Never Been Billed?!?

Leanna86

Wonder if someone can advise me of what to do as I am so angry with EDF and don't know where I stand.

I moved in to my rented property in August 2011, a new meter was fitted so know all usage is ours. I moved from a 1 bed flat to a 3 bed house and when I created the account with EDF they arranged £50 a month direct debit which would be revised every 3 months and will go up or down based on usage. that was fine all set up direct debit goes out every month.

I had my hands full as I had a new baby with a few problems, won't go in to detail but my mind was elsewhere so never really noticed I never had a bill just knew my direct debit was going out and didn't think too much about it.

When I did realise I never had a bill, or was never contacted to review my monthly payment I signed up online to view my accounts where I seen all my money was building up in credit and a bill had never been generated!!!

I have rung on a few occasions and emailed them and all they could ever do was input my meter reading!! useless, I have complained and also asked them to send an engineer to investigate my meter as the usage it shows equates to about £2500 a year which by no means do we use that much!! so I believe the meter is faulty, which would also explain why they cannot generate my account and link it to the meter.....they have been 'investigating' my account for about 5 months now and still no changes in the update.

I am wondering where I stand in that if they suddenly send me a bill for thousands of pounds do I have to pay this? No way could I afford this, and especially when I believe the meter is faulty or someone is tapping in to our meter - I don't know but EDF are not helping me at all, I don't know who to talk to or anything and it really is stressing me out badly!

I also want to find a cheaper provider and possibly use Martins new cheap energy site but don't know where I stand on moving when my account is in this state???

Any advise will be helpful

HappyMJ

What are the meter readings when you moved in and what are they now?

They can only charge you for 12 months of usage maximum. The payments you have been making would have gone towards the usage from 12 months before each payment was made so you could still have to pay for 12 months. However, £2,500 is much more than virtually anyone can use in a year without really noticing. It would have been about 100kWh per day over the winter months which would mean you would have a lot of daytime heating on electricity only which would be very unlikely.

Leanna86

it was a brand new meter so set to zero when we moved in, its now day rate 16287 kwh and night rate 14177 kwh this is over 18 months which we have NEVER had a bill issued, so none of my built up payments I have been making have been taken.

We live in a 3 bed semi detached and in the days nothing is on upstairs we only cook the one meal in the evening, yes we have the TV on but nothing mental!

I'm just expecting them to send me a massive bill and saying pay now, and us being in debt we cant afford a bill for a few hundred let alone the price im expecting them to send me, and the longer they are investigating the bigger im sure it will be

chanz4

whats the heating? Also if any one taps in its between you and the person, I suspect you have e7 storage / panel heaters set wrong

Leanna86

yes we are on E7 and we have storage heaters for heating our water which flicks on the cheaper rate during the morning...how do I know if its set wrong? how do I change it and would we be liable for it seeing as I have no clue about these things?

Leanna86

heating is elec radiators, we have no gas and only use the radiator in our sons room.

HappyMJ

so....20,309kWh over 12 months of which 46% is at the night rate. A gas heated property would use more than that but gas is a lot cheaper. It's possible. Why are you using panel heaters? How much do you use them? You should only be using the storage heating which is much cheaper.

What is the unit rate of the day rate and the night rate?

Fire_Fox

Sorry but IMO you could well have used that much,for a start the period in question covers the best part of two winters one of which was very cold. I've known people in small new build flats using £100 a month in winter, that was a few years ago and they had neighbours on most sides to keep the flat warm as well as a much smaller space to heat.

Cooking and televisions and lighting are not the issue here they draw relatively little power, it is heating, hot water and tumble dryers that eat electricity. If the heaters are drawing energy on the pricey day rate that will kill you, and if you have a new baby I am guessing you use far more hot water and perhaps tumble drier than you did as a single person/ couple. Have you been doing laundry in the day? Do you have a power shower or take deep baths?

Yes you are liable for the bill it's down to the occupant to make sure they know how to use the heating in your property, are on the right tariff and read the meter regularly. However you may well be able to pay the debt in instalments over, say, a year if you communicate with the energy provider. Try writing a letter.

macman

Your day rate consumption is unfeasibly high for a property with E7 and night storage heaters. Do you have electric heaters as well as night storage heaters? If you are using additional electric heating outside of the E7 cheap rate hours (usually midnight to 7am), then all that is at a premium rate-the trade off for E7 is that that you pay more for all non- cheap rate hours in return for the 7 cheap hours.
I don't know how you thought that £50 a month could possibly heat, light and power a 3 b/r property which is all-electric? A typical dual fuel tariff for such a property is more than twice that (and gas CH is much cheaper than E7). Unfortunately the fact that you 'have no clue about these things' does not remove your liability to pay for the energy used.
Your immersion heater should be set to heat up overnight using the E7 cheap rate (not in the morning, unless it's before 7am). Heating it after about 7am will cost around 300% more more, as it's then on peak rate NB: your storage heaters do not heat your hot water!
I suggest that you urgently investigate why your day rate usage is so high.

Wickedkitten

Leanna86 wrote: »

it was a brand new meter so set to zero when we moved in, its now day rate 16287 kwh and night rate 14177 kwh this is over 18 months which we have NEVER had a bill issued, so none of my built up payments I have been making have been taken.

We live in a 3 bed semi detached and in the days nothing is on upstairs we only cook the one meal in the evening, yes we have the TV on but nothing mental!

I'm just expecting them to send me a massive bill and saying pay now, and us being in debt we cant afford a bill for a few hundred let alone the price im expecting them to send me, and the longer they are investigating the bigger im sure it will be

If you have an tariff with an online account then you won't ever receive a bill in the post but if you update your readings online then you should have an up to date bill.

Definitely check the switching site though, we aren't far away from Bristol at all and Scottish Power havehad the cheapest e7 prices for this area for years.

chanz4

Leanna86 wrote: »

yes we are on E7 and we have storage heaters for heating our water which flicks on the cheaper rate during the morning...how do I know if its set wrong? how do I change it and would we be liable for it seeing as I have no clue about these things?

If you have the input to high, it could be wasting energy. I used £900 worth of gas / elec since sept