Dispute with energy company large bill - advice please

Cardew

SaleHunter wrote:

Yes, but they then made an arrangement with me whereby I would remain paying £65.00 per month for both services. Whether entering into this agreement was not economically sound on their part is irrelevant, it was a financial arrangement made between myself and one of their company representatives, and should be allowed to run the term of 12 months as stated at the time.

I am afraid that statement demonstrates a fundemental mis-understanding of the Direct Debit scheme - which is incidentally run by the banks.

There is no such agreement with DD schemes - it is not like an HP agreement where the price is £x and you have to pay £y for so many months.

They forecast that you would need to pay £65 a month. However under the DD scheme they have the absolute right to change the DD payment if they consider it inadequate, as long as they notify you in advance.

Don't forget that most DD payments are initially based on information supplied by the customer. If, say, I change a utility company and tell them that I paid £10 a month with my old company, they will set my DD at £10 initially for 12 months. If it transpires that my usage is, say, £150 a month are you suggesting that I have a binding 'agreement' that I can only be charged £10 a month for 12 months?

The import thing is that you sign the DD agreement that allows them to vary the payment - you didn't have to sign it.

What it boils down to is that you believe you have a moral and legal case against EDF; others don't. By all means try to get more favourable terms - nobody blames you - but trying to justify it, as you have done, sounds disingenuous.

SaleHunter

sickofhavingnomoney wrote:

Is that amount just to pay off the debt because if it is then there is still you winter usage to account for also your usage may well have dropped a lot if there is only you living there now, but not necessarily as much as you think. EDF will be aware that bills dont always drop drastically when there is only one person living at the address.

Yes, £88.55p/m would cover the debt, however like I say when applying the overpayment I have been making on my gas brings this figure down to £66.82. Although my electricity debt is £507.93, my *real* debt stands at £400.96, with another £65 due to be paid on the 28th of this month taking the balance down to £335.96

Aside from this, I do expect my bills to drop drastically, I no longer live in a 24 hour sauna, I have the central heating on about twice a week max, and only for and hour or two then. Also, there are times when the house is empty.

sickofhavingnomoney wrote:

Also the company I work for would say that some of the blame lies with yourself for the direct debit. In ten months you never noticed it not coming out of your bank account, this could be believable as a lot of people dont check their banks regularly enough (although I bet they would notice if the companies took more than they should) but in that 10 months they will have sent you bills showing your usage. Surely these would have mentioned that no paymenst had been made!!!

Well of course a company would say that, they're in the business of making money after all. With regards to bills and usage, they sent NOTHING!, until the final demand letter arrived, along with a nice letter stating they would seek entry to my property to cut off the supply if payment was not made within a week. I was told this was because of the switch from Seeboard Energy to EDF energy and their system not updating properly.

sickofhavingnomoney wrote:

We advise our customers that errors can happen but we send a bill/statement out to our customers for them to check everything is correct. If it isn't they need to let us know so we can put it right.

No bills etc here, I was under the impression everything was fine, as I had dealt with Seeboard quite often previously and felt they were diligent in managing my account, therefore I would have expected any problems with my account to be flagged and contacted by them.

sickofhavingnomoney wrote:

Also there is no point being difficult on principle because lifes too short, they are a business in the end.

It's not just priciple, I don't really have £330.00 to shell out in the run up to Christmas, especially after just coughing up £180.00 to have my gutters repaired.

sickofhavingnomoney wrote:

You are just an account number to them and they wont be getting stressed over it, when they hang up the phone to you they will move on to the next call and forget about you.

I'm not really worried about the person on the other end of the phone (although I am always polite and stress that my disagreement is with the company rather than the individual), i'm more concerned about my daughters Christmas, and my ability to make it enjoyable for her.

sickofhavingnomoney wrote:

What if you dont agree to their payments and they stop your supply or call in the baileffs?

Stopping the supply, I was thinking of transferring out to avoid this, with regards to bailiffs, i'm looking for further advice on this. And like I say, if there is a way I can drag this out a little then I think the company will realise that I will be able to be right up to date in 2007 and would consider avoiding recovery action.

tripled

Why not demand a refund on your gas account? In the long run your gas dd would probably have to go up, as they usually take any credit into account in the reassesments so you may get behind, but then you will only have to shell out less than £200 in the run up to Christmas instead of £300.

Also if the staff in the call centre don't want to 'override the system', have you asked to speak to a manager who can do it? They may still refuse, but it's always woth asking.

Cardew

tripled wrote:

Why not demand a refund on your gas account?

Tripled,
Lets take an analogy.

I concede that I owe you £500+ for goods I have received from you, and I have owed you this for a long while. I know you have lost a lot of interest on that money - but thats tough!

However, as you well know, you owe me £100 because I paid you too much for some other goods.

I have told you that I am going to do everything I can to delay paying back the £500+ I owe you, and I am “ quite willing to be as awkward and stubborn as necessary”.

