scottish power trying to charge me exist fees

backfoot

Aaaah fond memories.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3427121

Scottish Power never really got to grips with the decision or the intentions of the Regulations.

For a long time afterwards they claimed paperwork errors.:rotfl:

Perhaps the SP Rep will apologise and state that they are not so desperate to cling onto these appalling anti competitive charges for doing nothing and withdraw their silly fees.

backfoot

scottishpower_company_representative wrote: »

Bikeman sorry this has happened.

The point about telling us you are switching under right to cancel is so that we can flag your account not to apply the cancellation fee. Otherwise it is treated as an 'in-contract' switch and the fee is applied. Thanks David

I am afraid this is a pitiful excuse.

It would be so much better and easier for SP to alter your system to take away the cancellation fee from a product when a price increase is to be applied.

SP know that such charges are not allowed and persist in having a side process where your back office have to take individual action. Unfortuntely, half the time they forget to do it or you get some CSA trying to enforce it under some dubious technicality.

I raised this issue with SP previously soon after Ofgem clarified the rules. We are still getting situations like this which make your organisation look like a penny pinching outfit instead of a professional multinational company. Doesn't image mean anything these days?

Better still, get rid of these ridiculous fees on all variable priced contracts completely and charge customers for energy rather than made up admin charges and compete on price and customer service.

backfoot

Io_Saturnalia wrote: »

When I called to inform them of my intention to leave after receiving the same e-mail, the advisor assured me that I didn't need to and my new suppliers would inform them.

Io_Saturnalia wrote: »

I don't remember the exact text of the email it is it home but it was something along the lines of, 'Your deal is ending, we will move you onto our standard tariff unless you inform us by December 3rd you want to leave.' Which is what I did.

I too had a call from retentions yesterday claiming a termination fee would be payable said there was no record on the system of my call.

Can the SP Rep assure us that they will undertake some basic training of the relevant teams. i.e. understand their own letters, understand that phone calls are fully accepted communication methods that should be recorded. That the retentions team should not bully customers. It's not nice.

Also, why not make 'no Cancellation Charges' the default position and have your exception routine to add the charge, only when you are completly satisfied that such a charge is valid.

It seems that SP don't handle switching, end of contract and product transfers at all well. Too many work around processes.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3352560=

bikeman

Update: SP have advised me that upon receipt of a price change customers have the right to reject the price change and start a supplier switch without occuring cancellation charges.
The rejection must occur prior to the price change, in my case 3 dec and the switch must be started within 15 days of the price change.
This is all in the email sent.
The important point to note is whether I personally notified them or the new supplier did so is not important - they merely want to be advised of the decision to leave them prior to the price increase.
As such I have complied with their terms and will not incur cancellation fees.

Of course it is not in any providers best interest to lose a customer and leave them feeling agrieved.

backfoot

bikeman wrote: »

Update: SP have advised me that upon receipt of a price change customers have the right to reject the price change and start a supplier switch without occuring cancellation charges.
The rejection must occur prior to the price change, in my case 3 dec and the switch must be started within 15 days of the price change.
This is all in the email sent.
The important point to note is whether I personally notified them or the new supplier did so is not important - they merely want to be advised of the decision to leave them prior to the price increase.
As such I have complied with their terms and will not incur cancellation fees.

Of course it is not in any providers best interest to lose a customer and leave them feeling agrieved.

I am glad you have got it sorted.

Secondly, to help further, the 15 day rule does not apply to cancellation charges, only to the price increase rejection.If Scottish Power are still saying that in their correspondence and verbally, they are wrong.

Scottish_Power

Backfoot cancellation fees are a commercial decision. It is not our policy for retention teams to be as agressive as has been made out, however we are interested in retaining customers wherever possible. It sounds unlikely in this case that the correct procedure was followed I suspect that the right to cancel was properly recorded in Io Saturnalia's case. Staff are regularly reminded about right to cancel whenever a product termination reminder is communicated. Hope this helps. David

Scottish_Power

jalexa wrote: »

If you are the barrack room lawyer I think you might be, try to make something of this...

23.6 The licensee must treat the variation as ineffective and neither enforce nor take advantage of it where –
(a) the Domestic Customer notifies the licensee after he becomes aware (by any means) of the variation on or before the date on which the variation has effect that he is ending the Domestic Supply Contract by changing his Gas Supplier; and

(b) no later than 15 Working Days after the Domestic Customer has notified the licensee in accordance with sub-paragraph 23.6 (a), the licensee received Notice under the Network Code by way of the Relevant Gas Shipper that another Gas Supplier will begin to supply the Domestic Customer’s Domestic Premises within a reasonable period of time after the date on which that Notice has been given; or

IMO the "before the variation date" has precedence over the order of the events since the requirement is compliance with 23.6(a) i.e before the variation date. So get your notice in to Scottish Power pronto and/or a Complaint citing my argument:D.

There is similar wording for electric.

Oh and an aside. Look out for some final account nasties from Scottish Power, including loss of your online access just when you need it most, splitting of a dual-fuel account into separate accounts, arbitrary allocation of the single bill balance to separate fuels possibly creating credit and debit balances (never the twain shall cancel each other out). If you are lucky enough to have a credit balance, a refund eventually by cheque in the post.:rotfl: Remind me which century we are in.

Jalexa

we are in the process of moving to a new billing system over the next 12-18 months which will iron out some of these issues. In particular the cheque refund is a constraint of the existing system, in future we will be able to refund direct to bank accounts.

Hope this helps. David

backfoot

scottishpower_company_representative wrote: »

Backfoot cancellation fees are a commercial decision. It is not our policy for retention teams to be as agressive as has been made out, however we are interested in retaining customers wherever possible. It sounds unlikely in this case that the correct procedure was followed I suspect that the right to cancel was properly recorded in Io Saturnalia's case. Staff are regularly reminded about right to cancel whenever a product termination reminder is communicated. Hope this helps. David

The evidence of two separate posters differs.

Your letter regarding the 15 day rule applying to Cancellation Fees is also incorrect. Please refer to your Legal Department before issuing further letters.

Cancellation Fees may be a commercial decision but not a good one, especially when they end up being charged to customers without any right to do so.

A gesture of goodwill in such circumstances would be appropriate.

jalexa

scottishpower_company_representative wrote: »

Jalexa

we are in the process of moving to a new billing system over the next 12-18 months which will iron out some of these issues. In particular the cheque refund is a constraint of the existing system, in future we will be able to refund direct tobank accounts.

Hope this helps. David

Thanks for the update. It is the arbitrary creation of a single fuel debit balance from a dual fuel credit balance I personally have found most annoying. I trust that is one of the issues to be ironed out.

On "cancellation fees being a commercial decision" surely you mean waiving valid fees may be an commercial decision. You cannot charge fees exempted by regulations.

Scottish_Power

I can't speak to the single fuel final account issue as I'm not sure how this will be handled yet.

We don't charge cancellation fees that have been exempted by regulations. We will charge fees if a customer moves in the middle of a product term, where fees are attached to the product, except for price increase where we have been notified of a request to cancel.