Eon energy reviews: Give your feedback

AndyCF

Had an interesting afternoons worth of phone calls. Sorry to have to post this, really am.

I wanted to do two things, setup an arrangement for the Gas (its card fed) and speak to the ESTeam about the electricity supply (smart meter) with a view to an extension. I did realise I may of with the latter had to do this Monday morning when perhaps more senior staff were readily available. The gas was really today's concern.

I tried in the morning but live chat said 20 odd minutes wait so I checked later and it said unavailable. So it was phone time.

After a short wait, I spoke to a lovely lady who I spent a good 10-15 minutes explaining it all to, she said she'd pass me over to the appropriate department.

Spent about 15-20 minutes on hold. The 'hold music' changed after a while to the one with the message.

New representative on the phone did not know what I wanted at all, I asked if the data was there on the screen for my previous long chat (I have trouble concentrating for periods of time, so I cannot easily repeat myself, this is not my fault) and there was not so I had to briefly recap it all but just the gas this time.

She was helpful and attempted to set it up, even kindly checked which shops were open to pickup a new card as its not a case of having it just messaged to the card now as I thought it would be. Put me on hold while she rang around, nearest ones with a card available were about 20 minutes walk away, not ideal as there are shops within 5 minutes but they are not listed sadly. Anyway while on hold again I was cut off I never got to discuss the electricity nor find out which shop to go to.

Rang back, eventually got through despite the time, about 4pm by now iirc. Spoke to a new person. Helpful. Explained that I had the code but not where to go, he went through it again briefly to confirm it was setup and told the location. Asked about the electric while there he said I'd need to go back to the ESTeam for this as he could not authorise it and the ESTeam were unavailable. I just wish the first two had said this.

Before anyone wonders: I was not able to do this the previous few days as I was unwell, so it had to be today unfortunately.

Anyway the problems/feedback

1. Negative: Not being told the ESTeam was not available instead of the system (appearing to) just throw me back to the initial starting queue after ages on hold.

2. Neutral: I can't be sure but I sure did not hang up on the call!

3. Slightly Negative: The problems in getting a simple 'gas' update change. Three people in two long calls.

4. Positive: Everyone was polite and helpful on the phone. I have worked in customer service and I -always- treat those on the other end of the phone with complete respect.

5. Very Negative: To put the icing on the cake, although I only had a few pennies left on the gas, I could of just about managed I think maybe just as I'd of saved it for tomorrow had I know what would happen, read on...

However upon my long walk (ill health) to obtain the card and upon my return I find it appears it was not programmed/setup correctly

I had gas before I went out, very little but it was on. Now I do not. Not terribly happy.

I'm no expert but upon looking at all the screen readings, it appears it has only reset half of it looking at the credit vs debit. We are not taking more than two figures here either. Its shut itself off as despite it now being £40+ in credit (yes shows credit not debit, separate screen for that) a few minutes after my return  and popping the kettle on, the gas went off! On checking the meter again and trying the card again. It has updated the GD with the correct total figure, I checked that but also says "EC Used" and "OFF" , retrying the card again does not do anything. I did have this happen once before with a different supplier about 6 years ago , that took them 3 'shop visits' to update it to fix it however it never actually turned off.

I have electric heating so that's not a mass concern, what was is my kettle is stovetop (gas hobs) , ask a couple of people if they had a spare electric kettle but no so ended up borrowing an electric 'counter top' hob until Monday.

Update (Sunday) : I wanted to mention I am on the 'register' because of my health too.

Bear in mind yesterday when I put the card into the machine upon my return I did leave it in there for a few minutes, enough time for me to go in the house and come back out again. Est 2-3 minutes at least. I leave 'new' cards in the machine for a few minutes to ensure they initialise themselves properly something I've read about.

Today I thought I'd try it again as I was quite annoyed still. Put in machine, usual "0 on card" as expected, then a "hold A for gas" message, now why that did not appear yesterday despite several attempts I have no idea Card glitch perhaps ?

So I now do have supply today, however it still shows "EC Used" despite having supply now again , an incorrect credit/debit balance, but the total GD is right. To complicate it further the GDR (recovery) has now jumped to 99% , this should be 90% in most cases, as that afaik is the 'standard' setting for nearly all suppliers, as in you get 10% of monies for gas regardless, assuming the EC is not eaten (in my case it is though so I cannot place anything on it until its fixed) at 99% putting £10 in would give me £00.10p gas instead of £01.00p

Hugely upset and disappointed in all this and I still have to attempt to speak to someone about the electric concerns too on Monday as well as try to deal with the gas issues for the third time.

Am providing more feedback if an agent finds the customer is not on the line perhaps they should attempt a call back to check.

AndyCF

The lack of response (from anyone, not necessarily a rep) is slightly disturbing in itself. , I was not expecting any 'oh sorry' response But a response of some description maybe. I used to work in Customer Services so have "been both sides of the desk" and have no intention of "barking" at anyone

I want to ask a different question. I note that the electricity EC level is being reduced from 20 to 5 for Smart meters (realistically this about stops much value to that type of meter in most cases) however what is -not- clear is what happens if one has a Smart Gas also.

As I understand it before any changes:

Electric Smart only : EC = 20 (now 5) , something tells me this is not global but that's not relevant.

Electric Smart + Gas Smart = total of 15 EC can be split between as required (seems odd its less but does not matter)

Question is simply : If you have Smart Elec and Smart Gas (considering moving to Smart Gas from card) how is the EC going to work then ? Is it going to be 5 per meter now or stay at the '15 split as you choose'

Gerry1

AndyCF said:

The lack of response (from anyone, not necessarily a rep) is slightly disturbing in itself. , I was not expecting any 'oh sorry' response But a response of some description maybe

I fear it may be a case of TL;DR, especially with all those TLAs...

