Bulb, the UK’s seventh-largest energy supplier, has collapsed amid soaring wholesale energy prices. 

The supplier, which has 1.7m customers and about 6pc of the market, said it was going into a “special administration” process overseen by the Government. 

The process means customers’ energy supply will be protected before they are transferred to other suppliers. 

Bulb is by far the largest of more than 20 companies to have collapsed amid soaring energy prices since September. 

The company said: “We’ve made the difficult decision to support Bulb being placed into special administration. This process is designed to protect Bulb members, ensuring there’s no change to your supply and your credit balance is protected.

“Special administration is designed to protect the customers of a large energy supplier that’s become insolvent.  

“The process to appoint special administrators is not yet complete but we expect them to be appointed shortly.

“Our international businesses in France, Spain and Texas will continue trading. They are separate businesses from Bulb UK and are not immediately affected by us entering special administration in the UK.”

The biggest failure had been Avro Energy, which supplied gas and electricity to about 580,000 customers.

It collapsed on September 22 along with Green Supplier, which had about 255,000 UK customers.

Together the two suppliers represented 2.9pc of the domestic energy market.

The Telegraph reported on Sunday that Avro collapsed owing £90m to customers who had paid for gas and electricity in advance. 

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