British Gas credit check - incorrect information

pgoundry

British_Gas_company_representative wrote: »

Hi, if the score is 985 we will be happy to exchange the meter for you. Pls call 0800 048 0303 and advise the pay as you go team of the score and they will be happy to investigate this further for you...

I too have a score well over the 907 required by British Gas but they are refusing to change my metre. An old antiquated company with systems well out of date I suspect.

I'm off somewhere else and won't go back to BG as its boring to have to deal with such dinosaur organisations.

Experian_company_representative

I'm afraid you're comparing apples and pears. The guide score you can get with your credit report only appraises the credit report information in your name. The scores we help lenders build generally look at a wider selection of data (such as the information you provide on your application form, information about anyone you're financially linked to and so on) so they are not directly comparable.

If a lender cites your credit report as the problem then it's sensible to check it to see if there's anything on there obviously at fault. But if it's simply down to credit scoring - ie the overall picture your data paints of your situation - then that's different of course.

Under the DPA you can appeal against a refusal made purely because of credit scoring, asking a person to look through your details again. That can sometimes bear fruit, particularly if you can provide other information that backs up your creditworthiness.

James Jones

DGuest

Hi there,

As I have failed an Experian credit check for a British Gas electricity billing meter exchange this seems like the appropriate thread.

The write-up has turned into something of an essay, but I couldn't find an easy way to shorten it. Hopefully some will find the detail useful, and if anyone is kind enough to comment I hope they will at least find most of the necessary information.


Background:

Almost 3 years ago we moved to our current house. The sellers - it turns out - had many outstanding debts, and perhaps unsurprisingly relied on a prepayment meter for their electric supply. Between exchange and completion I called Scottish Power (responsible for supplying both properties) to inform them that I wished to take over the supply at the new address. They duly noted the change, but when I requested a meter exchange at the new address I was told that the system was down and was asked to call back a couple of days later. Unfortunately in the chaos of the move I failed to do this, and through a combination of apathy and unwillingness to tackle the chore of arranging the exchange, have stupidly continued to put up with the inconvenience and expense of prepayment. This is something of an anomaly as my financial affairs are generally in good order; I have now been debt free for many years, thanks in no small part to the great advice on this site.


The move from Scottish Power:

A recent Scottish Power price increase finally motivated me to request a billing meter, which was when I discovered another problem - it transpired that Scottish Power had not correctly registered the change of client at the new address. How could I not have been aware of this? Never before having had a prepayment meter it seemed natural enough to accept the meter key given to me by the previous owners. In addition, Scottish Power had written to me at the new address with a summary of the final bill and credit refund for supply to the previous house. I now realise that a prepayment customer is supposed to receive letters informing them of price changes, but at the time I wasn't expecting to hear from them given the key payment method. Very occasional letters arrived from Scottish Power for the previous owners, but then so did far more numerous letters from other utilities, creditors etc. I patiently marked these 'No longer at this address, new owners have no contact details, please return to sender' (in fact we received so many that I made up a stamp).

Scottish Power agreed to re-register the supply in my name - this involved much confusion and scepticism on their part - but they were not prepared to exchange the meter for free, despite an unblemished record as a direct debit customer at the previous address for over 6 years. With hindsight I feel I should have pushed harder for this, but having found it hard to convince SP even of my credentials, I opted to take my custom elsewhere.


The move to British Gas:

The offer of a free meter exchange and an attractive deal (Online Variable -6% Feb 2014) tempted me to British Gas. After explaining the reasons for my interest in BG (the free exchange and the -6% deal) and verifying the tariffs, I established that the exchange would indeed be free (provided I passed the credit check), that they would have to initially take over the supply which would take 4-5 weeks, 2 days after which I should phone to request a change from a prepayment to a billing meter and initiate the credit check. Meter exchange would then occur 2-3 weeks later, at which point I could take advantage of the deal.
Incidentally, I queried the ongoing availability of the deal given the timing. Although the first person I asked said it wasn't in their power to make my sign-up conditional on the deal being available to me once the transfer and exchange process had been completed, two members of staff assured me that the name Feb 2014 did not imply that the offer would end in Feb 2013, rather that the discount would be applied until Feb 2014. In addition, and most significantly, the specialist who finally signed me up stated that it
should be available...
"until February 2014 so anything up to that point you can sign up for that online tariff, unless something drastic happens that we
don't know about". I don't know whether it is the case that this deal was fated to end in Feb 2013, but that's exactly what happened.
As it turned out, that was the least of my problems.


Applying for the meter exchange (from prepayment to billing):

Two days after the supply coming across to British Gas, I phoned as instructed, and was told that I should in fact wait 21 days before requesting the exchange. After explaining that I had been told specifically to phone after 2 days so that the credit check could be initiated I was put through to the prepayment team.
The person took my details, confirming my identity and asking why I wanted the exchange. I explained that I had always been a direct debit customer at previous addresses, had a long history as such with British Gas, that the prepayment meter was at the address when I moved in and that I had finally got around to asking for an exchange to get a better deal. This was evidently satisfactory and after reading out some Terms & Conditions, the check was made while I waited on hold.

