Sudden massive NPower bill

LordLee

After a year of paying £65 per month for gas and electric I have now been told i have a massive outstanding balance and must pay £148 per month.

Thing is I have been calling nPower at various points during the year asking if my £65 is enough as i noticed some bills were not being totally cleared. I was informed by NPower all was well and as summer approaches and less gas is used they were happy with my £63 a month.

I only live in a small 2 up 2 down cottage. But am now faced with an outstanding balance of nearly £700, a monthly payment of nearly £150 and I simply cannot afford it.

I'm so angry with NPower for not giving me better guidance and information. But i do not know what to do as i clearly owe the money and that's that. I've given them up to date meter reading.

Any ideas anyone?

Magentasue

To avoid this in the future, read your meters and be aware of how much you need to pay/save for the inevitable catch up bill. I can see why you are angry with npower if you were submitting readings - they should have revised your DD arrangement. I would draw up a budget and work out how much you can afford. You obviously need to be paying much more than £63 a month to pay for this year's energy. Then you need to repay the £700 - maybe npower would allow you to repay this over a longer period?

At the end of the day, your payments will have to increase considerably to clear this. The only other option is prepay meters. There are problems with this - the cheaper tariffs tend to be for credit meters and, although your monthly payments maybe less than £150, the debt will take longer to clear keeping you tied in and you will have to put money aside to pay for increased energy use in the winter.

Best options are to negotiate a lower DD or reduce the debt with a lump sum. If these are not possible, prepay may be the only option.

macman

Check your actual usage against older bills for the same period to establish if you have used more, or if it is simply the price increases since your last bill

LordLee

I'm checking against older bills... seems high, but with the price increases i guess it could be right.

My beef is that after calling NPower to pro-actively make sure i'm not building a debt and if so pay more... they told me my original £63 a month was fine.

I find the utility bills confusing. So i asked for help... i didn't get it.

macman

LordLee wrote: »

I'm checking against older bills... seems high, but with the price increases i guess it could be right.

My beef is that after calling NPower to pro-actively make sure i'm not building a debt and if so pay more... they told me my original £63 a month was fine.

I find the utility bills confusing. So i asked for help... i didn't get it.

It's the usage (units consumed) you need to compare, not the price. Prices will of course be higher than a year before, But if your usage has soared and you don't think that is correct, then you need to question the meter readings.

LordLee

macman wrote: »

It's the usage (units consumed) you need to compare, not the price. Prices will of course be higher than a year before, But if your usage has soared and you don't think that is correct, then you need to question the meter readings.

Yes sorry... i was talking about meter reading also. They are highre... but not overly so. However i will double check. Hmmm... 'double checking' something i'll be doing more of in the future.

LordLee

If they stipulate a very high amount a month we need to pay... do I have any room for negotiation regarding this amount?

Anyone have any success?

Magentasue

LordLee wrote: »

If they stipulate a very high amount a month we need to pay... do I have any room for negotiation regarding this amount?

Anyone have any success?

Yes, they will negotiate but ... there is a limit because the monthly payment has to be increased anyway, as the original amount was too low. Then the debt has to be cleared, so that adds more on. If it goes below a certain figure, the debt isn't being cleared fast enough so prepay will be suggested.

LordLee

I wrote a detailed letter of complaint. My key points being...

I repeatedly contacted NPower asking if i am paying enough and do I need to up my payments to avoid a debit?

I repeatedly called in meter readings, these were ignored or misplaced.

I did not receive all the statements they claim to have sent out.

I have received a reply basically stating "we don't care... pay up"

What's my next move?

Widelats

LordLee wrote: »

I wrote a detailed letter of complaint. My key points being...

I repeatedly contacted NPower asking if i am paying enough and do I need to up my payments to avoid a debit?

I repeatedly called in meter readings, these were ignored or misplaced.

I did not receive all the statements they claim to have sent out.

I have received a reply basically stating "we don't care... pay up"

What's my next move?

CAB.

Anyone watch watchdog last night? The energy companies are robbing us they are getting their energy cheap and charging us all a lot more than they should.

ladybabe

I had a similar scenario with scottish power i moved to them from british gas and they said for the amount of usage (going by my past bills i would have to pay £79 per month) after 4 months of me paying this and sending in sending readings etc they said i had an outstanding balance of an extra £380. I complained as this meant my monthly bills would have been twice what they said i should have to pay looking at my previous useage, anyway to cut a long story short after 4 months complaining and threatening to take them to the ombudsmann they eventually looked into the complaint properly and found i had been initially missold and wrote off £240 of the outstanding balance they also sent me a massive box of chocs and 2 bottles of wine for the hassle they had caused me so if you think it is wrong i suggest you contact the ombudsmann and see if you have a case and if so follow up your complaint till your happy with the outcome as it can work out in your favour