Somebody please HELP!!! I am at a loss now :(

Woo1406

This is a quick ish version of what has been happening. I apologise now for the length of it!! It is very long and starts back in 2004 and I am trying to pick out the main points.
I switched over to Seeboard from a different supplier in August (ish) 2004 and Seeboard took out the pre-payment meter as requested. 12 direct debit payments were taken out from 01/09/09 to 29/06/05 and then they stopped for no apparent reason. When I noticed a few months later (August ish) I rang them and asked them why the direct debits had stopped. I was told that the computer had failed to allocate a bill so I was therefore in credit of £240 and the problem would be fixed. I awaited a bill and on a few occasions rang them during the rest of 2005 and questioned where it was. They apparently were trying to sort it out and I should be receiving a bill soon. Nothing arrived. I have continued to ring since that time to question where my bill was. At end of 2006 beginning of 2007 I received a bill for a massive amount (over £2000) and they were requesting full payment as the bill was unpaid! (I have since found out that EDF Energy owned Seeboard and in 2006 decided to drop the Seeboard name and trade under the name of EDF Energy) I rang them again countless times to try and sort this out. In the meantime I asked to set up a direct debit to pay for the electricity that was being used now and in the future. It was agreed by myself and EDF that I would pay £20 again, the first payment of £20 was taken out 02/04/07 however on the 03/05/07 a direct debit payment of £120 was taken, I immediately rang them and questioned how dare they increase the direct debit by £100 without consulting me first. I was told that this was for back payment of the last few years. Apparently they had sent a letter which I never received as I would not have agreed to that as I could not afford it. Since this time I have tried unsuccessfully to arrange payments that we could both agree but they just kept coming up with higher and higher figures. Over the years I have made countless phone calls, sometimes being told that they could see that I was not at fault as there computer had not generated a bill. I have been told that a manager would ring me back on at least 2 occasions and this has never happened and to this date I have still never received a phone call from a manager. Around the beginning of this year while I was out I received a visit from a bailiff who left a number for me to ring him. I did so and explained what had happened from the beginning, he then said he would speak to EDF and ring me straight back. He did so and explained to me he was told to walk away. I questioned what this meant and after a lengthy discussion he explained that it basically meant that as they were at fault he was to no longer pressure me for the money. I again rang EDF who again said they will sort it out. Their sorting out is for me to pay a ridiculously high amount every month to pay the bill. In the meantime I am continually using electric that is not being paid for. In this time I have also had a number of meter readings and every now and again receive a bill that just keeps going up. At one point it reached over £4000 which they ‘kindly’ took £2000 off. The bill I now have is £2514.58 which again I rang them and was told to pay a high amount or have a key meter put in. I refused a key meter as they said that the high amount they wanted each month would be taken from there plus the electricity I was using now. I received a phone call from them on 16/10/09 to basically tell me to pay the whole amount or they would take me to court. I again tried to explain what had happened since 2005 but the lady was unwilling to listen. She told me I had to pay £290 a month (again a ridicously high amount that I can not afford) or have a pre-payment meter fitted with an extra £5 a week being taken off my outstanding bill. I questioned the £5 a week and the amount of time it would take to pay off and explained that I did not want a pre-payment meter fitted. I asked could we come to some agreement of an amount that I can actually pay in real life! I was basically told you pay the £290 a month or we will take you to court to gain a warrant of entry if I do not agree to a pre-payment meter being fitted. I explained I was a single parent with 3 children but she wasn’t interested in trying to sort an agreement out. The phone call became very heated and I was told that a letter about a court date will be put in the post. On 02/11/09 I received the letter that they are taking me to court on 30/11/09. I asked my ex husband of nearly 2 years to ring them as I was at a loss with it now. He has had many lengthy conversations today with them and the outcome is I can either pay the whole £2514.58 and they would give a discount of 10% as a goodwill gesture as they normally wouldn’t do that. Or I could pay £1700.00 and then they would set up an agreement of £180.00 a month until it was paid or I can have a pre-payment meter fitted and £48.00 would be added weekly to pay of the debt. He explained that neither of these were viable as myself nor him could afford any of them. He questioned them about the £5.00 a week payment to be told that I should never have been told that as this would not happen and it would be £48.00 per week. I spoke to the lady from EDF at 5.30 tonight and was basically told that to stop it going to court I had 3 options. One to pay the full amount or to pay the £1700.00 and then £180.00 per month. Either of these options had to be paid by 6pm. I explained to her that as a single parent I did not have that kind of money just laying around and that by paying that amount I would not be able to pay for my children to eat let alone anything else. As I was becoming very agitated I handed the phone over to my ex husband and the outcome was still the same that she is trying to help us but that was all the help that could be offered. I am at a total loss now as what I can do. I do not want to go to court, I have never had to in my life and feel that I am basically being intimidated to pay their preferred amounts rather then what I can actually afford.
Please HELP!!!!

markharding557

i'm afraid you will have to have a prepiad meter you have to pay what you owe.
why have you not put any money aside during all this time for your bills?
if you do not allow them access to install the prpay meter it will cost you heavily in costs

Fire_Fox

Can you edit your OP and put in some paragraphs? It's making my eyes go funny as it is.

