Estimated bills and price rises

koru

espresso wrote:

I cannot understand all the moaning about estimated readings. Users would have had to of been on another planet to not know about the recent wave of price increases and do you really expect the energy suppliers to be able to read everybody's meter on 1st January!

All that is required, is that the customer provides their own accurate readings and then the customer stays in control. If users can't be bothered to do this, then an estimation of their use is the only sensible alternative!

No-one is moaning about estimated readings as such. They are complaining about ridiculously low estimates, which just happen to mean the power companies will get to charge more to the customer. Mine was a quarter of actual usage.

And some are moaning about the power companies correcting these errors by treating the adjustment as being units used at the end of the period, so charged at the new increased rate. Which is just plain wrong.

As posts in this thread have suggested, the power companies have complex algorithms which normally mean their estimates are pretty close, so it isn't normally a big deal. I think many people will be caught out by assuming that any estimation error will only make a few pence of difference, so may never spot that they have been ripped off.

espresso

I agree that most of the suppliers seem to be trying it on with their low estimates and the recent prices increases but is it really so much trouble to provide an accurate reading yourself like I did on the 1st January to stop them getting away with it.

:rolleyes:

koru

espresso wrote:

I agree that most of the suppliers seem to be trying it on with their low estimates and the recent prices increases but is it really so much trouble to provide an accurate reading yourself like I did on the 1st January to stop them getting away with it.

Well, yes, it is a lot of trouble, if you have to phone repeatedly to get the supplier to spread the adjustment over the full billing period.

Otherwise, I agree that phoning in a new reading is indeed easy, but I never said it was difficult. The point is that most people are going to assume that an estimate is going to be close enough that it makes little difference. The point of this thread is to try to alert people that the suppliers' algorithms seem to be suffering a mysterious rash of gross underestimation, so checking the reading is way more important than normal.

espresso

The advantage of supplying your own readings, at the time of known price increases, is that you can play them at their own game and over estimate! What's good for the goose......
:money:

Cardew

espresso wrote:

I agree that most of the suppliers seem to be trying it on with their low estimates and the recent prices increases but is it really so much trouble to provide an accurate reading yourself like I did on the 1st January to stop them getting away with it.

:rolleyes:

I think the point being made is that a great many people(the majority?) do not understand or bother reading their bills, and those that do might not understand the implications of an inaccurate estimate.

I have an annex that I use for guests and thus it has erratic consumption; which I suspect throws the algorithm a little. I had an extreme case where my meter was read on 06 July 2001. They estimated nil consumption! on 19 Oct 2001 and the meter was read again 11 Jan 2002. The price increase was dated 02 Jan 2002.

Their bill estimated that I used 51% of the total electricity in the 179 days from 06 July to 02 Jan and 49% of the total in the 8 days from 02 Jan to 11 Jan – and so paid the higher rate on this 49%

On my main supply the estimate was again greatly in BG’s favour, albeit not so marked as the annex.

In my case I got revised bills when I pointed this out(and it was not a lot of money) but I suspect, for the reasons above, very few people query their bills in this respect.

koru

espresso wrote:

The advantage of supplying your own readings, at the time of known price increases, is that you can play them at their own game and over estimate! What's good for the goose......
:money:

There, I agree with you. In fact, I am kicking myself that I didn't do that myself!

However, I suppose it would be a bit risky. No doubt the power companies claim that the underestimates are just glitches in their algorithms, not deliberate at all, heavens no. Whereas if I give them a figure, I am reading from the meter rather than estimating, so if they came to check and found it was too high I can't really pretend it was anything other than deliberate deceit.

Cardew

koru wrote:

Whereas if I give them a figure, I am reading from the meter rather than estimating, so if they came to check and found it was too high I can't really pretend it was anything other than deliberate deceit.

Unless you are dyslexic

koru

Cardew wrote:

Unless you are dyslexic

Or you have an old style meter with the clock dials. They would be easy to accidentally misread.

browolf

underestimating could be, conspiracy theories abound, a cunning way of stopping migration. i was seriously thinking about switching, and then got a huge bill i cant afford to pay off in one go. my elec company want me to pay it over 9months. a 300% increase :-(
i'm sure it just a coincidence. also gonna check what readings they have for my meter.

bootman

I had a my gas bill from Atlantic last week. They estimated me at only using 40 units :mad:

I had in fact used 310 units. I have been with them for over a year so they surely should work on last years figures of 300 units.

A scam if you ask me!!! :cool: