Agent Fraud on Power Supply Contracts

catch22victim

My power supply contracts were switched to a new supplier by an apparent agent fraud. As with other correspondents, my correct suppliers could not stop the transfer.

My “new supplier” said the contract was a crude forgery. They would discipline the agent and quickly switch the contracts back. This took 9 months and it later emerged (when I involved the Energy Ombudsman) that the agent had not been disciplined. During this time the case was "lost" several times.

I then raised the “fraud” with the police. The company (who had also refused to release the contract to me, even though Consumer Direct said they had to), refused to release it to the police saying it was protected by the Data Protection Act DPA.

I then asked to see it via my own DPA rights. The company ignored my requests.

I contacted the Information Commissioner’s Office who said they were, to all apparent purposes, powerless to act against companies who ignore the DPA. Also there was a Catch 22 (their words!) that a contract signed fraudulently would not be my data so the company could legitimately refuse to release it to me!

i.e. the DPA protects the company from the law but does not protect the consumer.


During this saga the company decided to tell the Ombudsman it was an administrative error, no longer apparently a case of fraud.

I tried to raise this case with OFGEM. It felt like an attempt to conceal fraud. I was told OfGem need cases to be widespread and raised by consumer bodies, not individuals.

However if power companies classify “frauds” as administrative errors, then it seems there is no way that consumer bodies can collect data on how widespread agent fraud is in order to raise it with OfGem. Catch 22 (my words!).


I now have a copy of the contract in question, though it took the company almost 6 months to release it after the Energy Ombudsman gave them 30 days to do so.

I offered the contract to the police. Their view is that as the company was the primary victim of the fraud (the agents’ bounty fee was unlawfully obtained) and my own losses were only incidental, so it will be up to the company to pursue the fraud.


i.e. in order to get OfGem to investigate the company’s bad practices, the company has to take action against its agent and expose its own failings in handling the case.

I expect this will happen the day after turkeys vote unanimously for Christmas.


Bottom line: I would like to know of other cases where companies seemed happy to benefit from agent fraud or seemed reluctant to take action against rogue agents. I suspect this is widespread and need to prove this to get OFGEM to take notivce.

dogshome

Hi catch22victim - Excellant Post, but it depresses me

As a regular reader and contributor to this section of the site, I get sickened by the terrible situations that consumers find themselves in when they have innocently got their coat tails caught up in the Heath Robinson machine that is the 2002 Utilities Act .

Perhaps we should take a lesson from history - When Margeret Thatcher's Poll Tax became law, it took riots in Trafalgar |Square to get it rescinded

Pink_fluff

Fraud? Surely it was an erroneous transfer? I think your getting yourself in quite a state (and taking it a bit far) for something that really, isn't a big deal.

Surely a waste of police time in my opinion!