Wrong meter number!

taka

Hi! Since I moved to my flat British Gas and I have being "agreeing to disagree" about my electricity meter number. The meter readings are fine and we both agree on those... just the actual meter number is wrong. I have brought this up on numerous occasions with BG and each time it is supposedly going to be rectified but nothing actually changes... Eventually I gave up trying to get it corrected as I got nowhere and life is too short to get angry over it anymore and as readings are fine its not causing a problem per say...

The thing is I'm planning to switch Gas/Elec companies soon so I suspect this may be a problem still? According to BG my actual meter number does not exist! Ermmmmm... it does and is in my hall! :wall:

Any suggestions?

Dave101t

if the bill doesnt correspond to your meter number at your address, its not your bill.

taka

Dave101t wrote: »

if the bill doesnt correspond to your meter number at your address, its not your bill.

It is my bill though... just that BG and I disagree as to the actual meter number. The meter number they think is mine is registered to my correct address... My initial reading when I moved in tallied up with the last reading of the previous owners readings too.

Thanks anyway...

Premier_2

All suppliers rely on the same database. If the meter on that database is not the one actually monitoring the consumption at your address, changing supplier won't resolve it.

Anyway I thought you decided life is too short?
If not, it's not that difficult to demonstrate whether a meter atually records consumption at your property or not.

factoryworker

taka wrote: »

It is my bill though... just that BG and I disagree as to the actual meter number. The meter number they think is mine is registered to my correct address... My initial reading when I moved in tallied up with the last reading of the previous owners readings too.

Thanks anyway...

I admire your refreshing honesty; not moaning just want resolved; an oasis posting in the desert of blame......

Firstly, hurrah, your being billed (and i presume paying!) correctly.

Personally i would get meter number resolved before switching; it will only cause heartache/hassle and a thousand further posts.

Ring BG and insist on a site technical visit; if they refuse declare that you are putting your account into dispute until they do so; ensure they acknowledge that you have put a/c into dispute. this will istingate a closer examination of the circumstances/meter details from someone who has experience rather than a phone answerer meeting call targets.

Ring your distributor (normally the emergency elec number on your bill) and ask to confirm what your supply/meter details are.

Wrong meter details commonly happen when a) a large/old house is converted into a number of homes and/or where a block of flats has meters together in a lobby; the other reason is an emergency replacement; check the meter you believe/know is yours; obviously the mtr no is on it, but there may be a label (like a luggage label) or sticker next to meter that says when meter was changed and details of that meter, which may be an old meter that your supplier hasn't updated

im curious how "The meter number they think is mine is registered to my correct address" and yet you have a different number; either they have not updated when replaced or you have 2 meters....

hellokitty08

Had a similar problem, except E.on had mixed up my meter with the flat next door. I sent them a very strongly worded e-mail says that there was no way I was going to phone them up and try and explain this on the phone as I had done before and nothing got done and I wasnt going to pay for a phone call to try and sort it.

Got it all sorted by e-mail in the end.

taka

factoryworker wrote: »

Firstly, hurrah, your being billed (and i presume paying!) correctly.

Yep I'm being billed fine and payments are all paid and up to date - I pay by monthly Direct debit.

factoryworker wrote: »

Personally i would get meter number resolved before switching; it will only cause heartache/hassle and a thousand further posts.

Ring BG and insist on a site technical visit; if they refuse declare that you are putting your account into dispute until they do so; ensure they acknowledge that you have put a/c into dispute. this will istingate a closer examination of the circumstances/meter details from someone who has experience rather than a phone answerer meeting call targets.

Ring your distributor (normally the emergency elec number on your bill) and ask to confirm what your supply/meter details are.....

I'll try contacting the distributor (Scottish Power i think). Thanks. BG point blank refused to send somone out... :mad: I'll try again but I don't really believe a word they say on the matter - I've been lied to so many times by them about it. They say either a) it is not possible for it to be wrong or b) they will refer it to the appropriate department to rectify it but never actually do or c) there is no record of the problem on their systems. :eek: I have tried both phoning and writing to them.

factoryworker wrote: »

Wrong meter details commonly happen when a) a large/old house is converted into a number of homes and/or where a block of flats has meters together in a lobby; the other reason is an emergency replacement; check the meter you believe/know is yours; obviously the mtr no is on it, but there may be a label (like a luggage label) or sticker next to meter that says when meter was changed and details of that meter, which may be an old meter that your supplier hasn't updated

Its a 1900ish tenement flat (ie purpose built not converted) with the meter contained within my flat. There are no labels indicating a meter change (like there is on my gas meter) - it looks pretty ancient to be honest.

factoryworker wrote: »

im curious how "The meter number they think is mine is registered to my correct address" and yet you have a different number; either they have not updated when replaced or you have 2 meters....

I only have 1 meter and the MPAN (is that the term? ) number definitely refers to my property and the meter reading itself is correct (ie the power I use)... just the number meter itself is incorrect! BG says that is XYZ and I can see its actually ABC!

