in credit, can i claim my money back?

roger56

kerryallc71 wrote:

i just think its disgusting. i pay for my gas by online bank and my electric is pre-payment. i think its disgusting that these big companys that you are all with cannot refund your credit, whether its pre-payment or direct debit or any other form of payment its still cash and still money you have all earned. to me its stealing and daylight robbery. thats your lots money and all of you should beable to claim it back.

Why don't you just switch - I'd recommend Ebico, they are a fair trade not for profit supplier with one gas rate and one elec rate regardless of how you pay (DD, pre pay meter, quarterly). They are also one of the cheapest suppliers.

Simple, easy billing and time to get on with life. Have a look here:
http://www.ebico.co.uk/en/open/pages/indexen.php

Admin is done by Southern Electric, and you can manage your account online and even put in correct meter readings for an accurate bill.

Cardew

BexTech wrote:

If paying by DD, then you don't usually get a refund of credit, you have to ask. It's when using pre-payment meters you usually get the refund when you receive the end of year statement.

However if you cancel your DD, BGas will put you straight onto their non-discounted quarterly billed service - The highest price tariff in the country.

I understand that it is BG's policy(and other companies?) to refund any credit balance, if it is over 100 pounds, automatically - but only at the end of the 12 month billing period. Certainly I have had that happen to me several times.

Agree with you about cancelling your DD and 'cutting off your nose to spite your face'.

I can't help feeling that people fail to understand the principle of the Direct Debit payment scheme. It is normal for you to be in credit at the end of the Summer as that credit balance will be eroded by the larger bills during the winter.

Those people screaming for a refund of their credit balance are not too anxious to pay back any debit balance that builds up and demand that they have a year or more to pay it back.

Frankly many people, who find the DD scheme too difficult to understand, should switch to quarterly bills or pre-payment meters. Costs more but hey those thieving utility companies" aren't earning interest on my credit balance!!!

flossy_splodge

I just feel I have to put the other side of the coin as my elderly father is several hundred pounds in arrears to BG. It has come about by him not upping his DD to match gradually increasing consumption so the deficit was growing. They have not chased him at all but I got involved as it certainly wouldnt help when he did eventually get chased and had to pay a huge bill. I am amazed he has got into this situation without them hassling. Problem is he doesn't recognise he has the beginning of dementia and simply forgets bills and such like and is reluctant to accept help as hey, I'm only a female, what do I know and his two sons are only interested in their inheritance1 So I personally am gratful to British Gas for their forbearance. They have been very polite on the phone and very understanding.:j

seven-day-weekend

I was £280 in credit with Powergen and have asked them for £200 of it back. They said it would be in my acount in five working days, this is only day two so we shall see.

The reason I'm so much in credit is, they wanted me to pay £80 pcm dd; I upped it to £100 based on my bills the year before with Scottish Power and NPower.

THey wanted me to lower the DD when I asked for my refund, but I said I'd leave it as it was till after the winter and then review the situation.

I know the bill is accurate because I rang them up and they used my readings.

Just hope I get my money in a few days time! I'll leave it in a high-interest account and then it will be there if Powergen ever need it back!

****Edited to say I received my refund on the fourth day.***

scorpio_princess

Cardew wrote:

Actually just the opposite is true!

The utility companies are owed far more money from customer's debit balances, than they are in credit with DD accounts. - according to the regulator.

This is almost inevitable in times when prices are rising. Look at the number of people who post here who are hundreds and thousand of pounds in debit.

Anyway what is "underhand" when you are informed how much you are to pay by DD and that sum cannot be changed without notifying you. You sign a DD agreement and if you don't like it - don't sign or end the agreement.

Hmmm - not sure I buy this one

On my mum's bill, it informed her that despite her significantly reduced gas usage, and the fact that she was in quite a bit of credit, her DD payments were going to rise by 15%. The sneaky part is that it was printed in very small writing at the bottom of the bill - she would have easily missed it if she wasn't so scrutinizing. If you call that 'informing the customer' then yes, they fulfilled their obligation. Anyway, just because they inform you that your bill is going up for no logical reason, it doesn't make it right! I could write to Sainsburys and inform them that I will no longer be paying for my food shopping from there, I'll just take it off the shelf and walk out without paying - does this mean that just because I let them know i'd be doing it, I can actually go ahead with it? Somehow, I don't think so.

You say that utilities companies spend more time in debit because of non/under-payers, than credit through over-payers (which my cynical mind finds a little hard to believe), but how is this the problem of the overpayers who quite rightly would rather THEIR money was in THEIR account? And why is it so difficult for them to arrange refunds? You soon hear from them if you owe THEM money!

