My EDF bills don't add up!?

persian_star

Hi guys,

I've had huge issues with my electricity (we don't have gas so it's not cheap) in the past - I'm on economy 7 with EDF, can't switch due to bizarre double meter system which it turns out they were billing back to front (!! - got a rebate thankfully!) so having got the whole thing sorted out, I've decided to keep a closer eye on my bills by building a little spreadsheet to keep all the info for each month in the same place, just in case I ever need to refer to it again.

While doing this, however, I have noticed that my bills don't seem to add up. I've just submitted my meter reading for the past 3 months, and while I have come to the conclusion that we are just heavy users so the kWh are fair, and I've double checked that at our tariff makes for the right breakdown of the bill, I have a weird anomaly:

3 charges, all correct for confirmed kWh used at my specified tariff:
Off peak, £37.25
Standard, first set, £37.07
Standard, second set, £91.50.

Their total...
Total cost of electricity used: £168.87

Now, call me crazy, but my strange method of addition makes that £165.82, which is £3.05 less than they've added it up to be. This £168.87 figure appears at the bottom of my bill and as far as I can figure out is only meant to be, well, the cost of electricity used, as broken down above! Then at the top of the bill they do the twiddly bits with VAT and charges etc.

I've checked last quarter's bill too, and there's a difference of £2.93. Unfortunately the ones before that were so messed up that I can't go back any further, but still, it seems a little strange. Now, I know this isn't a huge sum of money each month, but can anyone explain why the total of electricity charged is more than the sum of its parts (e.g. there's some legitimate charge that isn't on the bill and I don't know about), or are EDF actually just assuming I (and possibly others?) won't check their addition and adding a surcharge for no reason at all?

I would call them but having dealt with their customer service a lot over the past year, I'd really like some advice from MSE bods first and to see if anyone else has this mysterious anomaly before picking up the phone to speak to some poor representative who probably has not much more clue than myself.

Thanks!

spiro

All costs should be detailed on the bill. Is there no standing charge? Amount left over from last bill?

persian_star

The previous balance, my monthly payments, all charges and VAT are all detailed in the 'flow' section at the top of the bill. The Total Electricity Charges are then inserted in there too to formulate my new balance.

The bit I posted above in detail is just the 'Electricity Costs' that are broken down at the bottom of the bill, separately from the ins and outs of the balance. Checked and double checked the bill to try and find a charge that may account for it, but it just makes no sense to add it on in the electricity charges section rather than with all the other charges!

The weirdest thing is, for both bills, the difference between what they and I say should be the Total Electricity Charges is exactly the same as what I worked out should be difference in the full bill after charges and VAT etc, even though they base the VAT on their figure for the TEC and I base it on mine (it's a difference of about 15p). I'm completely flummoxed.

persian_star

Huw

Yup, spreadsheet is correct. I've double checked it on many occasions, but even without it, just the simple addition of the figures on my original post makes their figure incorrect.

There's 2 of us living in a 1 bed flat on economy 7, electricity only, no gas. We have three storage heaters and an immersion heater, plus an electric shower. Our monthly DD is £100 which from what I can gather (despite the awful mix ups) is about right so it's about £1200 in a year - this quarter's bill though is obviously for the summer when we keep the heaters off. Winter time though can be 2-3 times this bill.