British Gas Electricity token problem

lins_t

Hi

I've just been to buy tokens for my electricity meter, but the machine at the shop couldn't read my card. I rang BG (45min call!), to be told that they are stopping tokens. Have arranged to have my meter changed (bill paying one), they can't come until next Sat and am panicking as don't know if I'll be able to use my card to buy tokens, if they have put a stop on it. And the money will run out on the meter before it gets changed. Also means I'm going to have to spend money on bus fares trying to find out if Paypoint place will accept my card etc.

How ridiculous. British Gas could have at least contacted people to inform them of these changes rather than people being stuck.

Anybody else in this situation?

Thanks
Lins

denise123

Hi, dont know if its any use at all, but, earlier this year we had our meter BG electric changed from token to key meter, and its been in our local shop for a couple of months a large poster saying on such and such a date in december tokens will not be available any longer.

we had a letter from BG to say the man will be round on such and such a date to change our meter, we stayed in same old story he never turned up
so I sent of an email of complaint, and said according to your terms and conditions, we are asking for compensation, we got a cheque for £20
they said sorry
they sent us another appointment, again, no one showed up, so i sent of another email of complaint, and we received another £20 compensation.

the guy in the end did turn up, and meter installed, we have now done a switch after all that to scottish power.

all i can say is send of an email complaining,https://www.britishgas.co.uk/Help_Advice/ContactUs/ and explaining about the situation, and demand they phone you up as soon as possible to sort this matter out, they should phone you probaly monday

keep on at them, if they have not informed you of this change then hit them where it hurts, in thier pocket

scottish power have told us they will be removing the weekly charge on the meter also, which will save us 80p a week, if you are on a low income make sure you are on the essentials tariff with BG, it will save you quite a lot of money, the key meter seems to be set at a really high rate, the meter man explained that the token meters were not updated we had a bit of a shock, with the five of us here and using low energy bulbs and stuff, we are still spending about £15 a week on the meter, if we dont use the emergency at all.

wish you luck they cant keep you like this its silly.

denise123

did have a free phone number for BG, but sorry cant find it now. will have another look for you.

denise123

0800 048 0404

here it is, its one i did use once, when first complaint went in, its supposed to be for having problems paying your bills! which in my mind anyway means if you cant get electric in your home at all??

the other one i have is for that essentials tarriff which is freephone again
0800 072 7100

Joyful

An agreement has been made that you will be able to pick up tokens from your local Post office until 12pm on a Saturday as a stop gap or working hours during the week. If you run out and cannot top up call BG and they will deal with the situation.

The Engineers are working flat out to deal with changing over the meters so people are being prioritised but should have a meter exchange within 24 hours if there is nowhere for them to top up and they have run out.

This has been advertised for months and letters sent to most customers. Some may have fallen through the net if the Meter Operators have them down as Credit meters rather than prepayment. So if anyone has friends or family that have Token meters advise them to ring their Suppliers ASAP as all Tokens are being withdrawn across the country.

dunloadin

Letters were sent out to people about tokens being unavailable from 30 June in some areas. The majority of token meters have been changed to key, but inevitably some slip through the net, looks like your one of them unfortunatley.

If you have no tokens in your area call BG and get them to send out someone to change your meter ASAP, if you end up off supply you should get someone out within 4 hours of the call being made, if you have enough credit on your meter they should book you a visit within a few days....ask them to raise it as an E22...that should do the trick.

Try calling OnStream on 0845 6066588, thats the number for booking appointments for meter changes. You may not get any joy though as they may not have been informed by BG there is a meter change at your address, but it's worth giving them a go.

SwanJon

Joyful - the Post Office solution only seems to work in the Manweb and Yorkshire areas for some reason.

Onstream aren't the MOP for the whole country (Siemens in the south east, UU in North Wales and most of North England.

The PP number for BG is 0800 048 0303 - it's open 24 hours, every day, so you can relive someone's boredom if you call at 3am.

dave_gee123

we are having the same problem..3 times they have promised to come out and put a new style token meter in and 3 times they have not turned up.

we are with british gas for both electricity and gas and are on the token meters,we rang them today and asked about the essentials package as my wife is disabled and i am on incapacity benefits thru getting knocked down by a car,they told us that they no longer do the essentials package and its all the same rate now?

were they lying to us?

thankyou
david and kim

spiro

No, I think they have replaced that with something elese which I think includes assistance on energy saving. The problem with not turning up is cause by British Gas's agents not turning up possibly because they allocate each engineer more work that he can do in a day because they never get 100% access rate so it stops him running out of work. On some days he will get nearer 100% and will miss a few jobs but the worker is supposed to phone you to let you know. Don't forget to claim your compensation, this applies to all suppliers as it was set by OFGEM.

denise123

dont forget the compensation! @ £20 a time, its well worth it really, and helps to top the new meter up.

as to BG and no more essentials tarriff, we went with scottish power, [still waiting for the change over]
they said their [is it true? dont know to be honest, the guy showed us some figures, and we went with it] that scottish power is cheaper on their normal pay as you go meter rates then BG on thier essential tarriff, he clicked a few buttons on the key meter we had put in and BG did not put us on the essentails tarriff at all, rather lowered our tarrif from 17.?? per watt, to 13.?? per watt, scottish power they told me are just over 12p per watt, I said do you do a essentials tarriff or simular?

from what he told me, they do an essentials tarriff, but instead of taking the meter lower, every three months they send out a cheque. I said can I take your word for that, and if it does not happen, I shall contact your custmer services and stick in one hell of a complaint, he said do not worry I can promise you this is what will happen, and has been happening since these new prices came out and people put theirselfs on thier lower tarriff.

he also said they will lower our meter for nothing, which is great as i need a step ladder to reach it at the moment! and when i said about the weekly standing charge, he said scottish power do not have standing charges with thier pay as you go meters, I said but from what i have heard, the 80p a week is written in a chip and the meter will just take it out no matter who you are with, he said yes thats right, but an engineer will come out and do something to the meter to remove this 80p weekly charge.

as i said this new one is scottish power, which is for North Wales, I do not know who they would be for other areas of GB.

All i will say is make sure when you have the new meter put in, that you listen to the person who does it, as its really complicated, but you can by pressing buttons work out how much you use and how much it is costing you per watt how much you have put in since the meter was first put in, and lots of interesting things like that.

but we have problems sometimes when using the emergency, so I try now not to use it anymore, sometimes it says there is no emergency in the meter, one weekend we had to borrow money from neighbours to get another fiver in quick, which was not good, it just would not let us have any emergency at all.

anyway good luck and dont forget compensation, hope you got your free light bulbs, and free energy saving extension plug and lead, we got ours through, but cant work out the extension lead at all, so not using that yet.[not sure if its because we are to old now and new technology is hard to understand or what it is!! ]:D

dave_gee123

once again british gas have failed to turn up to put a new key meter in..thats 4 times now and we cant even top up the old meter.

who do i speak to about compensation over this please?

thanks
dave