Npower problem

alienfriend

I've lived in my flat since August and have tried to get npower to give us a bill since. At the beginning of this month they asked for a metre reading but, the digital display is now blank. I informed them of this and they arranged for an engineer to come to fix it on 5th Feb. They told me that they should be able to still take a reading from it or at least check the reading from when it went off and estimate us up-to-date from that.

However... today we received a bill of £483 based on estimates. The date this needs to be paid by is the 4th Feb. I have spoken to npower who offered no useful advice and said that it was unlikely that any reading would be able to be taken from the metre. Instead, they would check our new reading in about 2 months and work an estimate from that. If at that point it looked like we were owed money we should contact them then.

We discussed this with our neighbours who have the same sized flat and their bill for a similar time period was £180. We have been really careful over the winter only using the heating for a total of 15 hours and make sure we turn everything off except the fridge. Nothing is left on standby.

Does anyone have any advice to offer and can anyone let me know if I don't make the payment by the 4th Feb (this is the first bill), will that make any dent on my credit score as we're hoping to take out a mortgage in the next 12 months.

Apologies for such a long winded post but would really appreciate any replies! Thanks!!!!

macman

Did you take an opening reading in August when you moved in?

undaunted

Put your complaint in writing.

Pay what you consider reasonable / likely to be due in the meantime as a sign of good faith

You could possibly query whether they can evidence past occupiers / other customers generally in this area / type of home using £483 worth in this period / can really believe this figure realistic

Good luck

nPower

Hi alienfriend

Please don't worry - can look into this for you. Just send in your account and address details to forumresponse@npower.com and we will get on it straight away.

Best Wishes,
Sally