Shortly afterwards I was told "Unfortunately that came back unsuccessful".... "so at this time we wouldn't be able to change the meter for you."..."Now we're not given any reason as to why, you would need to contact the credit reference agency directly to find out if there was anything adverse on your file with them, and there's a company called Experian that we use, and you can contact them through their website."

After asking if it could be to do with outstanding debts incurred by the previous owners, I was told:
"I wouldn't have thought so - it's usually purely done on your own name and your details..." "We would be happy to look at it again for you in 60 days."

I asked more about the procedure with Experian and was told:
" Well what would happen is that if there was something incorrect there you would need to deal with them to get that resolved, and they would advise you on the timescale for that ... we would do another credit check after 60 days. I presume they say 60 days because that's how long it takes for them to get things updated.. but we wouldn't recommend doing that again till 60 days."

I also asked about the potential cost of installing a meter to which the response was:
"There's .. no other option around it, it's not like you can pay for us to do it or pay money up front or anything like that, we need to pass the credit check before we're able to exchange the meter."


Experian:

I registered for the free 30 day Credit Expert trial. Here I encountered another problem. At the point I was asked for the second time to confirm how many years and months I had lived at my previous address, I thought it would be wise to check the completion date, and returned to find the session had timed out. I logged back in and found that my application was stuck in a loop that would not allow me to complete the process. I cleared my browser cache and tried various tricks to no avail, finally emailing Experian to alert them to the bug and ask for a solution. When they replied they said they had reset my application session and that I could now proceed. I logged in again with near identical woes. Rather than persist with Experian support I tried registering again with an alternative email address – a ploy which succeeded. It is probably worth noting that 'in some cases' the trial period starts before you can gain access your report as you have to wait 'up to five days' for the PIN to arrive through the post (4 days in my case).

Now that the PIN has arrived I can access my report which reveals that it contains scant information.
For what it's worth, and I understand this information potentially means very little, the rating is 'Good'/915. Listed are three positive factors (The number of credit accounts you are using is low, The balance of your unsecured lending indicates a lower risk, The age of your accounts indicates lenders are likely to view you as lower risk) and one negative factor ('You have no successfully settled non-mail order accounts.').


Several things stand out:

1) Contrary to the report's assertion, I have numerous successfully closed non-mail order credit accounts - see 'other factors' below.
The most obvious example is the direct debit account I successfully closed 2 years 10 months ago with British Gas after over 6 years at my previous address.

2) The entry against the search submitted by Centrica PLC (British Gas) says Time at address: 0 years, 1 months. Should that not have been 2 years 10 months?

3) The report states: Number of credit accounts (including those settled) 1, Amount of available credit (excluding mortgages) £0.
In fact I have several thousand pounds of credit available on two cards, both used for occasional purchases, both automatically paid in full by direct debit. These are paid from my main accounts – sufficiently long established (I assume) to not be listed in the report.

4) The information the Experian report shows under the "details you gave to us when you applied to be a CreditExpert member" shows a different postcode for the previous address to the one I entered. Extreme scepticism is expected on the part of the reader, but let me explain that this reformatting/'repostcoding' of address became a well-known phenomenon at the previous house. I provide more details below, but as an extra precaution against my own possible error or false memory I revisited the sign-up page and found all the 'auto form fill' entries intact (not just generic entries which could have come from other forms, but security entries specific to this page; also recall that I cleared my pc's cache just before submitting the second application due to the previous Experian problem).
Sure enough, in the Previous Address postcode box there was only one correct entry, not the one that appeared on the report, presumably inserted after parsing via a national address database. This incorrect address (incidentally invalid in its combination of terrace name and postcode) was then used for the electoral roll check, hence yielding no names for the previous address (Names and dates: No Names Listed on Voters Roll), not surprising given that the address does not exist on the ground. I was in fact correctly registered on the electoral roll at the actual previous address.


More information on postcode problems:

At our previous address we often found that no matter what address was entered or selected on a website, it would be altered to match the form held in whichever database was used by the company in question. We became quite familiar with the variants. Extra ambiguity was added by the English and Welsh equivalents, as well as confusion over whether the county was in fact Ynys Mon / Anglesey, or Gwynedd or sometimes even Arfon, or Caernarfonshire. The main problem, however, was that we lived at 2 Y Terrace, X street,.. <postcode A>, and unfortunately there were three (later four) other addresses in the same street with the same number, specifically:
No 2 X street, <postcode B>
No 2 'off X street', <postcode C>
No 2 Z flats, X street, <postcode D>
&
No 2 back X street (properly N street), <postcode E>

The combination chosen by Experian is not even one of these valid addresses, but an invalid combination of 2 Y Terrace,. <postcode B>, where the house indicated by the postcode B is well over 100m from the terrace unequivocally and solely identified by postcode A. On my report this postcode appears once more: against the search submitted by Hutchison 3G UK (for a broadband dongle applied for and used only at the current address) under 'linked from'. They presumably use the same database as BG with the same error. Naturally all the correspondence in my '3' folder is to the new address, but in it I found the sheet I wrote on when I signed up with '3', listing all the details I provided (I do this in case companies later query them), and found that I had indeed submitted the correct postcode for the previous address.

