ScottishPower has revealed a 247% earnings rebound in its retail supply arm thanks to the Beast from the East cold snap, less than a week after it announced a price hike for 950,000 households.
The Big Six provider said first quarter underlying earnings in its generation and supply business jumped to £131.7 million as homes cranked up the heating in the freezing temperatures seen in late February and early March.
It marks a recovery after earnings in the division crashed a year earlier amid unusually mild winter weather.
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But the figures come after last Friday's price rise blow, when it said it would increase its standard variable gas and electricity prices for around a third of its customers from June 1, with impacted households facing an average increase of 5.5%.
ScottishPower, which is owned by Spanish firm Iberdrola, attributed the price rise to an increase in wholesale energy costs, alongside costs associated with upgrading meters and delivering electricity from low-carbon sources.
It comes amid the latest round of tariff increases, with British Gas and EDF also last week unveiling price rises, raising their standard variable rates by 5.5% and 1.4% respectively.
Lily Green, digital campaigner for auto-switching service Look After My Bills, said: "Last week, they hit their most loyal customers with a price rise and then this week announce a profit surge.
"Customers will rightly be asking why the price rise was necessary, given the £131 million in profit that has fallen into the company's lap."
ScottishPower said the first quarter results showed a welcome recovery after a tough 2017, but warned over a challenging year for the sector ahead of the Government's planned price cap and ongoing competition from smaller players.
It revealed customer accounts fell by around another 100,000 to 5 million in the first quarter as it continues to come under pressure from increased switching.
This follows the loss of around 200,000 accounts last year.
Chief executive Keith Anderson said: "The improvement in generation and supply follows a very difficult 2017, which delivered one of the weakest performances for the business in the last decade.
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"The first three months of the year has seen the business recover to a level just below the first quarter in 2016.
"With the price cap pending this year, we still expect a challenging environment for the retail business in 2018."
The wider Iberdrola group saw underlying earnings rise 24% to 2.32 billion euros (£2 billion) in the first three months of 2018, thanks in part to the better UK performance.
Net profits for the group lifted 1.2% to 838 million euros (£733 million).
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