in agreeing on contracts early but most people prefer to chance it and leave it late.

Chasing Up Clients

Just before lunch, I managed to get hold of “Verity”. I’d been calling her for seven months without her really giving me anytime. She’s usually a lovely lady who manages nine small pharmacies. However today she was in a hurry and bit my head off. She had all her sites with E-ON and had to recontract all if them this month but as they’re all small, according to Verity they were not worth the bother of switching or even renewing with E-ON on a cheaper deal. It’s a shame really because an 11% saving on each site would mean she’d get basically free electric for one of the sites the whole year. Well, my head had already been bitten before I could explain so I took her advice and scheduled her for a call back next year.

Michael who I mentioned wasn’t at his desk yesterday was next on my list. Guess what? He wasn’t at his desk again. Now Michael is a top lad, he comes across genuinely sorry for being hard to pin down and actually takes an interest in my life. One of my favourite guys to speak to. Rather than bothering him too much I dropped him an email asking him to call me and decided to put him in my diary for two weeks time.

After a nice lunch and some good chill time, it was back to work.

Dealing With Problems

Dealing with existing clients problems has always been a big problem and does, unfortunately, take up a lot of my time. I do however think this is what separates me from others. Most people think because they have successfully signed the customer up the customer has no right to come to them for help thereafter, since the broker doesn’t get any extra commission for it. I look at it differently.

If I go above and beyond for a person, which at the end of the day, that business owner is a person, then I hope that they would appreciate that. Usually, this means that the next year when I call they give me their time even though they’re busy and we can get the contracts arranged much quicker.

Steve, His Trip to Switzerland & The Best Energy Deal Ever

This brings me onto “Steve”, I believe he’s originally South African, he’s a lovely guy. Very friendly and trusting. I successfully signed him up both this year and last, which I really appreciate. I managed to get him a deal that basically meant his electricity was 4x less than what most people pay in the UK. We both were very happy. Unfortunately, the supplier pulled out of the deal so we had to rearrange a new deal with another supplier. Thankfully Steve had just got back from a two week holiday in Switzerland so he was super chilled out and agreed to instead switch to British Gas.

I really wish that other deal had gone through, would have been fantastic for Steve but these things happen. Although Steve’s contract is only worth £25 to me, I’m glad I could help him.

Omar Making Me Work Until 8pm

Still working, nine hours after I started, I called “Omar” at 6pm, I was ready to run outside and enjoy what remained of the daylight. Fortunately, Omar agreed to switch both his gas and electricity so I ended up getting off the phone at 6:40pm. You would expect me to be agitated at working for ten hours but Omar is a straight up guy, he says things as they are. He has some debt problems and explained them to me. He also comes to me for advice a few weeks back and even though all the prices I offered him two months ago were very high, he still stuck with me and waited for them to drop. I appreciate people like Omar he respects hard work.

By the time I finished processing and submitting all the paperwork and call recordings, for both Omar and Stuart, it was 7:45pm. Eleven hours after I started work, I have finished. It was a glorious but painful day. I arranged three contracts today, worked for 11 hours and helped a bunch of people out. Finished the day making twenty-three call, much improved from yesterday.

Tomorrow it begins again.