Cardew

Welcome to the forum.

Your post is very difficult to read as it is in a block of solid text and I doubt many people will try.

From what I understand the salient points are:

1. Over a period from 2004 you ran up a bill of £4,000.

2. They gave you a goodwill reduction of £2,000 and reduced the sum outstanding to £2,000.

3. That has increased to £2,514.58

4. You have 'refused' to have a key meter.

5. They have offered a 10% reduction on the £2,514.58 if you pay that now.

6. The other 2 options are pay £1,700 and £180 a month until the debt is cleared or a pre-pay meter with £48 weekly added to the meter.

7. You cannot afford to pay any of the 3 options and thought that a £5 a week option had been offered.

8. You are being taken to court on the 30/11/09

If my understand above is correct, I am afraid to say that you don't appear to have much chance to defend the action in court.

EDF have reduced your bill by £2,000, offered to reduce it by a further 10%, and given you 3 options for payment over a period of time.

Can you not get your ex-husband to help as he must have had some responsibility for the bills? - You apparently have been divorced only 2 years.

The only other thing I suggest is you go to the CAB for advice - there may be some organisation that will make a grant.

If you do go to court the magistrate will look at your income and outgoings. - he might be pretty savage about what is a luxury - like the internet? It is normal for him to grant permission for EDF to break in if necessary and install a pre-pay meter and he may make a court order for costs.

Woo1406

Sorry, this is the first time I have been on here and I dont really know what I am doing. I have made the text bigger and tried to put into paragraphs. Thank you for telling me.

This is a quick ish version of what has been happening. I apologise now for the length of it!! It is very long and starts back in 2004 and I am trying to pick out the main points.

I switched over to Seeboard from a different supplier in August (ish) 2004 and Seeboard took out the pre-payment meter as requested. 12 direct debit payments were taken out from 01/09/09 to 29/06/05 and then they stopped for no apparent reason. When I noticed a few months later (August ish) I rang them and asked them why the direct debits had stopped. I was told that the computer had failed to allocate a bill so I was therefore in credit of £240 and the problem would be fixed. I awaited a bill and on a few occasions rang them during the rest of 2005 and questioned where it was. They apparently were trying to sort it out and I should be receiving a bill soon. Nothing arrived. I have continued to ring since that time to question where my bill was.

At end of 2006 beginning of 2007 I received a bill for a massive amount (over £2000) and they were requesting full payment as the bill was unpaid! (I have since found out that EDF Energy owned Seeboard and in 2006 decided to drop the Seeboard name and trade under the name of EDF Energy) I rang them again countless times to try and sort this out.

In the meantime I asked to set up a direct debit to pay for the electricity that was being used now and in the future. It was agreed by myself and EDF that I would pay £20 again, the first payment of £20 was taken out 02/04/07 however on the 03/05/07 a direct debit payment of £120 was taken, I immediately rang them and questioned how dare they increase the direct debit by £100 without consulting me first. I was told that this was for back payment of the last few years. Apparently they had sent a letter which I never received as I would not have agreed to that as I could not afford it.

Since this time I have tried unsuccessfully to arrange payments that we could both agree but they just kept coming up with higher and higher figures. Over the years I have made countless phone calls, sometimes being told that they could see that I was not at fault as there computer had not generated a bill. I have been told that a manager would ring me back on at least 2 occasions and this has never happened and to this date I have still never received a phone call from a manager.

Around the beginning of this year while I was out I received a visit from a bailiff who left a number for me to ring him. I did so and explained what had happened from the beginning, he then said he would speak to EDF and ring me straight back. He did so and explained to me he was told to walk away. I questioned what this meant and after a lengthy discussion he explained that it basically meant that as they were at fault he was to no longer pressure me for the money.

I again rang EDF who again said they will sort it out. Their sorting out is for me to pay a ridiculously high amount every month to pay the bill. In the meantime I am continually using electric that is not being paid for. In this time I have also had a number of meter readings and every now and again receive a bill that just keeps going up. At one point it reached over £4000 which they ‘kindly’ took £2000 off.

The bill I now have is £2514.58 which again I rang them and was told to pay a high amount or have a key meter put in. I refused a key meter as they said that the high amount they wanted each month would be taken from there plus the electricity I was using now. I received a phone call from them on 16/10/09 to basically tell me to pay the whole amount or they would take me to court. I again tried to explain what had happened since 2005 but the lady was unwilling to listen. She told me I had to pay £290 a month (again a ridicously high amount that I can not afford) or have a pre-payment meter fitted with an extra £5 a week being taken off my outstanding bill. I questioned the £5 a week and the amount of time it would take to pay off and explained that I did not want a pre-payment meter fitted. I asked could we come to some agreement of an amount that I can actually pay in real life! I was basically told you pay the £290 a month or we will take you to court to gain a warrant of entry if I do not agree to a pre-payment meter being fitted. I explained I was a single parent with 3 children but she wasn’t interested in trying to sort an agreement out. The phone call became very heated and I was told that a letter about a court date will be put in the post. On 02/11/09 I received the letter that they are taking me to court on 30/11/09. I asked my ex husband of nearly 2 years to ring them as I was at a loss with it now. He has had many lengthy conversations today with them and the outcome is I can either pay the whole £2514.58 and they would give a discount of 10% as a goodwill gesture as they normally wouldn’t do that. Or I could pay £1700.00 and then they would set up an agreement of £180.00 a month until it was paid or I can have a pre-payment meter fitted and £48.00 would be added weekly to pay of the debt. He explained that neither of these were viable as myself nor him could afford any of them. He questioned them about the £5.00 a week payment to be told that I should never have been told that as this would not happen and it would be £48.00 per week.

