Eon - Are your monthly direct debit payments reasonable?

greyhoundcrazy

I wanted to switch to monthly direct debit to save 9%, but having been quoted £179 per month for gas and electricity I'm not sure I can.

I emailed them a week ago to ask why the estimated charges are so ridiculously high (much higher than explained in their FAQ's section) but they have not responded. Therefore I'm wondering what other MSE'rs have experienced with Eon please.

Are your payments reasonable?
Is it easy to get them to adjust your payments to something more reasonable?
If you are in credit by a large amount of money, do you ever get it back again? How long does it take?

Thanks

JayMT

As far as I can tell your monthly amount should be based on what you use over a year, divided by twelve. If there's any variation in usage within the year up or down they would adjust the amount to suit.

I am about £300 in credit at the moment, so I'll be making a phone call to Eon tomorrow to get it back. I'll let you know how it goes.

Last time I had to claim back a large amount in credit, all I had to do was provide the current meter reading and they refunded it fairly quickly.

It's annoying though that you should have to ask for your money back: I'm sure that years ago the refund would be done automatically if the amount in credit was more than a certain multiple of your monthly payments.

Nowadays I suppose the companies are more than happy to hang on to your money and hope you don't notice :mad:

greyhoundcrazy

JayMT wrote: »

As far as I can tell your monthly amount should be based on what you use over a year, divided by twelve. If there's any variation in usage within the year up or down they would adjust the amount to suit.

Yeah I thought so too but the amounts they are charging us are way higher than that. (over £800 too much)

I am about £300 in credit at the moment, so I'll be making a phone call to Eon tomorrow to get it back. I'll let you know how it goes.

Thanks. Will be interested to hear.

Codswallop

I have exactly the same predicament! I was going to swap from the standard tarrif on E-on to the online saver8 but the monthly direct debit is about £30 more than I'm currently paying by non-direct debit. It didn't indicate to me that I would be making any saving at all! Just them making interest from holding onto more of my money.

I would be very interested to hear about how quickly the overpaid money is refunded when a meter reading is provided.
Thanks.

Dannii_B

The new system at E.On aims to get a zero balance at your yearly review, which is usually the spring so now (since May) you should not have large debits or credits building on the account as the system will forecast charges for the year and divide by the number of payment dates left before the yearly review (could be 10 or 11 months, not just 12) so your monthly payments might be expensive compared to what you were thinking, but this is to combat large credits sitting there as customers don't want companies hanging on to hundreds of their money (and understandably so)

Direct debits can be amended at any time with the company, but remember to make it reasonable, you might not want E.On to be hanging on to your money, but would you prefer to have them chasing you for the same?

mintymoneysaver

I am quite frugal with my gas and electricity and pay £50 a month , but my new suggested direst debit is £84. I think this is probably about right but am waiting till after my holiday to change it!

huggermugger

Hi

I have been consistently in credit for a long time with Eon. I pay £51 a month though originally it was more and I have been between £70 & £150 in credit.

Spoke to them today as I switched to a cheaper tariff (hooray!) and the lady said that their calculation thingy would only reduce it to £48 a month, which still seemed high. However, she suggested they send me back £100 and said it would be in my bank account within 7 days.

They do seem to overestimate your direct debit but if they give me the money back when I ask for it, I can accept that, it just means I have to keep an eye on my bill, which I should do anyway! I don't want to be in debt to them, which has happened in the past with other companies, who have allowed large debits to build up and then demanded a lump sum. I've been with Eon for 5 years & customer service has always been excellent, unlike other companies.

seven-day-weekend

I too have been with eon for several years and am pleased with their customer services.

I have just changed to a capped rate tariff and my direct debit has risen from £83 a month to £106.(around 25%).

However, if gas/electricity prices rise by more than this I am better off. If the prices fall, my tariff rate falls. If prices rise, but by less than 25%, I lose out. It's the gamble you take for having the capped rate.

If I get into loads of credit, my money will be refunded upon request. I know this as I have done it before.

Much as I do not want to put money into e-on's coffers, their customer service is so good that I do not think it is worth arguing about. They will give you your money back if you ask for it. I certainly do not want to change supplier.

greyhoundcrazy

seven-day-weekend wrote: »

If I get into loads of credit, my money will be refunded upon request. I know this as I have done it before.

Much as I do not want to put money into e-on's coffers, their customer service is so good that I do not think it is worth arguing about. They will give you your money back if you ask for it.

That is good to know - thanks. If it is easy to get the money back then I'm not so worried about it.

Having had no response from Eon, I checked online last night and they had put my estimated payments down to £42 elec and £85 gas. These were still a bit OTT but much more manageable than the £179 estimated last week.

However, I had a call from them this morning saying they had recalculated by elec at £42 (same as online) and my gas as £99 (£14 more than online). The £99 is way over the top. £1200 on gas in a year??? That is the total of our gas and elec for the previous year. We have a capped tariff now too so our bill shouldn't go up that much :rolleyes: The man on the phone said to sign up online and I would be charged the online estimate of £85 for gas, not his £99 estimate.

greyhoundcrazy

Dannii_B wrote: »

The new system at E.On aims to get a zero balance at your yearly review, which is usually the spring so now (since May) you should not have large debits or credits building on the account as the system will forecast charges for the year and divide by the number of payment dates left before the yearly review (could be 10 or 11 months, not just 12) so your monthly payments might be expensive compared to what you were thinking, but this is to combat large credits sitting there as customers don't want companies hanging on to hundreds of their money (and understandably so)

Direct debits can be amended at any time with the company, but remember to make it reasonable, you might not want E.On to be hanging on to your money, but would you prefer to have them chasing you for the same?

Hi Danni
Thanks for that. I had read about it on their FAQ's but their original estimates didn't fit with their explanation. Their estimates would have totalled over £2000 for a year (my bills last year came to £1200 and we have since capped our tariff so not going to be spending anywhere near 2k). Hence I queried it with them.

JayMT

Just spoken to Eon and they are refunding my £300 credit within 5 working days, and reducing my monthly payment as well.

I didn't need to give them a meter reading this time, probably because they had one from me a week ago and they've just issued the latest bill.

Top marks for their customer service: didn't have to wait long at all and was dealt with very well.

Still puzzled as to whether to switch to nPower however, as detailed on this thread:
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=1075885