I had problems when I first moved in that they made up the flat number within my stair referring to it is 3L rather than 3F1 (the correct postal address) followed by the stair number and that took a lot of sorting for them to get it correct. 3L apparently refers to 3rd floor left (which my flat is!) but is not the correct postal address according to the post office! I guess its possible someone else in my stair has the actual meter with the number BG think mine is. Who knows... :rolleyes:

factoryworker

'BG point blank refused to send somone out'

I would compain about incorrect billing (technicaly they haven't) but this will geneder a more serious look at your account; i would emphaise under thier issue of licence obligations they are obliged to ensure accurate billing and accordingly they should send someone to do a site techincal visit to verift they are billing you accurately and you will place account into dispute until they do so; (maintain approx payments you consider correct throughout)

'meter contained within my flat'

phew...that makes life a lot easier; there can be no doubt over whose meter/what meter is supplying you; a site technical visit will confirm this

'3L rather than 3F1 (the correct postal address)'

what you need to do here is go to RoyalMail postcode finder website and check that the address as you know/use it is the same as on RM; invariably energy companies use this and it can vary a little from what is used in practice; if what you use is indentical to RM, you need to check that BG have this address allocated as 'site supply address'; if it is not request that it is updated (reuest that BG update Ecoes the industry database)

a little thought about the differing meter number you describe....if you are saying say G40245812009 and your BGsays 024581 i would suggest thi is the same...but i'm guessing you know the difference

dunloadin

'3L rather than 3F1 (the correct postal address)'

You live in a flat in Scotland by any chance, thats the sort of numbering on addresses I see quite often, and it can be confusing!

Do the last 5 numbers of the serial no match? I ask as sometimes when old meters get checked but not changed they put the year it was recertified in the first few digits.

It is also possible that you have (or may have had) a second meter fitted in series being used as a read meter (located elswhere in the flats). Quite a few areas in Scotland had token meters that had no meter read on them, hence the second meter....could be a hangover from them days.

spiro

taka, if you pm me the meter serial number on your meter I can check were the industry thinks it is fitted. If you also want to include your address I can check what meter it thinks is there. 'Crossed meters' are only really an issue when the supplies are crossed and people end up paying for each others fuel. However the meter reader should be given the serial number and report an issue if it does not match whats on the wall for various reasons including illegal abstraction (theft).

taka

factoryworker wrote: »

'3L rather than 3F1 (the correct postal address)'

what you need to do here is go to RoyalMail postcode finder website and check that the address as you know/use it is the same as on RM; invariably energy companies use this and it can vary a little from what is used in practice; if what you use is indentical to RM, you need to check that BG have this address allocated as 'site supply address'; if it is not request that it is updated (reuest that BG update Ecoes the industry database)

a little thought about the differing meter number you describe....if you are saying say G40245812009 and your BGsays 024581 i would suggest thi is the same...but i'm guessing you know the difference

Thanks for the tips! 3F1 XX ABC Street is the correct address - the postcode checker shows this address. Annoyingly on some databases (eg some shops and bizarrely Northern Rock ) also have it as XX/6 (ie flat 6) which is not strictly correct according to the post office. Calling it flat 6 seems to be an English company trend as they get very confused (with irritating regularity:rolleyes:) by having 3F1 XX as my address and have an annoying tendancy to loose the stair number altogether or truncate it to 3 which is not even my stair number! It is a very scottish numbering system I think! 3L seems to be a variation soley used by BG!

dunloadin wrote: »

You live in a flat in Scotland by any chance, thats the sort of numbering on addresses I see quite often, and it can be confusing!

Do the last 5 numbers of the serial no match? I ask as sometimes when old meters get checked but not changed they put the year it was recertified in the first few digits.

It is also possible that you have (or may have had) a second meter fitted in series being used as a read meter (located elswhere in the flats). Quite a few areas in Scotland had token meters that had no meter read on them, hence the second meter....could be a hangover from them days.

Yep... I'm in Edinburgh. The 2 serial numbers are very different and from memory they are different lengths with letters at different points (sorry don't have them handy to double check). There is only 1 elec meter and nowhere else for it to be either in my flat or in the common stair.

spiro wrote: »

taka, if you pm me the meter serial number on your meter I can check were the industry thinks it is fitted. If you also want to include your address I can check what meter it thinks is there. 'Crossed meters' are only really an issue when the supplies are crossed and people end up paying for each others fuel. However the meter reader should be given the serial number and report an issue if it does not match whats on the wall for various reasons including illegal abstraction (theft).

According to BG my actual meter serial number does not exist on the register at all! My meter reader has only rarely seen it -usually as a visual safely check every year or 2. They have given up trying to read it more regularly as I'm never there when they try to read it!

Thank-you very much for your offer but I feel a wee bit uncomfortable giving such detailed info to someone I have little knowledge of on the internet. I really don't mean any offence by this in any way... I'm just a wee bit cautious about it. Thank-you very much though.