However “I demand” that you pay me back the £100 you owe me.

Now I wonder what your response might be?;)

roger56

Salehunter,
- you've used the fuel
- you've had it interest free
- now all EDF want to do is be paid

surely you budgetted for this - the fact Christmas is looming is surely a red herring?

I notice you are self employed,
how would you feel if, just because you forgot to bill someone close to Christmas for services/supplies, then realised your error and billed them, they came back and used your arguements! I think you would then have a different view.

Just calculate what you owe, using a real meter reading, and pay up.
Sorry if that isn't what you want to hear.

tripled

lol Cardew, the second word would probably be 'off'. However I would have thought more accurate would be "I have overpaid you for some other goods, so please either credit the overpayment against what I owe you or refund it to me." Which isn't entirely unreasonable. Although it also wouldn't be unreasonable for EDF to demand Salehunter increase his gas direct debit if they have used his credit in any reasessment.

kat21

Remember
=======

There are posters whom use this forum, whom work for many of the energy suppliers so, take the advice of energy watch or a solicitor, or citizens advice.
Some posters may give the wrong information in order to protect the companys to which they work for. YOu should be aware of this when reading any posts, that look suspiciouse.
kat21

Cardew

kat21 wrote:

Remember
=======

There are posters whom use this forum, whom work for many of the energy suppliers so, take the advice of energy watch or a solicitor, or citizens advice.
Some posters may give the wrong information in order to protect the companys to which they work for. YOu should be aware of this when reading any posts, that look suspiciouse.
kat21

Kat21,
You have kept us amused for quite a while with your posts and wonderful turn of phrase – “erronus transfere” from another post today must surely be Latin?

Your repeated posts warning that utility company employees, or shareholders, are using this forum as a platform to promote/defend their company are equally amusing. However people new to this forum might actually believe your posts have some substance; indeed at times it almost seems that you believe it yourself.

I am sure you know the rules of this forum forbid anyone from promoting their company. So why don’t you report inappropriate posts instead of making all these unsubstantiated allegations?

Name names! Publish and be damned!

P.S.
I really do love your posts!

rosysparkle

If you don't want to pay the increased direct debit suggested, then surely the best way to proceed is to go on to quarterly billing, pay the £506 to pay off the electricity debt that you have run up, stop your direct debits to EDF, and then get a refund on the gas overpayment. Then pay the bills in full as they come in. That way EDF get paid, you get credited for the gas overpayment, and you won't be paying too much for your gas and electric usage in the future.

If this doesn't sound attractive, perhaps you'd be better accepting EDF's proposals for you to pay the debt off over a period of time?

(I don't work for any of the energy suppliers or in any connected field).

SaleHunter

Update:

Okay, I see some further comments have been forthcoming since i've been away, i'm glad I wasn't hear to listen

Today was the day my first installment of £200.00p/m payments on my electricity was due, and my £15p/m gas. Yesterday however, was the day I cancelled my direct debits to EDF.

As I have stated, I fully accept responsibility of the debt to EDF, which is why today I phoned them up and made payments of £50 on electricity and £15 on my gas. On this occassion I spoke to a lad who worked on the Gas call centre rather than electricity, I informed him of the cancelled direct debits, and that I would be paying by card. I asked to check my gas bill, which turned out to be £33.21 for nine months!!! This is the same account that I pay £15p/m to, and that the last call handler refused to credit my overpayment of £106.97 to my electricity account. I learned that this might have been more to do with it being a slightly complicated process (because EDF has previously been many different brand names in different parts of the country over the last few years) rather than any doubts about my ability to pay or that winter usage might even out the overpayment.

We also discussed the calculation of direct debits, he said that if he were the one making a calculation on the direct debit scheme, he would have set it at £90p/m, and that would be based on both my debt and the forecasted usage based on last years actual usage. So the previous call handler's figure of £150.00p/m was nonsense. He took another reading from me and confirmed that going by early figures, my usage has dropped considerably. He also stated that if I continued to pay in this manner, that he could see no reason why EDF would pressure me into making a payment in full of the current balance. He said that as long as my £65p/m continued to overpay on my usage then that would be seen as a commitment to settling the balance, and that while automated messages may go out to ask me to join the direct debit scheme, that I should not experience any further demands for payment in full, or increased monthly payments.

He also agreed that me phoning in my monthly readings would be a good idea, as this would provide a record of less energy usage, which would be looked upon favourably should anyone at EDF look at my account. Thank you to whoever suggested this,laura perhaps?

So, all in all, things seemed to have worked out rather well, I did'nt need to become difficult or awkward at all, it seems I just needed to speak to a call handler that knew how both to operate the current system, and had experience of the prior management/systems of the company.

A big raspberry to all those who would have rolled over and coughed up the £170 or £200 per month on the electricity bill, lol, not wise money-management advice.