I spoke to the lady from EDF at 5.30 tonight and was basically told that to stop it going to court I had 3 options. One to pay the full amount or to pay the £1700.00 and then £180.00 per month. Either of these options had to be paid by 6pm. I explained to her that as a single parent I did not have that kind of money just laying around and that by paying that amount I would not be able to pay for my children to eat let alone anything else. As I was becoming very agitated I handed the phone over to my ex husband and the outcome was still the same that she is trying to help us but that was all the help that could be offered. I am at a total loss now as what I can do. I do not want to go to court, I have never had to in my life and feel that I am basically being intimidated to pay their preferred amounts rather then what I can actually afford.
Please HELP!!!!

fullstop

Not much to offer, but as Cardew said make an appointment at your local Citizens Advice Bureau, they should be able to help you. Wishing you good luck.

KimYeovil

If you have three children then you have had more than enough income to put aside for eventual payments over the last two or three years. Or you have more than enough income to pay £300 per month. And you have more than enough to feed and clothe yourselves on top of it.

If you don't agree to pay then go to court. Unfortunately they will agree with you and will let you repay it over a ridiculous number of years. But that will only happen if you go to court. You have committed a misdemeanour (stuffed your pockets full of goods with no intention or design of paying). It is only fair that it ends in court.

Fire_Fox

I'd repost an edited version, basically the debt and the court action, on the Debt-free Wannabe board.

You would probably be best dealing with this in writing, and you will need to make an offer of payment you can afford based on your circumstances - so complete a Statement of Affairs:
http://www.makesenseofcards.com/soacalc.html
You might also consider contacting the CAB, CCCS or PayPlan (all charities) about going onto a DMP if you have other debts.

Woo1406

Cardew, thank you for your reply. Apparently the £4000 bill is just since Dec 2007 with the goodwill gesture taken off. That is what they have told me although I do not believe that. My ex husband has told me that he can not help me pay this bill as he is paying rent etc on a flat and has no spare money. We are both paying the mortgage on the house I and the children are in and money is very tight for both of us at the moment. I do not even get any child maintenance.

I do understand that I will have to pay costs which I presume will be added onto the debt which I would still have no way of paying. My income is low and my outgoings high due to mortgage etc. I am just about managing to keep a roof over my childrens head as it is, apart from our one luxury of the internet. I understand the fact that I owe them money and I have never disputed this, I would just like a chance to pay it at an affordable amount, which they keep refusing me. It just seems that all this time I have tried to sort this out and I keep getting knocked back by them. I have refused the key meter because the few times it has been mentioned by them the price I would have to pay changes constantly. In just a few weeks it has gone up by £43 a week which is why I questioned the silly amount of £5 which was obvioulsy a lie.

So it seems by what you say that I actually have no choices at all?? Apart from maybe robbing a bank or selling one of my kidneys?? :rotfl:

Firefox I am sorry I did not know how to use this forum...apologies.

Mark, I know I owe them money and I am willing to pay it back but not at the high amounts they want due to the fact that I am spending all my wages on keeping a roof over my childrens heads! And for you information, the money that I had set aside I have had to use to pay the mortgage as my ex refused at first to help with and I thought it was more important for my children not to be homeless.

Woo1406

Fullstop, thank you for your help and also thank you for your wishes.

Kim, You obviously think you know my wages and know exactly what all my outgoings are?? And you obviously think you know that I have all this money spare each month?? Unfortunately they will agree with me??? If you actually have nothing valuable to add then why are you commenting?? If I have commited a misdemeanor by stuffing my pockets full of electricity then I wouldnt have been trying to sort this out since 2005!! I do not want to pay this over a ridiculous amount of years, I just want to be able to afford to pay it!!!

Thank you again Firefox I will look into that more although I would prefer to just come to some agreement with them that I can afford until the house is sold so that I can pay the remaining balance. I have been trying to sell it and hope to sell soon but with the current market I know it will not be that quick.

Cardew

Woo1406,

I do sympathise with your predicament; but it ain't EDF's fault!!

However you really need to to get some court proceedings started against your ex-husband for child maintenance.

As you can't come to an agreement with EDF on a sensible repayment plan, you perhaps are better going to court. You will have to face the fact that one way or another a pre-pay meter will be installed.