GB Energy Supply

GB Energy Supply was a small, independent energy company based in the UK, founded in 2014. It provided gas and electricity to residential customers at competitive prices, primarily by offering simple tariffs and using online services to reduce overheads.

GB Energy Supply positioned itself as a budget alternative to the larger, established energy companies, gaining around 160,000 customers by the time it ceased trading.

What Happened to GB Energy Supply?

In November 2016, GB Energy Supply went out of business due to a combination of factors, mainly financial difficulties. The key reasons included:

Wholesale Energy Price Volatility: The company struggled to cope with rising wholesale gas and electricity prices. As a small supplier, GB Energy didn’t have the same purchasing power or hedging strategies as larger companies, making it more vulnerable to fluctuations in the cost of energy.
Low-Margin Business Model: GB Energy had built its business on offering low-cost tariffs, but the increasing costs of energy and industry obligations (like renewable energy contributions) put pressure on its margins. The company found it hard to balance low customer tariffs with increasing operational costs.
Failure to Secure Funding: GB Energy Supply couldn’t secure additional funding to stabilize its operations and maintain its supply chain, leading to its collapse.

What Happened to the Customers?

When GB Energy Supply ceased trading in November 2016, Ofgem, the UK’s energy regulator, enacted its Supplier of Last Resort (SoLR) mechanism to protect customers. Under this mechanism, Co-operative Energy was appointed to take over GB Energy’s 160,000 customers, ensuring that there was no disruption in service. The customers’ credit balances were also protected, and they were seamlessly transferred to Co-op Energy’s tariffs.

This collapse was one of the first in a series of small energy supplier failures in the UK in the years following 2016. Many small energy firms have struggled due to the challenges posed by the volatile energy market and regulatory obligations.

This was their message to customers before being absorbed into COOP Energy:

Dear Customer,

It is with regret that we are informing you that GB Energy Supply is no longer trading and therefore you will be unable to access our website at this time.

Due to swift and significant increases in energy prices over recent months and, as a small supplier our inability to forward buy energy to allow us to access the best possible wholesale prices, means that the position of the business has become untenable and as such we will now be entering a process overseen by Ofgem to move you to a new supplier.

Customers will be contacted soon by their new supplier with more information on how this process will affect them.

More information is available on the Ofgem website at: https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/ofgem-safety-net

During this process, all customer contracts will be honoured, so please rest assured that your supply will not be affected.

We understand that customers will want to contact our call centre to discuss this, however we request that you refrain from doing so at this time and instead wait until we contact you with further information.

Yours sincerely

Luke Watson
Managing Director

For more energy topics see: