It also shows how much they will continue to pay unless they switch more often. The group says that UK householders pay an average of £37,331 too much for utilities and insurance over a lifetime.

This figure is calculated with reference to 1000 households survey by Flipper. It is calculated as cash that householders could have saved in the past by switching to cheaper deals, and a projection for what they will waste in the future if they don’t change their switching behaviour.

The launch comes at a time when there is increasing concern about switching, following the failure of a number of small energy providers. This week Extra Energy and Spark Energy, which had 400,000 customers between them, became the sixth and seventh small providers to fold in 2018. They join the ranks of Future Energy, National Gas and Power, Iresa Energy, Gen4U and Usio Energy.

However, customers should also note that the energy price cap comes into effect on 1 January.  The cap of £1,137 a year for a typical customer on a default tariff is still more expensive than the best deals available through switching. At the same time, two broadband companies were fined over £13 million this month when it was discovered they had overbilled almost half a million customers.

“We know that many people find comparing deals and switching providers confusing, or a hassle – or more likely both,” said Mark Gutteridge, managing director of Flipper.

“This is especially true for energy where we have gone from a handful of suppliers ten years ago to having more than seventy providers offering hundreds of tariffs today.” Flipper has an auto-switching service, which finds and flips their customers to the cheapest energy deals.

Gutteridge criticised energy switching sites which, he says, haven’t moved with the times: “Comparison sites were a great idea when they first launched over 15 years ago, but technology has moved on massively since then and the sites haven’t. You still spend hours entering loads of details, then need to work out which is the best deal from a long confusing list, then have complete the switch yourself. That isn’t easy or simple, which is why so many people just don’t bother, or only switch every few years.”