I wish people would stop backing down to these companies. As long as they scare people into believing that they're never in the wrong, so you have to tow the line, they will keep overcharging people and keeping what's rightfully theirs.

scorpio_princess

Cardew wrote:

I understand that it is BG's policy(and other companies?) to refund any credit balance, if it is over 100 pounds, automatically - but only at the end of the 12 month billing period. Certainly I have had that happen to me several times.

Agree with you about cancelling your DD and 'cutting off your nose to spite your face'.

I can't help feeling that people fail to understand the principle of the Direct Debit payment scheme. It is normal for you to be in credit at the end of the Summer as that credit balance will be eroded by the larger bills during the winter.

Those people screaming for a refund of their credit balance are not too anxious to pay back any debit balance that builds up and demand that they have a year or more to pay it back.

Frankly many people, who find the DD scheme too difficult to understand, should switch to quarterly bills or pre-payment meters. Costs more but hey those thieving utility companies" aren't earning interest on my credit balance!!!

Can I just say, I find your post incredibly condescending. A lot of people DO understand how the whole billing and utilities services work - they are simply fed up with all the sharp practice that seems to be the norm these days. In my experience - both personally and in business - they estimate far too many bills, and then make it nigh on impossible to argue the point with them, even when you know for sure that your usage is much lower than they think it is!

Why do you think DD payments are 'cheaper' than pre-payment or quarterly? Hmm could it be that they earn money out of monthly over-payments, and so encourage people to use this method of paying? Surely not!

Anyone who feels sorry for these companies should check out their end of year profits!! Not exactly destitute are they? :rolleyes:

hobyden

hobyden wrote:

I HAVE GIVEN UP TRYING TO PHONE NOW, SPENT 25 MINUTES TRYING TO CONTACT ACCOUNTS DEPARTMENT THE OTHER DAY( ALSO COST ADDING UP )HAVE NOW SENT A LETTER OF COMPLAINT TO THE ENERGY OMBUDSMAN .

I recieved a reply from the energy ombudsman on 29/11/06 and was told that they dont have enough info to know if my complaint was one they could handle,strange considering i sent them a detailed letter (this was the reason for contacting them instead of energy help line , i found it impossible to explain properly on there complaint form , you have to say what you said and then in another box what they said , very difficult when you have complained about six times)
They also said i must use BG complaints procedure and allow up to 3 months for them to sort out my problem.(by the time i get my money it will be next christmas at this rate)
I sent a online complaint to BG on 29/11/06 but from what i have heard no one ever gets a reply :mad:

hobyden

today is a happy day,i have just recieved my refund .
BG said -thank you for contacting us on 28 november ( i never did )about changes to your refund cheque (what changes ? ) we are pleased to advise a cheque for £127.81 is attached, which we have re-issued at your request (re-issued at my request ? what are they talking about.)
I think the lies are to cover their backs .

Oh well at least i have recieved my money now (after a load of grief)and am finnally free . yipeee

:j

Mercenary

Mercenary wrote:

......our gas account was in credit by £120+ when we switched away from BG.
It took 5 phone calls and 6 weeks to finally get the cheque sent to us. That got put into the bank a.s.a.p. I can tell you!
At the same time I was also asking for the final electricity bill to be sent to us and that took one more phone call to sort out as we received conflicting bill amounts on two bills over two days. That whole scenario took 7 weeks in total.

It's all over now......:D .... I'm so happy.... :dance:...we're free!

I should have known better !
This morning we got a reminder about our outstanding electricity bill. This is the same electricity bill that I paid by credit card while on the phone to BG's billing department back on 23rd Nov. I also got an authorisation code given to me and I wrote down the nice lady's name plus the time and date of the call.

So...today I dragged myself back on the phone to BG and, after waiting about 20 mins listening to those damn messages, finally got through to another nice lady who told me that there is no record of the payment being processed and the authorisation code didn't mean it had gone through etc etc.

What does it take to pay these people and get them off our backs :mad: ??!

I am now going to wait for my credit card bill to arrive to check it before attempting to make any further payments to these idiots.

Can anyone spell INCOMPETENT ? :rolleyes:

aurora

Unfortunately, the £1000 in credit is not an urban myth, as I know to my cost. Although not with BG, with EDF. See here.

Believe me, we didn't want to go £1000 in credit, but EDF just kept upping our DDs. Thats one of the reasons we left them.

Today we still don't have our credit.