Can British Gas charge 125 to go on to direct debit?

Snowylady

Help.....Five years ago my husband had a debit balance with British Gas that he could not pay. BG installed a payment metre. We have had a nil balance on the bill (finally) for some time now. Yet the metre is still taking £5 a week to put to the bill. Result, £10 on the metre on a monday runs out by thurs, due to the extra fiver it is taking. I called BG to see if we can go on to direct debit and got the most unhelpful person ever! She said that we have to pay £125 to have the metre taken out and go on to normal bills. Are they allowed to do this. Feel frustrated as trying to get sorted with direct debits every month instead of big bills but feel up against a brick wall with BG.

clive_the_gas

Did you discover if it was an actual charge?

I think what you might find is that the £125 is a deposit payment.
Because of previous bad debt, it would be like an insurance for them (if you like) that would cover a quarters gas usage.

sunflower_2

yeah it defo sounds like a deposit - i think thats what they wanted from me when i first bought my house with a prepay meter in it

change to a supplier that will do it for free
with most companies Direct Debit is enough guarantee that u will pay

btw - the meter should automatically stop collecting the £5 a week once the debt is paid off - they are programmed to do this
if yours is still collecting you need to get them out to sort it - its faulty or been programmed wrong

and then change supplier...