Flats.. Wrong Meter.. Paying someone elses bills... No help from supplier or landlord

jenbags1

Hi,

I'm after some help, I live in a block of 6 newly built flats, it came to our attention that the meters that we had been told were ours were not and that everyone in the flats have been paying for the wrong electricity and in our case gas too. The person who has been paying for our gas and electric has been paying £20 a month, we have been paying £79 for theirs!! I have kept all of our bills since we moved in, including the initial meter readings and I have written them all down. We have changed suppliers for cheaper deals twice since we have been here from Southern Electric to Scottish Power. We are currently with Scottish power and I have called them to report this again and again... and they haven't resolved anything, just say they will investigate and will get back to us within 4 working days each time.

HELP!! What do we do now? We know we have been paying far too much for the past year at least but no one will help us sort it out and they wont let us reduce our payments so we are still paying £79 a month and don't even know if it's for the correct meter!

Can we get the Ombudsman involved and if so how and what do we have to do?

Thank you for reading and I look forward to any advice you can give us!!

Jenbags!

[Deleted User]

Hi, this is not at all uncommon to find this sort of mix up with flats and communal gas meters scattered around the outside base of the building.The sensible thing to all the residents to have done was to establish who s meter was whos by observation after shutting off your gas and checking the meter visually.Then clearly label your meter. I ve a sneaking suspician that you are going to lose out on this deal unless the other tenant who s had it cheap is a decent chap and is willing to make good your loss.I cannot see how it is anything to do with the supplier at all, if anyones liable its the developers for their sloppy meter labels plus the tenants for being a bit dopey also. Can you not just cancel your direct debit and pay a quarterly bill, making sure the supplier has your correct meter details and you supply the correct readings.

Terrylw1

It needs to be proved which meter supplies which property and then the meter details have to be changed using the industry data transfer standards.

This is going o be complicated though as it spans several suppliers and they may all contact different third party companies who use the data.

Your current supplier should send out a meter operators engineer to investigate this and they will then update the meter to the supplier and the data collector who handle reading data. Then your supplier will need to get your change of supply readings corrected when they changed to them. This comes down to how long ago it was as there are several agreed industry processes. You also need to recover your overpaynents from previous suppliers who will be reluctant and cannot send engineers out anymore. If you left them over 12 months ago they won't be able to get your consumption corrected for what thy pay which leaves them taking a loss...however you should insist this is not your problem, and whilst its not theirs either its this responsibility to correct the bill now they have got the facts.

This happens and uts very difficult to correct from a suppliers point of view if left and customers change supplier. Its not impossible to resolve but I would suggest you need to complain with all this data on meter reads and meter details to get them started, dates, etc...you won't get anywhere with a call centre on this as these disputes require more advance back office billing/metering staff as this can be horribly complicated and take 6 months or more to correct, even longer with some, or less but its difficult to say without details on supplier change dates.

In terms of the guy, your suppliers won't care. There are recent changes into the industry to report on duplicate meters on sites in registration records so once your supplier gets it corrected it should appear there and the other guys supplier should pick it up...his problems are for his Sid and suppliers seldom co operate with each other soven if they pass this on, it probably wouldnt alter.

The above is all for elec, its a bit different on gas but essentially the actions are the same just the parties involved are slightly different and how thy communicate.

spiro

Put you problem in wrting to your supplier labelling it COMPLAINT. As other have said because of the number of parties involved this will be very complex to resolve and may take months. During this time dont switch supplier.

