Can't get rid of prepayment meter

ste1985_2

undaunted wrote: »

I's not true that they are unable to do anything with the fuse. IN fact Meter Plus (you know the company Npower contract to do the job!) will happily remove a fuse as the quickest means of disconnecting & reconnecting a supply.

The truth may perhaps be that if you've not been an Npower customer before (or even if you have but have a poor payment history) they simply don't want to change it! (they themselves state that they normally dont unless there are "special circumstances - see page 17 below)

http://www.npower.com/idc/groups/wcms_content/@wcms/@busi/documents/digitalassets/wcms_000972.pdf

Why do so many of Npowers staff comment on things as "fact" without actually knowing what they are talking about?

Quite what happened to Ofgems supposed requirement to offer you a range of payment options is beyond me!

I don't know if its me not reading things right, but from what i think at no point throughout this thread has "Npower" been mentioned. This is nothing to do with Me being an employee of Npower, as it's not there brand being discussed, Your right in saying they WILL touch the fuse to disconnect and reconnect a supply but as they are a part of metering services which your correct in saying Meter Plus (However this is only in certain regions of the country each region has a different metering service) they DON'T have to touch the fuse as any upgrade etc that may be due to this is down to the distributor for the area.

Service standards you have provided for Npower do state about prepayment meters in section 17 as you also stated, but again, this is irrelevant to this thread, Mainly because we don't know that the supplier is Npower, either way the engineer did go to change the meter but just claimed that he couldn't. I can't help but feel that you don't apppreciate the comments from me, especially knowing that i am an employee of Npower (This is the impression i'm getting)

spiro

ste1985 wrote: »

Mainly because we don't know that the supplier is Npower

The supplier is British Gas, see post 4.

dunloadin

Shared fuses are more common than you'd think. The meter worker must remove the DNO fuse to change a meter, so needs to be able to gain access to the joined property (and get their consent) before knocking off the power.

Both properties power needs to be switched off at the fusebox/consumer unit as fitting DNO fuses with a load on the line can be a bit dodgy...blue sparks, potential bangs and a small risk of blowing the fuse down at the substation and knocking power off to a lot of houses.

SwanJon

Ste, don't worry about undaunted.
They like to sound off, but as you've seen, they don't want facts/reality to get in the way of a good rant.

t0rt0ise

Well here's an interesting update. As I said before, the key wasn't working (new key, error D2) so I called British Gas and they sent someone out .. he has just left. Firstly he said that the meter was charging us the wrong amount and wasn't charging us British Gas's rate, and also said that we don't have a common fuse and there is no reason we can't have the meter changed. Spiro has also confirmed that, and I'm very grateful to him for that as I would still have been wondering.

Anyway, I have just called BG who have arranged for the meter to be changed next Friday but oddly the company who tried to change the meter last month and told me about the common fuse is now claiming that they couldn't gain entry! BG also claim not to understand what the guy meant when he said that the meter was charging the wrong amount. The electrician guy told me that they can look up how much we've spent and how much power we've used and see if the two match, but BG deny that they can do this.

So I am going to wait until the meter is changed next Friday and then make a formal complaint. I have lost out by not being able to have their cheap websaver 9 deal and direct debit discount as well as possibly paying a higher amount for what we've used so I want to be compensated.

Thanks for all your comments, it's been an interesting episode.

Terrylw1

On the PP meter, as your Supplier changes their prices, they have to update the meter or the 2 become misaligned. BG would know all about this, it's common practice.

They will now need to check what they charged vs the meter charging. Then they may have a difference which could result in your owing more.

Premise wise, if it's s shared fuse it can mean 2 meters off 1 cut out, but these meter can have seperate MPAN's, making you seperate customers. Remember, the fuse is not who you are to a Supplier, your MPAN is.

When changing meters, a Supplier would then need to have permission for both properties because the engineer will affect the supply to both when changing the meter. This is very difficult for a Supplier if they don't have both customers because they are not allowed to contact the other. So, frequently this can be an engineer issue but not all of these appointed companies will work on both properties either if not contracted to. So, Suppliers can only explain to the other household, if they know who they are?

If the engineer has claimed he has not gained entry, this might be incorrect. When they bsay didn't gain entry, they sometimes mean didn't do the work and the data between them and Suppliers gets garbled.

If your supply needed splitting by the Distributor, it's something for the property owner and will cost money. If the work could be done without such changes, or any damage to the property, you could get around it.

P.S. meter association on ECOES is very badly maintained. I know of Suppliers over the years that never did this association, so you can't depend on ECOES in anyway for that! Association is where you have multiple meters for the same property hence you tag them together so you take them both on supply change. If you have 2 meters, 1 cutout but 2 MPAN's and seperate addresses, thats not Association.

SwanJon

t0rt0ise wrote: »

The electrician guy told me that they can look up how much we've spent and how much power we've used and see if the two match, but BG deny that they can do this.

Well, that's nonsense (BG, not the engineer). It is entirely possible to bill you from the read you provided when you moved in and compared this to the payments you have made.

As to the engineer telling you that the charges are too high, remember that he doesn't work for British Gas, and he doesn't have anything to do with setting the prices.

To find out for sure you'll need to start with some information from the meter.
Every screen has a letter, and you move through them by pressing the blue button (if you have an older meter it may be black/grey/orange).

The screens you are looking for are:
F - weekly charge (combined standing charge (if any) and weekly debt recovery (if any)
G - Overall meter read
H - Tier 1 Meter read (if one rate) or Day meter read (if 2 rate)
I - Price of tier 1/day (inc VAT)
J -Tier 2 meter read (if one rate) or Night meter read (if 2 rate)
K - Price of Tier 2/night (inc VAT)
(These next ones need a key in to see)
R - Emergency credit amount (£5)
S - Outstanding Balance (if any)
T - Weekly payment towards outstanding balance (if any)

You can compare the prices with those on the website to be sure.

If you go in with the maths of the difference in costs from when the meter was first meant to be changed, and when it is you might get soemthing. Worth a try.

PNPSUKNET

It just needs an interuption of supply been issued to the other flat, job done.

t0rt0ise

SwanJon thanks for that. I had no idea that those screens were even there. Nobody from British Gas has bothered to tell me so consequently I have not taken any meter readings. Now looking at them it seems that there is a weekly standing charge and one rate for use. Why then are screens G and H not the same? The overall meter read screen G is 18194 while screen H called rate 1 is 07541. If there's only one rate why aren't they the same?

There is no debt being paid off so that's a relief but I'm paying about 2 quid a day which is 60 a month. In my last house I was paying 61 a month for both gas and electric (and they've still to send me a £30 refund as I paid too much). This is crazy.

seafarers_wife

screen g shows the total units used on the meter since it was manufactured, and screen H is the current meter read. they can differ if the meter has been refurbished and put into another property so dont worry about them not matching.