Back Billing Rule for Electricity- advice please!!

Lucile_park

Hi everyone

I have been having an ongoing battle with my old energy provider Spark UK. Basically, I was living in rented accommodated from July 2008 to December 2010 and was paying for electricity through a monthly direct debit. When it came time to move, we informed the company we were moving and supplied our final meter readings. They came back to us in January 2011 with a bill for about £700. As you can imagine we were quite shocked about this, as we had been paying £50 a month in electricity and there was only 2 of us living in this place. Also we had been supplying actual meter readings, so had we had being paying too little, this should have been picked up. Well it has now been just over a year and after numerous attempts to contact Spark to get a revised and accurate bill (including sending registered mail), we finally received a response dated 16th December 2011 to say they have discovered that the meter point was de-energised when they took the supply on 01/07/2008 and thus cannot be billed. The letter then went on to say they must bill on another meter point, which is the running meter and has an unrestricted billing type (rate 1). It then goes on to confirm the bill is now correct. In light of this, Spark then conclude by saying they will offer us a 20% discount and that £695.35 is due to them in 7 working days.

I have had a look through the back billing code and from what I can see Spark are not able to charge us for these services as it has been greater than a year and also as we have in no way tried to be invasive to them coming up with an accurate bill (evidenced by submitting a registered letter again with final meter readings, new address we moved to etc). I also understand that Spark were obliged to at least once in a 15 month period check the meters themselves. As they have only just realised the wrong meter was being used(?) this would perhaps indicate they made no attempt to check the meter.

Am I right in thinking we don’t owe Spark anything and that we need to politely write back and tell them this according to the back billing rule with the various reasons as outlined above. Would really appreciate any advice or guidance.

Thanks

insanegloss

The only issue I find with that is that Spark UK are not mentioned in the Back Billing for Domestic Customers, and therefore may not be under obligation by it.

Otherwise, I'd say you were correct.

Lucile_park

Thanks insanegloss for your reply. I came across this:

Customers of energy suppliers who aren't part of the ERA
Strictly speaking the back billing rules outlined were only signed up to by the big six suppliers who are part of the ERA. However Ofgem has recently written to all domestic suppliers and stated the following:
"We expect all domestic energy suppliers to adhere to the back billing requirements. Whilst the ERA back billing code does not apply to all suppliers the principle of being unable to seek payment from customers for more than one year's gas or electricity where the supplier was at fault for not billing the customer does. Therefore, you may wish to refer to the ERA billing code and scenarios for guidance when deciding whether the back billing rule should be applied in a particular circumstance." (Ofgem letter dated 19th August 2011)

Lucile_park

Ooops....it sent without finishing my post.

Was just going to add, hoping the above means Spark UK cannot say they are not included.

insanegloss

In that case, you are indeed correct.

I would refer them to that letter from OFGEM and the ERA back billing document for domestic customers. If the agent doesn't want to know, escalate it to their manager.

gentlebloke

Spark won't follow the BBC - and, as a matter of interest, neither will number 7 of the 'Big 6', Utility Warehouse.

Cardew

The BBC is also about supplying accurate bills.

I am not sure if I understand you correctly.

Did the bills(prior to the £700 final bill) use your meter readings? Did the bills display the serial number of that meter.

Lucile_park

Hi all, a brief update. We have exchanged a couple of letters now between Spark and are going through their official complaints process. They have failed to comment on the statement from Ofgem and have offered us so far a 20% reduction on the bill and also to spread payments over a number of months. We are at step 1 of the 3 step process they have, so will follow this process and see how things progress. Thanks everyone for your advice.

jalexa

Lucile_park wrote: »

We are at step 1 of the 3 step process they have, so will follow this process and see how things progress.

I concur that on the face of it the equivalent requirements of the ERA code would apply, by Sparks's own admission the failure results from an industry failure to set up and maintain the meter registration.

One thing I want to add is that if you remain dissatisfied 8 weeks after first raising a formal complaint you are entitled to ask the Energy Ombudsman to consider the complaint. There is no cost to the consumer but I do not believe the process is cost free for the supplier.

How to play this seems obvious.