Before agreeing to a business energy contract, establish who is contacting you, obtain the complete offer and give the authorised person time to understand it. A useful enquiry should lead to a clear decision, not confusion about what has already been accepted. This guide helps businesses in Great Britain organise those checks before committing.
Establish who is contacting the business
Ask for the caller's name, organisation and role. Are they the supplier, an independent broker or another representative? Knowledge of your address, meter or existing supplier does not by itself establish who they act for.
Use a published contact route to verify an unexpected approach where necessary. Ask which supplies the enquiry concerns and why contact is being made now. A genuine renewal enquiry should be distinguishable from a general request for account information.
Tell the caller whether you are gathering information, requesting quotations or considering a specific offer. Those stages have different purposes. Ask staff to refer procurement decisions to a named person rather than allowing an administrative conversation to become an acceptance conversation.
Request the complete proposal before deciding
Ask for the business entity, supply identifiers, intended start date, duration, prices, payment terms and relevant contract conditions in writing. Check which parts of the price are fixed and which may change. Resolve gaps before comparing the offer with alternatives.
If a price is said to expire shortly, request the written expiry time and ask what happens if you do not accept it. A time limit may be genuine, but it does not remove the need to understand the proposal or establish the appropriate authority to agree it.
Use our quote-comparison guide for the detailed cost checks. Keep the comparison separate from the approval decision: obtaining several prices is useful only when someone can see what has been included, excluded and assumed.
Check remuneration and permissions separately
Use these questions to make the broker's role clear:
- How will the broker be paid, and how is the amount calculated?
- Is remuneration included in the supply price, billed separately, or both?
- Which suppliers and offers have been considered?
- What support is included after agreement?
- What authority is needed to gather information or act for the business?
- Are there separate service terms, exclusivity provisions or cancellation charges?
Ofgem's disclosure changes extended the requirement to display broker fees in principal terms to non-domestic contracts signed from 1 October 2024. Ask for the applicable documents and an explanation of anything unclear.
Our fee guide explains remuneration, while the LOA checklist covers the scope and expiry of a letter of authority. Signing an information-access document and accepting a supply contract should not be treated as interchangeable tasks.
Make the final decision and acceptance deliberate
Confirm who can approve the proposal for the correct legal business. Give that person the complete offer and outstanding questions, including differences between the broker's summary and supplier documents. Retain the version actually approved rather than an earlier quotation.
Ofgem warns that business energy contracts have no cooling-off period after agreement. EDF's example terms also describe verbal, online and signed routes to agreement. A handwritten signature is not the only possible acceptance route.
Before proceeding, use the pre-signing checklist to confirm supplies, dates, terms and authority. If something remains unclear, ask for it to be resolved before giving agreement. Once the decision is made, record how it was accepted and what confirmation is expected next.
Keep evidence if an agreement is disputed
If someone says a contract has already been agreed and you dispute it, ask the broker and supplier promptly for the evidence relied upon. That may include a call recording, electronic acceptance record, signed terms or relevant authority. State what you dispute and retain the correspondence.
Do not assume that no signature, a complaint or a withdrawn LOA automatically ends an agreement. Request the current contract or transfer position in writing and obtain appropriate independent advice where liability or cancellation charges are disputed.
BBA Energy's procurement support focuses on clear offers, questions and decisions. Agree the scope of any assistance rather than relying on a promise that every unwanted commitment can be cancelled. Where escalation is needed, check the organisation's complaints process and the eligibility and membership conditions of the relevant redress scheme.