Scottish Power - when paying for your energy used isn't enough!

nsdlil

Dear Forum ,
SP had a 'forecast for the rest of the year' facility before their recent website update and I've been told they will be reinstating it this Summer . Due to the especially inclement weather and family sickness our winter usage increased by around 33% a month and thru' the SP feature and using http://www.ukpower.co.uk/tools/smart_meter_calculator to project an annual cost , I made ad-hoc payments to keep the DD s to the original amounts BEFORE submitting monthly readings (which generate the quarterly DD recalculation) . SP's system 'creaks' a bit with this , although I was advised that the recent website changes are linked to the requirement for coping with 'smart' meter readings in the future . I hope they do full & adequate customer testing in the implementation of their future changes to ensure that ALL account payments , both DD and ad-hoc are included in the recalculations and that they allow the possibility of micro managing and control by customers , which is actually what most commentators call for , although I recognise my interest as an OAP is largely as a hobbyist .

Simon7685

Cardew.....

I am not looking for a fight, I do however constantly have to keep having one because SP will not listen to me. They are not interested in whether I can disprove their estimations, they are only agreeable with what their computer wants to tell them and that is the problem. Also when you ask how they can suddenly come up with a way over the top estimation, all you get is, because that is how much you will use!

Yes when they wanted to increase my payments to £125 in April, I was able to get them reset to what they were (should/need to be) but not without a lot of hassle. I again had to fight and threaten to cancel the DD, just to get them to put me through to Customer Care. Even then I was told I could not speak to anyone else and if I did, they would only concur with what I had already been told and no way would they reduce my payments, which obviously wasn't the case. Then when it comes to the next time I end up having to go through the whole scenario again, only this time, I had all the garbage that I noted on my opening post thrown at me. It took me just short of 2 1/2 hours on the phone to get it sorted and once I got though to Customer Care, it was reset without issue in about 30 seconds.

As a customer I should not have to go through all of this every 3 months. They are the only company that I have dealt with that seem to want to go to the end of the earth to stop you speaking to someone with a bit more clout. That I concede does absolutely infuriate me.

I do accept that I am one of probably a handfull of customers that such bizzarre fluctuations in usage and obviously that probably means their computer system does not know how to work out my future forecasts. That though should not mean they are not prepared to sit down and listen and look for a way forward, that will suit both them and me. I do not want to end up owing them a load of money at the end of the year but neither do I want to be paying over and above what is needed, I cannot afford to, which is another part of the problem.

That does not mean that I should have a bespoke system all to my self, that would be silly and impossible. There are alternatives though.

I have noticed that you keep refering to the interest gained from money being in the bank and not in their account. I do not have an issue with that, as I do not receive interest on monies in my current account anyway. If you thought I was giving that impression, sorry I wasn't.

The problem I have with paying anything extra, even for 3 months, is one I cannot afford to suddenly start paying an extra £20 or more a month, my budgets are too tight and two, I know I do not need to. Which is why somewhere they are going to need to listen to me and look at how my usage patterns pan out. If they don't I do not believe it will ever settle down, even after the first year.

My usage is so far away from a normal pattern that I think in year 2 the computer will still be looking to increase payments, even though the forecast will should be made on the first years usage, with last winters excessively high usage. When it sees what the usage is from Dec - Mar it will be demanding an increase, I cannot afford to pay and that is part of the problem. So maybe I will end up being forced to change my payment method to a manual credit every month but if that happens, I think they will be even less inclined to accept my insistance that the payment amount is correct. So that will then lead back to all the same problems again.

You ask how companies should estimate and forecast for people who don't have a clue about their usage. Well if energy companies shared information about peoples usage they should have the answer there. If the customer doesn't know the old energy company will when they switch, so the information can be passed on. If it is a new build then I would suggest using an average for the property type in the area, which is probably not too far away from what they do now. The usage can then be measured and checked every 3 months for the first year and adjustments made if needed.

As regards future forecasts for people, I think they should ultimately be looking to measure use over a 3 to 5 year period and calculate an average from that. That would seem a fairer picture to me. Where someone does not have that in depth a history then again there should be averages for the property type and area and a system could default back to that.

Obviously that is only an overview of something they could do, it will have lots of pitfalls and need to be a bit more in depth and have some problems ironed out but I think it would give a much better and more accurate forecasting.

Simon7685

SwanJon

Some of them will accept it and have regard to it, if they know you qualify for it. I was able to get N Power to accept it on my Mothers account in January. It wasn't easy granted but they did do it. I know that was probably an exception to the rule though.

However it does open up another debate in itself with the WHD. Is it fair that a company will not allow for the WHD in their calculations, if they know the customer is going to get it?

Surely the point of why it exists is to stop people struggling to meet the heavy winter period costs? Also to help the vulnerable and those in fuel poverty be able to afford to heat their homes. The WHD is worth £11.25 a month in 2014. So if your forecasted payments are £60 a month, wouldn't it make more sense to set them at £50 and let the customer have the benefit of lower monthly payments over the year?

I guess its a bone of contention but does again seem a fairer way to administer it, if the energy company knows the customer is going to receive it.

SwanJon

It would be nice if they could do it that way, but it would only work retrospectively - once the payment has been made your DD amounts would drop.
Expecting a payment 9 months in the future to affect payments now is unrealistic as manyy things could happen in between - move house, change supplier etc.
I accept that for the core group who get the payment even if they do move house or change supplier it is not quite the same challenge (once the cut off date has passed), but would require changes to billing systems - otherwise you end up paying thenin the summer when the credit isn't needed - or do you excluide prepayment and pay on bill customers from your solution?

Simon7685

Nsdlil

Another bone of contention, if they had regard to every payment that was made it would reduce the amount of the forecasted monthly payment, so they would get less money. I can't see that happening in a hurry...........

