British Gas, personal details and general incompetence.

davesnapeuk

13 months ago I moved into a new house and had the electricity transferred over to my name. All seemed to go OK until 11 months ago when british gas started sending me letters addressed to my previous partner. As my previous partner has never lived in this house I challenged them at the time and they eventually corrected the mistake - no apology.

Last week I received a meter reading reminder via email addressed to a ficticious person I have never heard of. The email was addressed to 'Mrs' and my ex-partners 1st name followed by my middle initial and my surname. Usually the emails come correct addressed to Mr. and them my complete name.
I then logged into my online account to find that the name on the account was Mrs <ex-partners 1st name>, then my middle initial and surname. Also the nectar points panel now showed the same ficticious name despite my nectar card never having beebn shared with my ex partner.

On Friday I called British Gas and explained that I was upset about the name being used. The lady changed the account name on the system and explained that my profile had become merged with that of my ex whilst they were doing some data cleanups! WHAT!?!? She was unable to issue a formal apology and therefore gave me the details for the compaints department. I logged back into my online account and whilst the account name is now mine again, the nectar panel is still that of the ficticious person created by BG.

Another 30 minutes on the phone results in a techie going away to look into how my 'business partner' field had the wrong name in. Apparently I was the 2nd person on Friday to call with the same problem. I am still awaiting for the call-back at 4pm on Friday from said techie to advise of an update.

This morning I received another email stating that my new bill was available to view online addressed to.... the ficticious person created by BG combining mine and my ex partners names! Another 25 minutes on the phone (24 of which was on hold) to be advised that BG's systems have all been taken down and therefore they have no access to my account. I should call back later today or tomorrow when they are back up. So, as they can't tell me when their systems will be back up I have to try again randomly and wait 20+ minutes listening to the annoying BG music and advertisements just in case they are back up.

Highly annoying :mad:

And just to add to their incompetence further the last part that they've messed up is that my new bill includes all of the outstanding charges from last year that I had agreed would be split over the next 12 months. Apparently they want it all next month now. No calls to me to tell me that they had recinded the agreement that we made and no ability to check or change it currently either!:mad:

Have BG caused a problem for lots of people or am I just unlucky?
What confidence can I have that they should be allowed to hold my personal data?
What recourse do I have for their incompetence?
At what stage do I get OfGEM involved?

Yellowcard

davesnapeuk wrote: »

13 months ago I moved into a new house and had the electricity transferred over to my name. All seemed to go OK until 11 months ago when british gas started sending me letters addressed to my previous partner. As my previous partner has never lived in this house I challenged them at the time and they eventually corrected the mistake - no apology.

Last week I received a meter reading reminder via email addressed to a ficticious person I have never heard of. The email was addressed to 'Mrs' and my ex-partners 1st name followed by my middle initial and my surname. Usually the emails come correct addressed to Mr. and them my complete name.
I then logged into my online account to find that the name on the account was Mrs <ex-partners 1st name>, then my middle initial and surname. Also the nectar points panel now showed the same ficticious name despite my nectar card never having beebn shared with my ex partner.

On Friday I called British Gas and explained that I was upset about the name being used. The lady changed the account name on the system and explained that my profile had become merged with that of my ex whilst they were doing some data cleanups! WHAT!?!? She was unable to issue a formal apology and therefore gave me the details for the compaints department. I logged back into my online account and whilst the account name is now mine again, the nectar panel is still that of the ficticious person created by BG.

Another 30 minutes on the phone results in a techie going away to look into how my 'business partner' field had the wrong name in. Apparently I was the 2nd person on Friday to call with the same problem. I am still awaiting for the call-back at 4pm on Friday from said techie to advise of an update.

This morning I received another email stating that my new bill was available to view online addressed to.... the ficticious person created by BG combining mine and my ex partners names! Another 25 minutes on the phone (24 of which was on hold) to be advised that BG's systems have all been taken down and therefore they have no access to my account. I should call back later today or tomorrow when they are back up. So, as they can't tell me when their systems will be back up I have to try again randomly and wait 20+ minutes listening to the annoying BG music and advertisements just in case they are back up.

Highly annoying :mad:

And just to add to their incompetence further the last part that they've messed up is that my new bill includes all of the outstanding charges from last year that I had agreed would be split over the next 12 months. Apparently they want it all next month now. No calls to me to tell me that they had recinded the agreement that we made and no ability to check or change it currently either!:mad:

Have BG caused a problem for lots of people or am I just unlucky?
What confidence can I have that they should be allowed to hold my personal data?
What recourse do I have for their incompetence?
At what stage do I get OfGEM involved?

The introduction of Nectar has caused data quality issues on a number of accounts which a specific team has been setup for and is working through, although i haven't seen any cases to the extent of your previously. Has the callback taken place yet / is there any progress with this?

With regards to ofgem they won't take it on without it going through the BG internal complaints procedure first.

DVardysShadow

Time to write letters, not phone. Generally with these issues, if they are not resolved on the first call, they tend to spiral into a dreadful mess, which then makes writing a letter much more daunting. If you write a letter, as the matter spirals, you just refer to your previous letter and what has gone wrong since - which becomes easier than a phone call where you have to tell most of the tale - and the person speaking to you does not get the down time off the phone to sort it, so they are fighting with the system while speaking with you.