British Gas is doing my head in!

Lizzie75

Am new to these forums and I need to vent about BG! Have just moved into a new build property and the house has been automatically registered with Britiish Gas, so my first thought was to ring them, hand over some meter readings from my first two months and see if they could give me a rough idea of how much I would need to pay on a fixed monthly direct debit....I could then work out whether it was best to switch suppliers or not.

So, I rang them last week and was told that I should set up a payment of £25 per month for elec and £35 per month for gas. As I'm only a light user (using an online calculator, based on Kwh, I worked out that last month I only spent £27 on gas and elec combined), I thought I'd shop around.

Anyway, had a busy week so left it to this week and thought I would ring up various suppliers and get a new quote....just to be charitable, I started with BG, to see if there would be any difference in their price, if I rang again.

This time, spoke to a rather annoying bloke, who did the whole sales patter on me and without asking me a single question about usage, said I needed to set up a direct debit of £95 per month for dual fuel. I spluttered into my coffee and said, 'you have to be joking....you haven't even asked me about the property,how many occupants there are, or even whether I have economy 7 or gas central heating'. He then rattles off - getting progressively more patronising as he goes - why he 'guesses' my bill will be about £1000 a year....for a single occupant in a 1 bed flat, who is here for approximately 3 hours a day. Yeah right.

I can't believe I actually started to argue with him - pointed out that he couldn't just pull a random figure from the air, based on national averages...but he was insistent that the 'avergae' energy bill was now about £1000 a year. I said to him again, 'yes, but that is an average FAMILY bill'. I am not an 'average family'. But no, Mr BG was right and said I would be daft to set up a direct debit for any less than £95 per month, unless of course I wanted a big bill at the end of the year.

Anyway, kinda glad I did have that conversation, because it confirmed what I think I already know about BG....so have now put in a call to Energy Helpline, who are going to ring me back.

GGRrrrrrrr. Very irritated at BG wasting my time like this.

1carminestocky

It's unusual practice for BG to over-estimate a new customer's DDs IME. They normally tend to under-estimate them. The truly cynical would say this is to lumber new punters with a debit balance very quickly which tends to stop most of them switching suppliers. Of course, I'm not that cynical, oh no, lol.

PS I agree with you about the general standard of customer service offered by BG - it's pretty appalling IME.

Lizzie75

Thanks! Have continued ringing round and have just signed up with E-on for a much more modest £55 per month. E-ON actually took my meter readings and did an estimate from them. Ah well, BG loses another customer...

By the by, I did ring Energy helpline, following advice on the site. Someone did ring me back, but it was a call from a very crackly line, presumably overseas, from a guy whose English was pretty ropey and who had my name wrong. Didn't exactly inspire confidence, especially when I had to repeat my postcode four times before he heard me. Bit disappointing really!