Npower door knocker - Is it a Good Deal?

Parva

mattcanary wrote: »

Thing is, it is not just the prices that should be considered. Customer service counts for a lot - and bad customer service can hit your pocket badly anyway by causing an excessive number of telephone calls for an excessively long period of time on each occasion. NPower have an appalling reputation for customer service and much of it is deserved.

Absolutely 100%! I moved into my current house several years ago now and the previous occupants left me with the delights of NPower and an electric token meter. My requests of 'remove it please' were met with 'you must retain it for 12 months'.

Why? I wasn't the one that defaulted on my payments, indeed I had a perfect payment record via direct debit to Scottish Power prior to my move and had never had to purchase tokens to feed a meter in my life! I did get it removed eventually but not without having to live with buying electricity tokens from my convenience store for 12 months (we won't mention the surcharge placed on using token meters).

When I could eventually manage to switch and did so online the phone call to NPower to reclaim my £160 credit was sweet. Got put through to their disconnections department (or lost customer?) or whatever it is, "Why are you leaving us?". I doubt they had a pad big enough to note my concerns.

And as for trying to get in touch with them over the phone.... Sorry, I'm on one and I shall finish by saying go with NPower if the deal looks good but from everything I've seen and experienced they are generally expensive and lack customer service badly. Frankly, I would rather pay MORE to a provider to get decent service rather than go with NPower. No wonder they can afford all of their sponsorship of sport, earned from the likes of low-income people that are trapped by them.

Just a further cheeky, university graduates doing door to door selling for NPower really should understand how to spell and punctuate their posts correctly. I should consider myself a professor if this is the typical standard of graduates these days.

mattcanary

When I moved in to my flat early this year there were prepayment meters for both gas and electricity. Both were being supplied by NPower.

Norwich City Council routinely cap the gas supply when one of their homes become empty. In order to obtain gas after moving in, you need to contact the supplier in order for them to come out to the property and reset the quantum prepayment meter.

Initially upon telephoning NPower, they stated that it is the council's responsibility to first uncap the supply before they will come out. Wrong! The gas supplier does their job first.
Second, they then were reluctant to do this because of the previous resident owing them money. They seemed to not believe that I was the new resident - even though the council had capped the supply! Finally, they agreed to come out making it sound as if they were doing me a favour!

NPower were only able to offer me a 12 hour all day appointment (8am -8pm) to reset the meter. Bear in mind, this was in January when the weather was really cold and I had no other way of heating my flat. Furtehrmore, at this time I suffered quite badly from anxiety, beingt on regular medication to help reduce the impact this was having on my daily life.
Guess what, I was at home all day and NPower did not turn up! Leaving me still without any heating. And of course, NPower's customer service line closes at 8pm. Very convenient!

First thing the next day, I telephoned NPower up. They wouldn't apologise for their poor level of service, blaming the weather. Now, whilst it was cold and there was some snow around, the roads were certainly not unpassable. Additionally, my flat is just off a main road into the city. Whilst I was out of work at the time, NPower were not to know this. This would be an even greater inconvenience for someone that works full-time.

They offered to book another all-day appointment to reset my quantum meter. I was not prepared to accept this after the debacle. I asked for another appointment this time with a 4 hour time-slot.
After they were point-blank refusing to do this for me, after they were in the wrong the previous day I asked to speak to a manager.

The manager again stated they couldn't do this. I held firm and in the end the manager agreed to book a 4 hour appointment to reset the quantum meter. He let slip that in order to do this, NPower would have to book the appointment with Accuread and would need to pay them a set sum in order to ensure that the meter man would come within a 4 hour timeslot. So that is why they are so reluctant to book 4 hour time slots - they have to pay a premium for this, thanks to not employing enough staff directly themselves!

They also totally messed me around with my electricity keymeter. Firstly, they gave me the wrong reference number to take to a shop so that I could obtain my own key that I could then insert into the meter. Upon taking this number to the shop, they stated that the process wouldn't work.