I would be inclined to think that the Experian 'previous postcode' error had resulted in information other than the electoral roll registration being missing from my report, were it not for the fact that the correct previous postcode appears against numerous entries, including some of those listed below which should be classed as successfully closed.


Other factors of potential significance:

As the report notes, I am correctly registered on the electoral roll at the current address.

Successfully closed non-mail order credit accounts - a non-exhaustive list of those the report fails to include:

British Gas - monthly direct debit for gas supply to my previous address, closed 2 years 10 months ago, and likewise at my two properties prior to that. Until then I had been a direct debit customer of theirs without break for something like (possibly exceeding) 20 years. When I ended this contract I received a letter thanking me for my business. Am I to infer that British Gas fail to update the records of the very same credit reference agency that they use to vet potential customers, or were Experian notified but then failed to register it on my report; or did their corruption of my 'previous postcode' prevent this successfully closed account being found?

British Telecom - monthly DD - successfully closed 6 weeks ago after approximately 20 years at four addresses.

Hutchison '3' network - monthly DD contract successfully closed 11 months ago.

Barclaycard Visa Platinum - paid off monthly in full by DD, and successfully closed 1 yr 5 months ago.

Scottish Power - monthly DD - successfully closed 2 yrs 10 months ago.

Virgin Broadband - monthly DD - successfully closed 2 yrs 10 months ago.

Vodafone - monthly DD - successfully closed approximately 6 yrs 5 months ago.

Mortgages - in case they are relevant - three successfully closed mortgages with different lenders, all paid by DD, most recently 2 yrs 10 months ago; no mortgage on the current house as I'm lucky enough to own it outright.

I note that I succeeded in passing the Experian Consumer Services credit check for their own Credit Expert service!


Credit History Summary (as shown in report)
Number of credit accounts (including those settled)1
Amount of available credit (excluding mortgages) £0
% of your total credit being used (excluding mortgages) 0%
Amount of outstanding debt (excluding mortgages) £0
Number of accounts overdue 0
Number of missed or late repayments in the last year 0


Conclusion:

I would be grateful to anyone – especially British Gas/Experian representatives - who can:

a) advise as to how best to resolve the Experian 'previous postcode' issue and get the relevant corrections and updates made to my report (in your experience is it best to write to them, or should I simply make a 'Notices of Correction' entry, and if so in what format?),

and/or

b) shed some light on why my application for credit was unsuccessful and how - assuming British Gas are interested in my ongoing custom - this might be resolved to the original timescale and with the deal I was lead to believe would be available, as we are currently paying significantly more per kWhr than we were under prepayment with Scottish Power.


All the best,
DGuest.

Experian_company_representative

We should be able to help with the previous postcode issue. Please drop us an email, referencing this thread, to customerrelations@uk.experian.com

While we provide credit scoring services for many lenders, the criteria and pass-marks are set by those lenders and only they can explain any particular decision. Credit reference agencies do not make lending decisions, but we certainly help. If the person you spoke to at BG can't help I suggest you ask to speak to someone in their underwriting department.

James Jones

DGuest

Sarah,


Can you help with this? I tried to PM you as suggested in your replies to previous posters but I get:

"British Gas company representative has chosen not to receive private messages or may not be allowed to receive private messages. Therefore you may not send your message to him/her."


Regards,
DGuest.

DGuest

Experian_company_representative wrote: »

We should be able to help with the previous postcode issue. Please drop us an email, referencing this thread, to [EMAIL="customerrelations&#64;uk.experian.com"]customerrelations@uk.experian.com[/EMAIL]

While we provide credit scoring services for many lenders, the criteria and pass-marks are set by those lenders and only they can explain any particular decision. Credit reference agencies do not make lending decisions, but we certainly help. If the person you spoke to at BG can't help I suggest you ask to speak to someone in their underwriting department.

James Jones

Thank you for responding. I have emailed your Customer Relations team as recommended.


Questions arising:


1. Assuming I correctly informed British Gas that I had been at my current address for 2 years, 10 months, should this period appear in the report against the search they submitted, (rather than the '0 years, 1 month' shown)?


2. As explained I have numerous 'successfully closed non-mail order accounts' (not least with British Gas 2 years, 10 months ago!) and significant unused available credit. How can I have these glaring omissions corrected?


3. As mentioned above, British Gas have advised me to wait 60 days before re-applying, and suggested this is how long it takes for Experian to "get things updated". How soon can I expect the errors I report to be corrected and when will I be able to re-apply?


Regards,
DGuest.