Help with BCW

chrissie3589

Hi everyone,

I'm having a little trouble with BCW and I'm hoping somebody might be able to help me out.

Three years ago, I was a student living in rented accomodation. I paid my electricity bill by direct debit every 2 months. When I moved out of the apartment (I only stayed for 6 months), I was only three weeks in to the next billing period and so the landlady of the apartment said she would pay whatever the bill was as a way of saying thanks for keeping the apartment in such good condition.

Now a couple of months ago I started getting phone calls from the elctricity company, none of which I was able to answer as they always rang while I was at work. At the time I thought nothing of the phone calls and kind of forgot about them and never got around to ringing them back. Now I'm getting calls from BCW who are saying I owe the electricity company money....but I really don't.

I don't know what to do, I have no proof that I don't owe them money and I don't know how to get them off my back. I hate ringing them because I'm no good at being authoritative and would probably end up giving in to them and paying money that I don't owe. But if I ignore them I believe it can affect my credit rating?

Any help with this would be greatly appreciated as I'm finding it hard to cope with the stress of this right now

Tixy

Hi

Might already be affecting your credit rating - I'd get copies of your credit files to see.

Are you picking up the calls from bcw or just getting left voicemails. If you do pick up a call from them ask them to write to you with details of the alleged debt, until you have something in wriring from them you can't really begin to dispute it.

However I think the reality is that regardless of what your landlord said you are legally responsible for paying the electricity bill to the date you moved out. And if the landlady hasn't paid it, then you will need to.
Have you still got copies of the bills from when you lived there - they might be useful if they are trying to bill you more than you are likely to have used. Do you have some proof of the date you moved out? I guess you didn't take electricity meter readings when you moved out?