electricity estimates

McKneff

Youve probably wasted the £22 in the time its taken you to do all these calculations and be posting on here to be honest.

Basilb_2

Well 10mins for £22 seems a good rate of pay to me. I'm hoping posting on MSE isn't a waste of anyones time.

jalexa

Basilb wrote: »

Well 10mins for £22 seems a good rate of pay to me.

Except its not 10 minutes, its the time to consume 1000 units. Possibly over 4 months.

lithopsian

jalexa wrote: »

Except its not 10 minutes, its the time to consume 1000 units. Possibly over 4 months.

So long as you don't have to sit and watch every unit go round on the meter, why is it such a chore? And if something unnecessary really is costing several pounds a month, why not sort it and have the money for an extra pint of beer

Terrylw1

jalexa wrote: »

Hmmm... Why would they want to benefit the competition?

As far as estimates being under, over, or even accurate, the best way for the entire customer base to address that is to ensure every bill reading is close to actual. That process is specifically referred to in the Code of Practice for Accurate Bills. Allthough I'm not certain that consumer compliance with the code is "required", it is a potential customer benefit to be in a position to "require" the supplier to comply.
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You, on the other hand, are on your own.

Customers have no contract outside of their supplier (not considering the HH market) so they won't be bound by policy.

As many reads as you can get in is always good but its also important for then supplier to send them to the Data Collector. Their estimation processes for change of supply and fuse or meter changes where readings are let or inaccurate, become much more reasonable.

I don't see it as a fraud, if it were, the same could be said about suppliers knowing about reads they don't use due to process failures, its an inefficiency on either side.

As long as they don't get in to read the meter, the OP can risk it, but whether its worth it depends on the differences in deals. Their choice really, but was long as they use it before switching, any such Demed change of supply reading is going to be higher or a customer reading will be to a lesser extent.

Something to consider is also that if the supplier ends a tariff in favour of a more expensive one, do they ask you or a reading? No, so where they have been underestimating, they get the higher new rates due to a customer lack of following your advice. This issue is another falling on the regulators part to watch these companies practises.

Terrylw1

jalexa wrote: »

Here is another scenario for your comment. If the OP didn't switch but the supplier took an actual reading less than the "estimate", the account would be unwound to the last "actual" an rebilled around the price increase.

I don't know if that is still done but it happened to me once.

A side effect is that the OP could end up paying full standard rates having lost the opportunity to switch to a no longer available tariff.

As an aside I think to knowingly do what is proposed is no less "fraudulent" than Edf's unsubstantiated recalculation of direct debit described in another thread.

It would but given the new actual would be later, they would have to work out the daily average between the 2 actual so they can create a reading for the price change. Depending on the crossing of the seasons, it could be worse or not...but I doubt anywhere near the benefit of 1000kwh.

Cardew

Basilb wrote: »

Not sure about it being fraudulent - I'm sure energy companies frequently under estimate peoples bills, so when tariffs change people are paying higher rates for energy they have already used - I'm just doing the opposite. Maybe they should use some of their mega profits to employ more meter readers!

Are you really sure!

For a start the algorithim that estimates consumption is independantly audited and takes into account input from the Met office on weather etc.

Secondly all the millions of bills are produced by a computer and a program to calculate the estimates has to be written.

So your scenario has a programmer who takes it on himself to deliberately defraud millions of customers(or perhaps he is ordered to write such a program by his bosses)

We could speculate on the likely custodial sentence for anyone convicted of Conspiracy to Defraud on that scale - let alone the action taken against the company - a fine of £xxmillion and loss of licence??

It is not as if it could be covered up - the evidence would be available for years and just possibly a disgruntled employee might become a 'whistle blower'?

Still if it salves your conscience;)

Basilb_2

Streuth,I've only been on this site a day and I'm already losing the will to live. I'm sure I didn't say companies deliberately estimate bills wrongly. They just do. 1000 units is 20% off what I have used, which doesnt say much for their algorithms:). My conscience is clear - though that is usually the sign of a bad memory.