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Success Stories
ELECTRICITY
Printer – Greater London
A printer with one main works and two additional sites tendered their
electricity supplies for a contract renewal due to commence on 1st October
2005. They were shocked when the best price received was calculated as
a £42,000 pa increase compared with their existing rate. With the
contract deadline fast approaching the customer called in eum
to see if an alternative was possible. We immediately went to collect
the invoice copies and other paperwork from the customer’s office,
agreed on an action plan and within four days were back at the customer’s
office with alternative contracts costing £18,000 less than original
“best offer”. We are now preparing for the gas contract renewal
and carrying out efficiency surveys in order to bring costs under control.
ELECTRICITY
School – Hertfordshire
A small independently run school was suddenly hit with a £1,815
charge on their electricity bill for backdated “reactive power”
costs covering a one year period. The supplier was adamant that they were
only passing through costs as per their contract. The school asked eum
to get involved and we argued that the supplier should have presented
the charges in a timely manner which would have enabled the customer to
carry out corrective action. Eventually the supplier agreed to waiver
the first nine months charges. We have now arranged installation of reactive
power correction equipment to avoid further penalty charges.
GAS
Warehouse – Kent
A large humidity-controlled warehouse storing paper and board was found
to have much higher than expected gas consumption, despite its size. An
eum engineer visited and found potential efficiency savings
of 22% for no capital cost and a further 15% with payback periods less
than two years. In addition, an inspection of the gas meter revealed that
the wrong correction factor was being applied to the account. Copies of
historic invoices were requested and it was found that the overcharge
dated back to a contract change in 1998. A total refund of £27,000
was obtained from the existing supplier and two previous suppliers on
earlier contracts.
LPG & WATER
Park home estate – Essex
Many park home estates are not connected to mains gas and rely upon LPG
for heating and cooking. This is either supplied through individual cylinders
or by tanker for on-site storage. eum carried out a detailed
analysis of LPG costs at a 120 home park in Essex and achieved cost savings
of £2,600 pa. Our engineer also discovered an underground water
leak and the repair resulted in a one-off refund of £1,520. Further
savings are expected from efficiency measures still in progress.
ROAD FUEL
Furniture retailer – nationwide
This multi-site retailer with 36 stores and 10 warehouses operates a fleet
of cars and delivery vans. Fuel costs for the year to June 2005 were £800,000,
purchased through the company’s fuel card contract. eum
negotiated a fixed on-cost agreement with the existing fuel card company
resulting in a price reduction of approximately 1p/litre on both diesel
and unleaded. This is equivalent to an annual saving for the customer
of £10,400 pa. The fuel card operator now sends copies of the monthly
fuel statements to eum for checking before the customer
pays each bill.
WATER
Shopping arcade – Essex
A property managing agent presented eum with electricity,
gas and water invoices for a portfolio of retail premises they manage
on behalf of a large pension fund. As well as checking the electricity
and gas invoices and arranging new contracts where some had recently expired,
our engineers visited all the properties. One shopping arcade in Essex
had two water supplies. Site investigations by our water engineer found
that one of these supplies was feeding a tenant. On the agent’s
instruction we met with the tenant and agreed a backdating of charges
and then arranged for the water company to update their records. Investigation
of the second supply revealed an underground leak. The leak was repaired
and the supply logged to provide before and after flowrates. The repair
resulted in a saving of £2,300 pa. Water costs have now been reduced
at the site by 68% following completion of these works.
ENERGY EFFICIENCY
Private art gallery – central London
For large, energy intensive manufacturing industries the best approach
to energy efficiency is a detailed survey, normally carried out over many
days, with on-going monitoring. However, for smaller premises the short
survey can also pay dividends. A recent survey at a private art gallery,
carried out in just one day by an eum engineer, identified
a 35% saving in gas charges with no capital cost required. Such cases
show the importance of surveying all premises, not just those with the
largest costs. Experience has proven that savings exist at most properties,
often providing a significant boost to a company’s profitability.
TELECOMS
Financial services – central London and South East
The customer’s holding company, a major high street bank, had negotiated
a group telecoms deal for the bank's national telecoms usage totaling
£1.6 million per year. The customer’s company was recently
sold by the bank to a management buyout. Their own single site telecoms
costs were just £50,000. eum analysed the bills
and implemented call and line rental price reductions through our wholesale
call rate agreement. This resulted in savings of £15,900 pa (31.8%)
despite the customer having previously been part of a much larger group
deal.
No saving –
no charge.
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