N Power - £1000 bill for 1 bed flat!!

chopper6

Hi there,

Just wondered whether anyone could help me. N Power had not been round to read my meter for the last 18 months minimum and to be honest this was the first time i had moved out from home and didnt really realise the importance of getting meter reads done reguarly.

I decided to call them to see why that hadnt been round for a read for so long and just basically got an apology. They asked me to give them up to date reads which i did and its produced a Gas bill over £1000. Iv made sure that i read the meter correctly also.

Now for my first 12 months with them i paid £30 a month and they wrote to me after this period to say i had over paid and put my dd down to £2 a month which it has been now for over year. Now if iv underpaid is this their fault for not ever reading my meter? Also can this actually be correct as it would mean iv used over £60 of Gas every month for last 18 months even in summer and i only have a 1 bed flat and live on my own??

Do i have a case to fight this at all??

macman

If you know what the last reading was on your earlier bills and now you have the reading on your latest bill, you can calculate the units used in those 18m and work out your own bill. Then deduct what you have paid to see if the bill is correct.
Are you sure your DD is £2pm and not £20? £2 is incredibly low-£24 a year for gas?

Cardew

chopper6 wrote: »

Do i have a case to fight this at all??

Assuming the amount used is correct, unfortunately you don't 'have any grounds to fight it'

Whilst it is a hard lesson to learn, it really is up to you to check your bills. Each bill would say it was an Estimated meter reading and you should have checked this reading and informed them if it was incorrect - they would then have re-issued a correct bill and increased your DD to a realistic level. Surely you must have realised that £2 a month was a joke?

Meters only have to be read by the company every 2 years(as a safety measure)

Certainly £60 a month for 18 months is very high indeed for a 1 bed flat - are you sure the meter reading was correct when you moved in?

That said, if you make a fuss about meter not being read, and a stupid £2 DD, you might get a reasonable 'goodwill' reduction and of course you are entitled to pay back any debt over the time it took the debt to build up.

mellowyellow2608

Hi i had the same sort of problem with NPower, i was paying a set direct debit of about £30 odd a month, then they wrote to me saying i had overpaid and new payments would be £9 per month. i queried this but was told it was correct. then when i had my new bill it showed i was hugely in debit and payments have been £93 per month for over a year (gas bill). theres 2 of us living in a 2 bed terraced and very rarely have heating on. My friend lives in 4 bed house always has heating on and her bill is half mine! Can't figure out why mine is so high