Owing money from prepayment meter?

Cardew

flushfolder wrote:

it was a new meter reading 000000
they took out the pre pay meter after 15 years and than sent me a letter threatening court action for non payment.
i have asked them for a bill (itemised) but have received nothing.

Then send a recorded delivery letter and if they won't provide details you need not be worried about court action.

However it is a fair bet that those detail have been sent to you - they might have got lost in the post!

flushfolder

are you sure cardew?
i know even less about court actions than i do about meter reading!!

Cardew

flushfolder wrote:

are you sure cardew?
i know even less about court actions than i do about meter reading!!

Anyone claiming you owe them money must provide evidence in the form of a bill.

They can't just pluck figures out of the air - and they won't have done so.

If it was that easy I will claim £7,583.67 from you for...(I'll think of something)

However it is almost certain that they can provide proof so don't take this business of going to court lightly unless you know you are correct. The CAB will always advise.

flushfolder

thanx mate .
i will get a letter off first thing.

madduck

Hi Flushfolder

How did you get on - any response?

I'm in the same position. Earlier this year I moved from a prepayment meter to a 'normal' meter thinking that it was the money saving thing to do. Several months after I switched I got a quarterly bill through from British Gas (my electricity supplier) saying that I owed over £200. It wasn't clear from the bill how this was calculated and I called them. After a good bit of toing and frowing between departments, I was told that this was a balance from my prepayment meter. However, I was told that this was probably due to a delay in credits to my account being processed through the system. I previously was a Scottish Power customer and when I switched BG didn't provide a new card for the purchase of Power Cards. I was to continue to use the card provided by SP and buy Scottish Power cards. (Still with me?) I was told that they were having problems with the payments coming through, not to worry, they would put an investigation on my account and it would be sorted out.

No further word - got my latest bill in this quarter and guess what - the £200 and odd is still showing as due.

I know that prepayment is a more expensive way of buying electricity - but I used to buy on average £15 to £20 worth of cards per week with the prepayment meter. I now spend an average of £35 per month on electricity and if anything my useage must have increased. Previously no one in the house during the day - now there is. Other than that no obvious changes in useage.

Spoke to a really unhelpful customer advisor (LOL!) at BG who explained that I owed £200 odd and that I had to pay it, if I refused it would be refered for debt recovery. I explained to her that the last thing I had heard was that the account was being investigated and that I had had no further communication from BG. Her response was that it wasn't her fault that her managers hadn't got back to me!

I asked her for clarification of the outstanding amounts ie confirmation of amount of electricity used, breakdown of payments made, etc. We don't provide that was the response.

It seems that BG can just demand any amount of money and we have no recourse. At least in you are mugged in the street the mugger has to face you. BG do it by post!

I'm not leaving it at that. Will be drafting a strong letter to BG and copying to regulator, MP and MSP. Anyone have any other advice?

flushfolder

hey madduck
glad to know im not the only one who is going through this madness.

in answer to your question - yes i did get a response.
i got in touch with a lady called fiona who was really nice and helpful and promised me that although the person she needed to talk to was not there at the moment she would deal with it personnally until it was sorted out, she even called me back on my mobile, twice, to say she was still on the case .
that was two weeks ago and so far nothing!!!
still no itemised bill, (also no more court letters) but now i dont know what to do.
will i have to wait until they send another court letter and start the whole process again?
have e-mailed energy watch and no reply from them either.
i think i might take a leaf out of your book and write to my mp, we all know what a good job they do {groan!}.

anyhoo keep me posted on how you get on, if we find a system that works with these incompetant muppets we could sell it and make a fortune!!

good luck duck!