It might come as a welcome surprise to many who feel that British Gas is a little unwieldy to deal with, but the giant energy company has been ranked as one of the U.K. top 50 places to work.

The accolade actually goes to two businesses inside British Gas: British Gas Business and British Gas Services.

The rankings are put together by The Financial Times newspaper and announced recently at the eighth annual U.K. Best Workplaces Awards ceremony which took place in London recently.

In fact, British Gas Business received a Financial Times Laureate Award for companies that have maintained a position on the list for five consecutive years. To date, only ten organisations have achieved that standard. It’s the second time for British Gas Services.

Badar Khan, British Gas Business managing director, said:
“To come in the UK’s top 50 places to work again is a fantastic achievement. We’ve got a ‘legendary’ employee engagement score at British Gas Business and this award just goes to prove that this means a great deal to the team.”

The Great Place to Work Institute run the awards and they are based on a survey plus organisation questionnaire.

Another newspaper, this time The Sunday Times, also gave British Gas a thumbs up as a great place to deal, making it 17th in its list of top employers.

British Gas is one of th world’s major energy companies and as a residential supplier, is the biggest supplier of gas and electric in the British domestic market with more than 16 million customer accounts.

So, next time a customer is waiting patiently on the telephone being told that an engineer is sure to get there, just remember, at least the souls at British Gas are happy in their work.

Guest Article by Neil Camp

British Gas owner Centrica has been reported to be buying a stake in British Energy, the U.K. nuclear power, for some £2.3 billion.

This represents 20% of British Energy, which is owned by French company EDF, but is less than the 25% (for £3.1 billion) than was first reported.

Talks are said to have stalled after the world recession forced down electricity prices. And the deal which saw EDF snap up British Energy for £12.5 billion was only itself concluded in January 2009.

EDF and Centrica have ambitious plans to grow the business which currently operates eight nuclear power stations throughout the U.K. At the heart of the expansion is a plan to build four new nuclear power stations on the existing sites. This will be necessary in order to meet the government’s plan to generate more power from nuclear than fossil fuels.

The current eight British Energy nuclear sites are at Dungeness B, Hartlepool, Heysham 1, Heysham 2, Hinkley Point B, Hunterston B, Sizewell B and Torness. Together they generate around 15% of the U.K.’s domestic energy.

The four new plants are expected at Hinkley Point in Somerset and Sizewell in Suffolk. Depending on regulatory permissions, the first new plant is meant to be operational by 2017.

EDF is currently the world’s biggest operator of nuclear power stations. It’s acquisition of British Energy was at the time criticised by MPs and action groups. EDF is 85% owned by the French government and many were concerned that the U.K. was unnecessarily passing on control of one of the country’s main assets, and threatening energy supply security.

Guest Article by Neil Camp

An Eaglestone pensioner who opted for a free gas meter upgrade found herself with a bill of £168.

And what made matters worse, she was left with no heating, or hot water.

The 73-year-old responded to a British Gas offer to update customer’s technology which is part of a countrywide initiative.

An engineer made the visit, fitted the new meter and then tried to relight the pensioner’s boiler. After three attempts he gave up and left, saying it was no longer his responsibility, leaving the boiler unlit and the house cold, and without hot water.

After repeated calls to British Gas to try and resolve the situation – and with British Gas doing their best to distance themselves from the problem - she was told that they would send an engineer out to fix the problem, but that it would cost £168.

The pensioner refused the offer and had the foresight to ring her local newspaper to tell them about her predicament. Within two hours of the call a British Gas engineer was round to her house, the boiler was relit and there was no word about a bill.

Corporate apologist Sara Powell-Davies of British Gas apparently said: "As a gesture of goodwill, we did arrange for one of our engineers to visit … on Friday afternoon and he was successful in getting her boiler relit. We advise all our customers to have their boilers serviced on an annual basis to ensure they remain in good working order."

So, there you are then. We are left to decide that whilst making their apologies, British Gas were making the point that the pensioner’s boiler had not actually been regularly serviced.

Gas boilers must be serviced every 12 months by an engineer from the Safe Gas Register. If you don’t, you could face worse than an unlit boiler, but death by carbon monoxide poisoning.

Guest Article by Neil Camp

The government wants every house in the U.K. to have a smart meter installed by the year 2020.

British Gas was amongst many energy companies that welcomed the initiative, as it allows them to not only remotely record the energy they are using (doing away with physical meter reading), but also let their customers see accurately how much energy they are consuming.

The cost of the initiative will be some £7 billion, as around 22 million gas meters are needed and 26 million electricity meters.

Smart meters will not only save a fortune spent on actually reading meters, but they should also reduce the amount of mistakes and controversial estimated readings. Consumer groups hope that many of the savings will be passed onto customers.

And because consumers will for the first time see the cost of heating their home, or cooking, they will begin to conserve energy and this will help reduce carbon emissions.

The meter fitting project will be the biggest of its kind since British Gas undertook to convert 17 million properties to natural gas in the 1970s.

It will be the energy company’s responsibility to run the meter fitting programme and estimates reckon the £7 billion total cost equates to around £15 per home, per year, for the five years between 2010 and 2020.

Of that £15 cost a year for five years, some £10 will be recouped in direct cost savings from the energy suppliers, leaving £5. But, with hoped for energy use savings of around 2.5% on average, this would mean some £30 off the average bill. The net result is customers better off by about £20 a year.

Overall, this could cut around £100 million of bills by 2020 and see a dramatic reduction in carbon dioxide emissions of nearly three million tonnes.

Guest Article by Neil Camp

British Gas may be hedging its bets about future energy sources, having bought a near 20% share in Econergy – a specialist in biomass heating systems - for £1 million.

The deal gives British Gas the option of acquiring the whole business over the next four years.

Econergy, which designs, manufacturers and installs a range of biomass heating systems for the domestic, commercial and public sectors, reported sales of around £5m for the year to June, 2008.

Centrica, the parent company of British Gas, bought Econergy for its British Gas New Energy Division and this adds to previous purchases of Solar Technologies and Semplice Energy; an agreement with Ceres Power Holdings; and, partnerships with Baxi, Disenco and vPhase.

Guest Article by Neil Camp