15/02/2024
British Gas has announced its profits for 2023 increased 10-fold to £750m.
The supplier said the jump from £72m in 2022 was due to regulator Ofgem allowing it to recover losses of £500m it racked up in the aftermath of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
While oil and gas firms made record profits when energy prices spiked, suppliers that took on the customers of bust retailers made hefty losses.
Centrica, British Gas's parent company, said its profits fell by 17% to £2.8bn.
The energy giant, which extracts and generates fossil fuels, followed BP and Shell in posting reduced, albeit still large, profits for 2023 due to oil and gas prices falling back on the levels seen in 2022.
Millions of households have been hit by higher electricity and gas bills in recent years. Energy has also been the main driver in the rising cost of living in the UK.
Centrica said its retail business, British Gas, which has 7.5 million customers, made £750m in profits as a result of being allowed by Ofgem, the energy regulator, to claw back £500m in losses.
This was due to the energy price cap, set by regulator Ofgem, allowing energy providers to take a bigger slice of profits in the first half of 2023, to compensate them for debts on bills that they cannot recover from customers.
