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I have also finished with Extra Energy, new supplier starts in a few days time. I have not received the final bill from Extra Energy, at what point do I cancel the Extra Energy direct debit mandate?

I agree, cancel the DD straight away, I worked out I should have only owed them no more than around £100 - £150 but they tried, and failed, to collect over £700. I have still not heard back from them after my previous post either.

Credit Style Limited, who are the debt collection arm that EE uses, sent a letter to get us to pay this ridiculous amount which was apparently built up over just 2 months. So I rang them but they wouldn't talk to me as it is my partner who is named on the bills. I asked them when they were open as my partner has to leave for work at 7am and doesn't get home until just before 9pm and they said they close at 8pm. I asked if she could call on a weekend but they don't open on weekends. So I said I would get her to e-mail them when she got home then and they said that was ok. So she e-mailed them from the address that was registered with EE explaining that a complaint has been logged and she is awaiting a respone from them before taking it up with the Ombudsman if a resolution cannot be found, and she has still yet to receive an e-mail response from them.

Yesterday we received another letter from them saying as we haven't contacted them, pure lies and I have the e-mail to prove it, they are now looking at taking legal action to recover the oversized debt. Seems these guys practise the same 'Ignore them and they'll go away' attitude of EE. So she is going to send another e-mail today to find out what on earth they are playing at spouting lies and threatening us. I will update you when I have more.

Does anybody know if this is legal for them to be doing this?



PS, I have pictures of old actual reads and texts between me and my landlord with actual reads in them with a date and time, as my electric meter is in a shop downstairs which was empty and I had no access to it, so I will get those saved on my PC too. Can't have too much evidence can you.


UPDATE: Finally received a response from Credit Style to the 2nd e-mail asking for meter reads so they could log the dispute.

I have just received an email from them saying that they have calculated a correct final bill and I can see it on their website (I left them on 23/09/16).

With some trepidation I opened the PDF file - and the bill was absolutely correct!

They owed me about £13 which they said the would repay in a week or so, but I really did not care about that. I have got them out of my life forever, without recourse to the Ombudsman, debt collection agencies, or court action! :j

Perhaps I have just got lucky on the ExtraEnergy equivalent of a lottery, but maybe, just maybe, they are beginning to respond to what must be enormous pressure on them to get their act together - I do hope it is the latter, and that all of you who still have issues with them will soon get swift and satisfactory resolution.

Good Luck and Best Regards

I have previously posted about my Back Billing dispute with EE who took 11 months and 18 days to submit a Final Account after I switched.

The Energy Ombudsman found that EE were in contravention of Back Billing (The Code) in July and told them that they must remove charges that were older then 12 months and make a goodwill gesture of £75.

54 days after the Resolution was agreed, EE made a Back Billing payment into my account but as yet no Goodwill Gesture.

The revised account had no explanation as to how the repayment was calculated and I queried this with the Ombudsman and asked them to chase the Goodwill Gesture. I am now told the latter will be paid within 10 days.

The Ombudsman did however clarify the Code. I had thought that the limit applied to the cost of all energy usage older then 12 months when in fact it prevents the energy company seeking additional payment for such usage not covered by monthly payments held in credit.

This reduces the liability of the poorly performing energy company to a pitiful amount where, as is the case with EE, that company is constantly striving to increase the customers Direct Debit to levels not supported by the actual usage. The energy company may have to pay the Ombudsman a small fee for complaints found against them and to make a modest Goodwill Gesture to the customer but in no way are the penalties severe enough to force a material change to the way the company runs its business. For the majority of customers the return in no way justifies the time and stress of pursuing the claim.

Fortunately, in my case, the EE complaint handler was also unclear as to his company's liability under the Code and actually paid out 153 per cent more than was due so that was some sort of repayment for the trauma of my dealings with EE.

The question is, "what can the Ombudsman do if the energy company fails to comply with the agreed resolution?"

As far as I can see,"absolutely nothing". This leaves the complainant in the same situation as they would be in if they hadn't complained. This obviously suits the energy companies.

Bearing in mind that the Ombudsman is financed by the energy companies it is simply a means of getting "whinging" customers off their backs. Likewise Ofgem is or should be aware of what is going on but chooses to look the other way.

When I spoke to an Ombudsman adviser he said he was unaware of the existence of this website.