AndyCF

Gerry1 said:

AndyCF said:

The lack of response (from anyone, not necessarily a rep) is slightly disturbing in itself. , I was not expecting any 'oh sorry' response But a response of some description maybe

I fear it may be a case of TL;DR, especially with all those TLAs...

Perhaps, but if I'd put the whole story in (yes really) it would of been massive. I've not sorted this out properly yet either. Not been up to it to be honest, not through choice either. I have had time to see what it was doing however, aside from the fact the GD recovery rate was set at 99% (yes really I tried it , put £2 in, it kept 1.98 for GD and removed £0.02 from owing EC) , it was merely using the supplied credit to 'feed' the GD, a case of just moving "one pot to another" , oh well.

I do want to know about the Electricity E.Credit changes however as its not clear in some situations:

Previously:

Smart Elec Only : 20 EC

Legacy Elec Token Only : 5 EC

Legacy Card Gas : 5 EC

Smart Gas Only : EC unknown (probably not possible to have this without Smart Elec due to sending readings)

Smart Elec + Smart Gas : Total of 15 EC to be split/shared between as required.

What is not clear here is now the Elec EC for smart meters has been changed to 5 only (in reality you're now not much better off with a smart unit compared to a key one really) , what happens if you have a Smart Gas -and- Smart Elec ?

Rep Question: Does this mean it is still at at total of 15 'shared' EC between both meters ? Or is it 5 per meter now ?

Its not at all clear given that the Smart Elec E.Credit has been dropped from 20 to 5 (its always previously been 20 iirc, certainly the past two years if not longer) what happens to those who have both Smart Meters ?

Honest question

I'd also heard an unfounded rumour that those who were on the Priority Register would not have their EC reduced but that seems to be just a rumour, I've not seen it in print anywhere.

I was vaguely considering changing the card gas to smart gas so I was curious on what the ECredit situation would be.

AndyCF

Its quite telling (sorry) there's no answer to my question above.

Today feeling a lot better and wanting to take a fresh approach to it, I telephoned ( see my story here )

I spoke to a nice lady on the phone who as usual to their credit are always polite and helpful. I explained the situation with the gas namely:

> The meter was never actually set to what was agreed

> The GD recovery rate was set to 99% , machine default I'm sure is 90% and most suppliers afaik keep it at that

> I had gas before and did not after!

> The ECredit was never reset, meaning for each £1 I place into the machine, it eats 99p for the GD and then any remainder (if the GD is paid that week etc) for the EC which I can't reset.

I was merely after confirmation on it all, I explained last time that I had to call a couple of times.

Anyway she listened carefully and said she'd have to transfer me to someone else, fair enough.  

About 5 maybe 10 minutes later I spoke to someone else, guess what they did not know anything about anything I wanted so I was forced to explain myself again (this is now the 4TH yes really) time I've had to do this over two calls. I can't keep explaining the same thing repeatedly as I have some 'issues' its very difficult for me to maintain concentration for periods of time. It effects me for the rest of the day.

She was helpful and said she'd check about the GD rate as I was concerned it was not meant to be at 99% , if it was intended = fair enough but I asked her to please check this for me, as well as what had happened with the reprogramming. I'd explained I'd provided recent meter readings via shop visit and she could see those and was happy with them etc. She placed me on hold.

Guess what, after about 10 minutes it returned me to the main 'holding' line then cut me off

I don't know what to do next about this I really don't, there's no email to discuss it either. At least there are phone records to show all this.

I ask for no freebies or anything merely to have things "put straight" please. I think to be honest someone is going to have to come out and reset it properly as I'm going around in circles, and

AndyCF

I was able to find out about the EC levels now as it was not very clear (as the elec is set at 5 for most regardless of meter type) , as if you had both smart gas+elec you'd get previously iirc 15 to either split between or otherwise.

Anyway point to this post is I can now confirm apparently that the gas EC level on a smart unit will also revert down to 5 too, so each machine has 5, the same as legacy card/token type units have. Obviously if you live miles from the nearest shop to topup I think they extend it a bit more (I did read that somewhere) but when I had to speak to someone about an unrelated issue the other day I asked them about the EC level for gas with a smart now the elec one was changed as it was not clear.

simon_73

OK so I was just investigating how my fairly elderly father got £500 bill for one month and he seems to be locked into a EON rate until 2023  Bussiness tarrif for 29p per KWH
this is compared to my domestic rate 12.6p 
Anyone else heard of a tariff this high ?

Ady_State

Hi. I have had a great experience with EON but I think I have Martin to thank for that.

Back in Septamber last year Martin started to mention a looming crisis over fuel bills I was near the end of my contract with Eon so looked at other options to fix my bills Eon offered me the best two year fix at the time which was only slightly above the rate I was paying then so I did the fix which runs until September 2023.

I currently pay £50 a month and am currently using around £47-48 a month so my credit is building up.

I have my thermostat set to 15 degrees not to save money but because I am comfortable at that temperature.

If I get cold I put a sweater on!

I have a 2 bed bungalow and it has stayed above 15 degrees throughout the winter.   So the only gas I use is for cooking.

As for electricity I have low energy bulbs throughout and use the washing machine and tumble dryer during the daytime hours when the solar panels supply enough electricity to supply them easily.  I also wait to take my shower when the sun is up.

Consequently I have energy bills below £ 600 a year.

I do expect a bit of a shock next September though!

CRISPIANNE3

We were originally with Symbio and  switched just before E.on next took over our supply. We had to fight to get our credit of £27.00 but E.on eventually paid it to us.  However I was very surprised and with no intervention from us they have just sent me a cheque for £60 because they said the standard of service was below of what I should have expected.