British Gas Reviews: Give your feedback

silvercar

British Gas slowly redeeming themselves.

Someone in their team is monitoring my switch over and keeping an eye on it. Had a second phone call confirming that they are watching my account and making sure it all gets sorted.

Border_Reiver2

We switched from Atlantic to British Gas through the cheap energy club and saved over £200 on gas and electric during 1 year. We were led to believe that British Gas would put us onto a standard tariff if we did nothing, so we started looking at switching again. While we were looking, we received a letter from British Gas informing us that they had looked at our usage and would put us on a new tariff that would actually save us more money - not much, but a few pounds per month and as good as or better than any other supplier. Well done British Gas (if it's true).

victor2

Border_Reiver2 wrote: »

We switched from Atlantic to British Gas through the cheap energy club and saved over £200 on gas and electric during 1 year. We were led to believe that British Gas would put us onto a standard tariff if we did nothing, so we started looking at switching again. While we were looking, we received a letter from British Gas informing us that they had looked at our usage and would put us on a new tariff that would actually save us more money - not much, but a few pounds per month and as good as or better than any other supplier. Well done British Gas (if it's true).

Be wary of the "savings" they quote. If they are using the OFGEM mandated method of calculating, they are comparing it to the cost of their standard (ie. most expensive) tariff once your current one ends.
Doesn't mean they aren't offering you a reasonable tariff, but it in all probability won't make a saving over your current tariff.

Border_Reiver2

victor2 wrote: »

Be wary of the "savings" they quote. If they are using the OFGEM mandated method of calculating, they are comparing it to the cost of their standard (ie. most expensive) tariff once your current one ends.
Doesn't mean they aren't offering you a reasonable tariff, but it in all probability won't make a saving over your current tariff.

They have actually given us a quotation of what our "new" tariff will be and it is slightly lower than before. If they try to be silly about it, we'll just switch again, their loss.

Crinkmeister

silvercar wrote: »

British Gas slowly redeeming themselves.

Someone in their team is monitoring my switch over and keeping an eye on it. Had a second phone call confirming that they are watching my account and making sure it all gets sorted.

You must be very important to have had two phone calls and someone to make sure your account is sorted out. O, good evening Your Majesty!! :D

Jessiecar

I'm sorry to vent but this hasn't been a fantastic experience so far
We switched from EDF to British Gas on about 5th October and I registered with their online site on the 6th. This was the duel fuel offer for Gas and Electricity through the MSE Cheap Energy Club.

Then I got an email from BG saying my new electricity supply day was 19th October.

Around 10th October, I got another email asking me to register online. When I looked at my online account, both the gas and electricity accounts appeared all right, but the electricity one seemed incomplete.

As we had a credit balance with EDF I contacted them about refunding our credit balance. They said they hadn't issued a final bill yet (so no refund) and also British Gas hadn't transferred the electricity supply yet.

The next day, British Gas asked us for meter readings. We didn't do this at once as it's not that easy to read the gas meter in our house.

Then on 21st October after I had completed the British Gas feedback form asking "How did we do?" I got another email from them saying that our electricity supply would start on 1st November.

Okay...

I submitted the meter reading on 28th October and got an acknowledgement saying they had received it. Two days later (I'm sure you know what's coming if you haven't died of boredom) I got another email saying "we're sorry, we couldn't process your meter reading".

So I re-submitted the meter reading on 31st October, and the same thing happened. I got the automated acknowledgement email and then the second email saying they couldn't process it. This was on 2nd November.

I rang up British Gas and managed to speak to someone in a call centre after a fairly long wait. He was quite helpful. I explained the situation and he said something about having to look it up in their main database and disappeared for some time.

I gave him some new meter readings and he said he would look into the situation with the electricity supply. I also said to him that I'd like to register a complaint (sigh) and he said that someone more senior would call me back within 48 hours. (They haven't called so far...)

To top it off, when our direct debits went out on 1st November, British Gas collected £21 and EDF collected £68.

Now, we're not exactly rolling in money, and you can imagine how easy it will be to get the money back off EDF, especially as British Gas seem unable to sort themselves out.

I'm really sorry to rant but this sort of thing seems to happen on a regular basis whenever we change utility company.:mad:

I'm so fed up, to be honest.

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fluffymitten

I joined the recent collective switch and utterly regret it. They think I have lived in Gloucester since March (I have lived in West London for over two years and never been to Gloucester), they have deleted my association with where I live, they have given me access to the full home address, email, and phone number of another person but claim that's not a breach of the DPA. The ongoing incompetence is astounding. I don't care how much it costs me, I am getting out of this contract as I am exceptionally concerned that there is some identity theft going on.
Other collective switches have been great. This one has been a disaster and I won't be chasing cheap any more if it's going to be at the expense of my security.

unhappychappy16

My account is still not correct and im still getting e-mails every few days for meter readings .... i noticed my account now shows " British Gas Beta " ooh cool im on the beta site so meter reads could go wrong again ......

Mary_McLary

My MSE big switch from Ovo to British Gas has been a nightmare. I got emails from BG asking me to submit my meter reading online, which I did - twice. BG said they had taken over my Ovo account from 20th Oct but when I rang Ovo to see what was going on they hadn't had the final readings. I gave Ovo the readings myself, and then rang BG to see why they hadn't given them the readings and they said they hadn't received them from me. They told me that you couldn't submit your opening readings online - so why was I getting emails with a link to do so? I then noticed that my direct debit had been set up and that BG would be taking 2 payments in Nov. Again I rang BG, and was assured that the first payment wouldn't be collected and to ring them if it was. When I rang to tell them it had been taken, a different person told me they always take a payment 14 days after the account is open and then the regular payments start on your chosen dates. At this point Ovo direct debit was also still live so I was facing the prospect of 3 payments going out of my account in 1 month! I am in credit with Ovo so I cancelled that direct debit myself. It is now almost a month since BG took over my supply and I still haven't had the final bill from Ovo - who owe me a considerable amount of money but which they can't give me until my account is settled. I know there are thousands of people doing this switch but even so, it has been a very frustrating process. In comparison, I also did a bank switch this year which was quick and simple and had no problems at all.

Zugspitze

I have a HomeCare 200 plan with British Gas. On November 22, an engineer came to provide the annual service and pronounced the boiler to be in good working order.

Seven days later, after overnight temperatures had fallen to -8 degrees C, the boiler failed to come on on the morning and required a reset - easy to do with just the twist of a dial. I put this down to bad luck. Four days later, the problem has recurred today.

BG HomeCare said they will send an engineer out tomorrow but at a cost to me of £99, which is the excess on the agreement. The hapless call centre assistant (who said he was new to the job) said he would raise a complaint when I bridled at the charge, could only guess about when I would hear back from the complaints department, and was unable to proceed with booking an engineer until I gave him my card details. Then I was put on hold for about 10 minutes whilst he fixed the appointment. Before ending the call, I informed the call centre assistant that I would be publicising my experience on the MoneySaving Expert forum.

Sometimes these organisations make me question my own sanity, but it is hard not to draw an obvious link between the engineer's annual service visit and the almost immediate problem with my boiler.

Fifteen minutes after the call, the assistant unexpectedly called me back to say that he would now try to arrange for an engineer to repair the issue tomorrow with no charge, given that it was so soon after the annual service. A further 15 minutes or so later on hold, and the appointment was confirmed.

Hopefully this issue will now be sorted out to my satisfaction in good time, but it makes me wonder how many times British Gas successfully get away with charging £99 to other customers whose boilers stop working shortly after the annual service.