Electricity Bill in Credit by a rather large amount

Tanzee

I have just received my electricity statement and I am well over £1000 in credit! This seems rather a large amount to me, especially as I am limping, financially, towards the end of each month at the moment, and I was wondering if I can claim this back. I have tried calling them but have been on hold all morning. Should I keep on trying? Can I get this money back? I would be grateful if anyone can offer me any insight if they have been in a similar situation.

eurmalian

Before you do anything else, check that the statement is to an actual reading rather than an estimate and that the reading is correct. Also think about it. With the ammount you pay and the ammount of electric that you use, does it seem likely that you've overpaid by £1000?

The last thing you want to do is fight like mad, get that sent back and then get a bill 2 months later saying you owe over £1000 as they get a correct reading...

Tanzee

Thank you eurmalian. Ive have had a good look at my bill and, to me, it is just a jumble of figures ... some have an "A" by it, meaning actual reading and some have "E" for estimated.

It actually says my account balance before this statement was £1,420.84 cr
Followed by electriity charges for this statement £178.60 E
bringing my new account balance to a total of £1,2444.54 cr

To me that seems that only this statements usage is estimated. Or maybe I am wrong. I have never been able to make any sense of gas or electricity bills. Also I have been paying £260 a month for both my gas and electric jointly which seems a rather hefty amount anyway. I can't make much sense of my bill to be honest. Is it likely to be wrong?

eurmalian

That E is likely to mean estimated, so the first thing that you want to do is take a correct reading and get the supplier to re-bill you. Are you able to get a reading from the meter? It should be on a screen or series of dials on the front of the meter. If you take that and then call the supplier then they will be able to re-bill you to that reading and tell you your correct balance. At that point, if there is still a large credit then you should be able to ask for it back, though I think different suppliers have different policies on refunds.

You are paying a large ammount each month, so unless you use a lot of electric and gas then there's a fairly good chance that you will still have a credit of some form after billing it correctly.

Thinking about it, one last thing to check is have you had a gas bill? It's worth making sure that they haven't been putting your full payment onto the electric account and nothing onto the gas before asking for any credit to be refunded, as again that could cause a lot of problems in the future.

david39

£260 per month seems an excessive amount to be paying, even in these escalating-energy-costs times - unless you have been in arrears at some stage and are paying back monthly or you live in a large house with lots of other people.

Follow the advice in the above posts and then, if it is no clearer to you, contact your supplier and ask them to compare your bills with the amount you are paying and ask them if your consumption justifies the monthly payments.

This should draw their attention to whether you are in fact overpaying and they will do something about it. I suspect you are paying too much.

Tanzee

Thank you! Yes, its quite easy to take a reading so I will do so before I call them again. Also I wondered too whether they had somehow incorporated my gas payments into this bill. My gas and electricity payments used to be made separately but suddenly they were being taken out as one lump figure. Actually, looking at my bill again, they do seen to have incorporated both payments into this one bill. However I haven't received a separate statement for my gas bill. Thank you for pointing that out. I will need to get in touch with them to find out what is going on.

McKneff

What telephone number are you using

If its an 0845 or 0870 number look for an alternative on
SAYNOto0870

Tanzee

david39 wrote: »

£260 per month seems an excessive amount to be paying, even in these escalating-energy-costs times - unless you have been in arrears at some stage and are paying back monthly or you live in a large house with lots of other people.

Follow the advice in the above posts and then, if it is no clearer to you, contact your supplier and ask them to compare your bills with the amount you are paying and ask them if your consumption justifies the monthly payments.

This should draw their attention to whether you are in fact overpaying and they will do something about it. I suspect you are paying too much.

Actually I was in arrears a little while ago because my dd's were set too low. My payments were put up to cover the money I owed. In fact they kept readjusting my payments. I am guessing that once the money was paid off my monthly payments should have been readjusted again.

Its odd because although my joint £260 payment (£60 for electricity and £180 for gas) shows up on their workings out, on another sheet it shows my new electricity usage has been estimated as £68. It has actually gone up but then they are taking £14 off as credit - making my new monthly dd payments £54. However, I expect this will still be taken jointly with my gas payment. Oh, I am so confused.

McKneff wrote: »

What telephone number are you using

If its an 0845 or 0870 number look for an alternative on
SAYNOto0870

It is an 0800 number. I have also emailed them but an automated reply told me that I would hear within 10 days.

macman

Tanzee wrote: »

Thank you! Yes, its quite easy to take a reading so I will do so before I call them again. Also I wondered too whether they had somehow incorporated my gas payments into this bill. My gas and electricity payments used to be made separately but suddenly they were being taken out as one lump figure. Actually, looking at my bill again, they do seen to have incorporated both payments into this one bill. However I haven't received a separate statement for my gas bill. Thank you for pointing that out. I will need to get in touch with them to find out what is going on.

They might be on one bill, but they will be itemised out separately. Your estimated readings are either way out or your DD's are far too high (or both). You can't have built a £1250 credit in the 3 months since your last bill, so this must have been going on for some time.
Get your actual readings submitted, get your bills recalculated,and ask the to return the majority of your credit.
At present you're giving your supplier an interest free loan.
In future, remember to submit readings at least every 3 months and check them against your actual bils.

eurmalian

I think that you're definitely at the point of giving them a call, providing the new electric readings (and the gas ones won't hurt either), then asking:

What the balance is on each account
What the payments being taken for each fuel are
(if there are payments going on for each and the electric is still in credit) Can you have the credit back
(If there are no payments going onto the gas) Can they sort this out and split the payment as they are meant to. Plus can the electric credit be moved to the gas, where it should be.

I'd definitely suggest phone rather than email for this. Email is likely to drag on for ages, whereas a decent agent should be able to sort the whole thing in one phone call, whatever has happened. It might take half an hour, but at least it's done rather than a months worth of off and on emailing...

eurmalian

macman wrote: »

They might be on one bill, but they will be itemised out separately.

My guess is that it's actually separate bills, but all of the payment is going onto the electric account and nothing onto the gas one...