[Deleted User]

I have found that the only person to sort this mess out are the tenants themselves. sending out a meter rep wont work too well as the tenant has to be at home and willing to do the simple check of a meter trace check, that is switch the supply on high and do a visual check that the suspect meter you think is yours stops registering when you switch off.I have many flats etc which never bother to do this even after years of mess ups especially if the tenants are short stayers.Meter readers only have the meter serial number to go on when reading them,with sometimes only plot numbers attached to the meter to confuse even more.All the tenants need to do this, not just the odd one.I may be wrong, but I cant see how the supplier has anything to do with this at all when the tenants and lanlords/developers (and meter readers) have conspired together in the mess ups.i have found the mess ups apply more to the gas meters in semi concealed outside boxes than electrics in the communal meter rooms

Terrylw1

sacsquacco wrote: »

I have found that the only person to sort this mess out are the tenants themselves. sending out a meter rep wont work too well as the tenant has to be at home and willing to do the simple check of a meter trace check, that is switch the supply on high and do a visual check that the suspect meter you think is yours stops registering when you switch off.I have many flats etc which never bother to do this even after years of mess ups especially if the tenants are short stayers.Meter readers only have the meter serial number to go on when reading them,with sometimes only plot numbers attached to the meter to confuse even more.All the tenants need to do this, not just the odd one.I may be wrong, but I cant see how the supplier has anything to do with this at all when the tenants and lanlords/developers (and meter readers) have conspired together in the mess ups.i have found the mess ups apply more to the gas meters in semi concealed outside boxes than electrics in the communal meter rooms

In terms of elec, the meter operator has to correct their assets as part of their compliance and the supplier has a compliance obligation to ensure the meter is correct with their agents (mop, DC) and mpas. The supplier maybe willing to do this from the tenants but its not good practice without an engineer call I case if confusion & mistakes. In a case like this the customer should be there so they can explain it to the engineer as he won't get much detail from the supplier as the transfer of data between them doesn't allow it.

Some areas still offer trace services but given its on the customer end, most dont or may charge or request the customer to get a Sparky to do it.

Most likely the tails were incorrectly marked up but with several suppliers and agents involved its very difficult to correct and even worse across multiple change if supply periods.

[Deleted User]

British Gas dont take much notice at all to anything I correct on my handheld computer I use. we do the same thing every quarter with these mess ups. British Gas are hopeless in this regard, in fact they are next to useless in most things.the residents are the only ones to sort it and some of these are very happy to keep the status quo, such as the one paying only £20 a month, he s not going to volunteer the mess up.Have just been out today and found 2 fiddles and a stopped meter!(undeclared to B.G.as usual) the British public I have found, will try and get away with everything they can.

Terrylw1

sacsquacco wrote: »

British Gas dont take much notice at all to anything I correct on the handheld computer I use. we do the same thing every quarter with these mess ups. British Gas are hopeless in this regard, in fact they are next to useless in most things.the residents are the only ones to sort it and some of these are very happy to keep the status quo, such as the one paying only £20 a month, he s not going to volunteer the mess up.Have just been out today and found 2 fiddles and a stopped meter!(undeclared to B.G.as usual) the British public I have found, will try and get away with everything they can.

I don't want to offend any BGAS staff on here, but that company for a long time has been a source of amusement over data flows and market domain data, but then the enforcing body is a tiger with no teeth and very little changes.

I would say all suppliers have varying degrees of mess when it comes to data but ive had my first share of correction projects following take on from them.

This isnt their staff, its their top down policies.

[Deleted User]

completely agree with you terrylw1 as i am not direct B.G. staff but have to put up with their policies.I think the regulators words last year, " the suppliers are greedy and lazy" were aimed at British Gas in particular.

Terrylw1

If you have any experience of data regulation, the mess the industry has been in is no mystery. The yearly audits are not in depth enough and there is no checking of much of it as they seem to trust that suppliers will tell the truth about their problems...as if!!!

[Deleted User]

Hi Jenbags1, if your electric meter has a small red light( and most have) it will flash more rapidly when more electric is used, and if the mains are completely switched off it will show constant on.So if you switch on something like the dryer or kettle on you can then check your meter is yours by relaying to an assistant by your mobile to switch every thing off and check the meter stops the rapid flashing.with just the fridge on the flashes are very slow,best is to throw the mains to off when you then get the constant on. Get your full meter number and inform the supplier of the change.clearly label your meter with your flat number for any meter reader, and inform other residents of this method,notes though letterbox and a note on meter cupboard door.the real mess starts trying to get what money is owed to you from the other resident