repeated final bills from British gas

kerry32

Hi,

Around 3 or four years ago I had a knock at my door from a British Gas representitive who promised to lower our bills. I decided to swap over but soon realised that my bills went up, so swapped back to my previous supplier. Soon after, I got a final bill for gas from British Gas. I thought it odd as I knew that we had paid the final bills so called them to ask what it was for. The bill was for the year 2002, when I first moved into the property, the previous tenant was supplied by BG but I swapped over to Scottish power and paid the final bill. Although 6 or 7 years had passed, I vaguley knew that I had settled the bill with them, but as so many years had passed, I couldnt really prove it so paid up. A few months later I got another final bill for electricity, and again...paid up. A few years after this, we recieved a telephone call from BG asking us to swap back to them, and we refused. Several months later we discovered that they had swapped us over anyway (is this illegal?) we immediately swapped back to our previous supplier...and settled the bill. So, about a year or two ago, I recieve another final bill. When I queried it, I was told it was for the brief period we were with them a few years ago (I am sorry I dont have exact dates, we were with them briefly in 2002, briefly in 2006 or so, and illegally swapped over shortly after this) So, I was a bit confused, and was POSITIVE that we had paid our final bills to get rid of them, and really kicked up a fuss but they kept sending me threatening letters so once again, I paid up. Shortly afterwards, I have recieved yet ANOTHER final bill! I have argued with them for about 12 months and demanded that they take me to court. I think this bill may be for when they illegally swapped us over without our consent. I have quite recently recieved two letters from DCA. Could any of you offer me any advice? is there a template letter I could send? I seem to be paying BG more money that any other supplier, even though weve never really had them supply us!

kerry32

Is there a letter I could send to dispute the bill??

Perelandra

I would ask BG for copies of the bills they claim are outstanding and then, if you can, check your bank statements (and credit card, if you might have paid that way) from the time.

Check that the bills have your name on the top.

If you still have the bills from your preferred supplier:

See if the bills from BG have dates that crossover with dates from the company you wanted to have your gas/elec supplied from.

And check if the meter reads on the bill from BG "make sense" compared with those on your preferred supplier's bills.

Basically, I would try to check to see if I had any proof from bank statements that I'd paid, and also see if there was any chance (perish the thought!) that BG had got you confused with someone else.

NB- I work for British Gas. Any views I express are my own, and not those of the company I work for.

Terrylw1

If they swapped you without consent, it's known as an erroneous transfer. You tell your correct Supplier, they get you swapped back. The important part here is that the reading's never left a gap with your correct Supplier. If they did, then you would be expected to pay the Supplier who took your supply in error because your correct Supplier might have simply re-registered you, not processed you as an erroneous transfer.

So, check the reads on each of the bills and see if this is the case.