Simon7685

Cardew.....

I meant to say before, I am assuming you have read and digested the information on my usage that I worked out yesterday and posted?

If so I would be interested to know if you would now agree that my usage this year (Oct 12 - Oct 13) (albeit with a 3 month period I have forcasted based on last years period) is covered by my current payments?

Also whether you agree that using my first year usage for the second year my payments are going to work out, assuming the usage forecast is right and I don't use any more.

If you do, then how exactly would you suggest that I get SP to accept it and stop messing around with my payments every 3 months? A hard question I realise because their computer isn't going to accept it I don't think.

Finally one other gem of wisdom I forgot to put is my percentage split for this year. I know the national average is 55/45 but based on my calculations mine for this year is going to be 75% night and 25% day. I think this is also something that SP are struggling with because I am so far away from the norm.

Simon7685

SwanJon wrote: »

It would be nice if they could do it that way, but it would only work retrospectively - once the payment has been made your DD amounts would drop.
Expecting a payment 9 months in the future to affect payments now is unrealistic as manyy things could happen in between - move house, change supplier etc.
I accept that for the core group who get the payment even if they do move house or change supplier it is not quite the same challenge (once the cut off date has passed), but would require changes to billing systems - otherwise you end up paying thenin the summer when the credit isn't needed - or do you excluide prepayment and pay on bill customers from your solution?

I don't include or exclude anyone, I just think that it is another thing that has been brought in to help people but maybe somehow should have been better adminsitered as I can see where some people can be struggling to make payments before it hits their accounts and then reaping the benefit of lower payments afterwards doesn't necessarily even things out for them. It's always about what you have left after the bills have been paid that counts when on a limited income, so only have £30 for shopping from say Nov - Mar, doesn't really help to know form April - Oct you're going to have £50, if you know what I mean.

I guess all these things are never easy to administer and you will never get the perfect system that works for everyone, I do understand that.

I think that what they should have done though was leave the social tariffs in place that were there before. By and large they seemed to be working and helping people throughout the year, which I thought was better.

The problem with the WHD is it resulted in many many people ending up worse off as a result. I know in my own case I was on BG Essentials and the ending of it meant my annual bill went up by nearly £400, so a credit of £130 last year still meant a hefty jump.

Don't get me wrong I am extremely grateful of getting whatever it is and it does help. It has covered the higher usage incurred last winter.

My main gripe was the majority of people were sucked in thinking great we are getting £130, then £135, then £140 each year and the energy companies were really rubbing their hands together because most people ended up paying a load more for the same energy they were using. A great strategical move though for the energy companies:D

Cardew

Simon7685 wrote: »

Cardew.....

I meant to say before, I am assuming you have read and digested the information on my usage that I worked out yesterday and posted?

If so I would be interested to know if you would now agree that my usage this year (Oct 12 - Oct 13) (albeit with a 3 month period I have forcasted based on last years period) is covered by my current payments?

Also whether you agree that using my first year usage for the second year my payments are going to work out, assuming the usage forecast is right and I don't use any more.

If you do, then how exactly would you suggest that I get SP to accept it and stop messing around with my payments every 3 months? A hard question I realise because their computer isn't going to accept it I don't think.

Finally one other gem of wisdom I forgot to put is my percentage split for this year. I know the national average is 55/45 but based on my calculations mine for this year is going to be 75% night and 25% day. I think this is also something that SP are struggling with because I am so far away from the norm.

I really think you are missing the point.

It is not in dispute that your estimate(and it is an estimate) will prove to be correct and your DD did not need to be changed.

That presumably was the case when you had the same issue with BG and EDF.

You appear to have a problem discussing this issue on the telephone with call centre staff without losing your temper - I suggest you re-read your first post:

I have just had the mother of all rows with Scottish Power and lost my temper big style, in fact I can't remember when I was last as angry:mad:

So simply send them an email stating your position and say that you require your DD to remain at the current level.

As I have stated in several posts, your consumption pattern is atypical(75% usage on off-peak) and the computer cannot have a bespoke program for the 4 million SP customers.

In any case when they have a year's consumption history your issue becomes a non-problem as they use that history for your future estimate of consumption.

Try and look at your posts on this subject in this thread objectively and IMO you have made a huge fuss - customers dying etc - about nothing other than SP's computer being unable to anticipate your future consumption.

malc_b

I think the main point here is that the OP was told he didn't know what he was talking about and SP was right. When you know you're right that is a red rag to bull.

I must admit that I'm another pedant that records annual usage (how else can you do a search for cheapest deal if you don't know what you use?). I had a similar issue with my mortgage. There was an error, mortgage company said no our computer is always right. Went to ombudsman who said yes I understand your maths but even I can't get them to see it so I'm just going tell them to pay you £xx in compensation, which I accepted as it this covered the shortfall and the error was a one off caused by the mortgage company changing format.

I would suggest the same approach here. Rather than ringing I'd email or write saying these are my last x years consumption figures so this is the calculated annual consumption, hence my DD should be £xx. I think I'd say I'd accept rounding to £100. If not then said you aren't happy with that wish this to be made a formal complaint.

That then gives then 8 weeks to sort it out after which you can take it to the ombudsman which AFAIK automatically charges the company for having to investigate your complaint so SP should be keen to sort it. After all if you can prove your consumption is constant and SP are ignoring this and thus attempting to overcharge you then they don't have a leg to stand on have they? BTW when you apply to the ombudsman don't forget to claim for all the letters and phone calls. Letters are at least £12 each.

anotheruser

Maybe because the bill is generated on the 15th, it detects your account is in debt, therefore wants to adjust your DD.
I bet if your DD came out a few days before the bill was generated, you wouldn't have a problem with all this.