Abusive Utility Companies... Where to go to avoid them?

anniecave

I'd agree with Chris1973's comments.
If you take your own meter readings (moving in, moving out, every quarter, at the point of any price increases) take responsibility for your own usage, then you can't go too far wrong.

I was at the receiving end of Npower's debt collection department once, but there was a host of issues behind it, some of which were factors outside of their control, so it's all swings and roundabouts really.

Our landlord deals with utilities here, but with the previous places I have lived in I've just used a comparison site and picked the cheapest option at the time. Worked well for me, and saved us a lot of money over the years instead of just staying with the original supplier when we moved in.

Any supplier can have problems but they can be resolved, if necessary by escalating through the complaints procedure. It sometimes just takes a bit of patience.

Hope you find a cheap supplier who gives you good customer service!

willowgirl

anniecave wrote: »

Any supplier can have problems but they can be resolved, if necessary by escalating through the complaints procedure. It sometimes just takes a bit of patience.

...and lots of time that I don't have to waste.

I really don't want to have to spend hours and hours arguing with utilities over what should be a straightforward transaction. Lifes too short...but thanks for your posting!

jamesperrett

I've always been happy with Scottish and Southern's customer service and would have stuck with them if they could have offered a tariff that was somewhere close to the market leader but unfortunately I couldn't ignore the fact that I was paying £200 a year more than I should have been. So I switched to Ovo nearly 2 years ago which was fairly painless although they recently came back to me to say that they had been undercharging me on gas. I had built up a healthy balance and gained a good rate of interest on the balance but, thanks to the mistake, the balance has now gone. However, I will stick with Ovo when the contract next comes up for renewal unless they're ludicrously expensive.

I'd certainly avoid British Gas - I was certainly not impressed with their customer service when I was forced to use them for a couple of months after a house move.

James.