Electric Bill Doubled after switching!

sandrogalli

Hi guys,

As the title states I have a small problem which I could use your help for. I recently switched from Powergen and British Gas to Atlantic Electric and Gas using the uswitch website. At the time I was paying approximately £1000 p/a on my utilities, and the quote was about £830. A direct debit was set up and the switch went smoothly no problems there.

However two months after the switch, I received a letter from Atlantic stating that the estimate for my electric was too low and my monthly bill would have to be increased from £43 to £108 pounds per month! Obviously this came as a bit of a shock as my usage had remained largely the same. I have not yet contacted them about the issue because I was wondering what could have caused such a steep rise in my bill.

I know that the recent price hikes may have been a factor, and that the time of my switch (October 2006) seems to have coincided with this. This may have increased my monthly bill, but surely not an extra £65 per month??

There is also one other thing. At the time of the switch, we were advised to provide our meter readings to Atlantic so they could determine the cut off point from Powergen. I was at university at the time, and this did not happen. I am not sure of the complications this would cause, but I am beginning to suspect that it may be related to the unexpected increase. Could anyone confirm this? If this is the cause of the problem, how should I go about talking to Atlantic about this.

I will probably call Atlantic in the next couple of days to see what they have to say. Any advice you may have about what to ask or say will be very warmly appreciated.

Thank you,

San

p.s. I am also aware from the posts on this forum that I can claim a rebate from Atlantic due to the delay they have in introducing there recent price cuts. I would however, like to make sure that I have a correct bill before I set about doing this.

darkcloudi

When you changed gas and electric suppliers using uswitch did you provide gas and electric usage in Kwh or did you say amount you spent in pounds.

In the comparison website if you were comparing cost as oppose to usage thats where your problem is. There are numerous threads on this subject.

nellykim

Regarding the switch from Powergen to Atlantic, I also switched, the same way. I gave my kwh to them, in October 2006. The bills that followed; I was always in DEBIT, and I now owe them something like £240.

I know they would have to put up their price, but it would be to the same level I was paying beforehand, to Powergen ( and I got Tesco Points before !!)

I e mailed them - no reply, did so again, no reply. So yesterday I switched back to Powergen, and Powergen have a freephone, and the female operator I spoke to - Debbie- on their customer team was more helpful than any other operator I have ever spoken to. Their customer service is brilliant, I think. And that counts for a lot.

I would advise you to change back to Powergen.

anniecave

sandrogalli - take a current meter reading for both your gas and electricity. Then make sure that these new readings are higher than your final readings for your previous suppliers. If not then you need to go through the disputed readings process with your new supplier to get a correct changeover reading.

In addition, I would work out how many kilowatt hours you use for each for gas and electric in a year (from your previous bills), then work out how much that will cost with the new tariffs from Atlantic. Divide the annual cost by 12 and that is how much you should be paying per month for each as a dd. It's probably something in between the low estimated dd payment figure they often start off with and the revised dd figure. If you have paid too little for a few months though you will need to pay off the debt as well as the correct monthly amount, so your revised monthly dd figure will be high for a while whilst the debt balance is paid off.

anniecave

and i'd only advise going back to your previous supplier if their prices are cheaper than your new supplier!