I went home, phoned up NPower and they admitted that they had given me the wrong number! They gave me a new number to take to the shop again. As I was between addresses at the time, I asked them to give me details of the nearest shop to my new home where I could do this. Upon walking to the shop that they recommended I go to, the shopkeeper told me that in fact they do not have any keys to give to customers! I then had to find another shop myself.

All ina ll, NPower showed themselves up to be totally incompetent and displaying virtually no level of customer service skills whatsoever. The one positive was that they answered the phone quickly every time I called them.

Unsuprisingly, I soon changed supplier away from NPower. Equally unsurprisingly, I arranged for both prepayment meters to be taken out - if I had had normal credit meters initially I would have had far more control of the situation. The new supplier agreed to offer me an appointment with a 4 hour timeslot - even though I already had gas by this stage. Something NPower were so reluctant to offer me, when my need was far more pressing.

Having worked as a meter-reader and having read meters on behalf of NPower in the past, I can state that they also had a terrible record for holding wrong meter information about their customers on their records too. All in all, they are a shocking company!

davidgmmafan

If anyone has been on credit with another supplier for reasonable period of time. say 12 months, personally I would switch to them right away and ask them to take the meter out as they know you are a good payer.

As regards the OP the guy sounds dodgy, there IS a £100 DD discount you get after 12 months, and there is a tariff the door knockers have for £100 off. Why I am I not on this tariff? Because for my consumption the online tariff works out cheaper than this offer.

The online tariff with any supplier is supposed to be around £2-£300 cheaper than standard, you get the £100 DD discount anyway. So even with this 'special' discount the door knocker has I'd be £1-£200 worse off on that taraiff as opposed to the online one. Oh and as others have said discover cashback websites, I got £40 but I understand its more now. Enjoy!

Robert2009

Did you know that in the Hydro Electric region that because all the electricity is generated using water, that their electricity is smoother than electricity generated by coal, because when they put more coal on the fire in a coal fired power station it causes a spike in the voltage?

I didn't know that either but the person who came to my door to persuade me to change back to them assured me it was correct.

I actually agreed with him but told him I still was not changing back to Hydro Electric as my direct debit is still less now than what they put it up to 15 or so years ago.

oscarward

Robert2009 wrote: »

because when they put more coal on the fire in a coal fired power station it causes a spike in the voltage?

:rotfl:

they have absolutely no idea how steam power generation works or how power supply is controlled no matter what the source!

davidgmmafan

As a general rule most sales people will tell you anything to get you to switch. My personal favourite load of tripe was in a letter to the local paper. A chap was most bemused as one company said we own the power station so we pay less to distribute the electricity and therefore can give a better price.

Then later on another chap came from another company based in another area and told him they did have higher distribution costs but were offering competitive prices to gain new customers.

BTW The latter is true, the former has little, if anything, to do with what they charge. Almost all companies are involved in generation as well as supplying (or billing) customers. It all goes into one pot, ie the national grid, to meet demand.

ruolrap

Parva wrote: »

Just a further cheeky, university graduates doing door to door selling for NPower really should understand how to spell and punctuate their posts correctly. I should consider myself a professor if this is the typical standard of graduates these days.

Haha sorry but there are no major spelling mistakes within my post and believe me if I wasn't writing this at leisure I would always proof read but this is an internet blog not a dissertation. If you read my post it was simply to defend people who are doing this, as all too often they are misunderstood. There are no jobs for a lot of students coming out of university, so door to door sales is a good way of gaining experience and one of the only ways available. I no longer to door to door thankfully, but it certainly helped me get employment and if you really want to bring up punctuation, which was a pointless dig, try looking at your own posts. As for Npower, I don't like them myself and I agree they are about as much use on the phones as a sex line. So I would not recommend them for customer service and I agree that is as important as the prices, which is why I was always polite and honest and regularly had letters and phone calls from my customers to my boss to confirm this.