Npower - massive gas bill :(

strummergirl

Hi everyone

Our direct debit went out for gas ONLY today usually £40, and they took £156 :eek:

Having called up, that's now our monthly payment for the future as we owe them £540 for gas over the winter. At our wits end as we really cant afford that! I appreciate that we used the gas and we owe the money but I think it's so unreasonable to more than triple our direct debit with no notice at all!

So my questions is, (I'm not very au fait with utilities and switching!) If we pay the £540 arrears over the next few months can we leave npower? We absolutely cannot afford that payment moving forward.

Many thanks

JamesMason_2

http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/wales/consumer_w/consumer_energy_and_water_supply_e/consumer_energy_supply_e/problems_switching_energy_suppliers/you_cant_switch_energy_supplier_because_of_a_debt.htm


James

Nada666

strummergirl wrote: »

So my questions is, (I'm not very au fait with utilities and switching!) If we pay the £540 arrears over the next few months can we leave npower? We absolutely cannot afford that payment moving forward.

I take it you mean you want to immediately leave npower and pay them off over a few months separately rather than you pay the £540 over a few months and then leave?

No to the former. If you apply to switch even with a payment plan in place npower are liable to block any application to switch.

If you do not want to pay the four or five hundred pounds up front to leave then you may as well resolve to change to current cheapest tariff with npower and stick with them until you have caught up. Remember even if you do switch your net monthly outlay will not be any lower than your new direct debit - you will have to pay £80 or £90 to any new provider and pay off the balance to npower over three or six months.

If you really cannot afford to pay £156 per month you can apply to npower to get a prepayment meter fitted. That way the debt repayment can be set lower.

strummergirl

No, no I meant pay them then leave We will have to afford it for now but cannot do it long term - its so high!!

If we switched after all paid up, our direct debit wouldn't be as high is my logic. I don't know anyone who pays that much for gas WITh electricity! Thanks

Nada666

Well, if you pay off the balance then of course you can switch. You do, however, have to start reading your meters on a monthly basis and then estimate how much you are actually using and make sure your ongoing debit is realistic - otherwise the exact same thing will happen with your next supplier.

jaybeetoo

Don't move for the sake of it unless your next supplier provides cheaper gas. Moving to a lower monthly direct debit for more expensive gas will leave you worse off and you'll be back in the same position.

macman

But your payment will drop down again once you have cleared the arrears. You are not actually using £156 of gas per month. It's a catch-up bill from the long winter period, almost certainly because you have not given regular 3m reads-easily avoided.
However the supplier cannot alter your DD without prior notice. If they have done so, then invoke the DD guarantee with your bank and they must immediately refund it.

superted187

Hi there,

We had a similar situation with regards to our npower electric bill. We have no gas at our property.

Our arrears were a massive £600 for the winter period. It is horrible to receive a bill like this and that bill will only get bigger in future. Phone them up, be polite, and explain that you cannot afford to pay what they are asking, and ask to setup a payment plan.

This is the best option if you don't want to move supplier just yet. You will essentially get an interest free loan from npower to pay off the arrears on your account. This is obviously smarter then settling the debt on a credit card (as you will pay no interest) or stretching to pay it off over a short amount of time.

Npower will then spread the payment over a period of time ontop of your normal usage payments.

The more important thing though, is think about the future. Everyone's gas and electric bill will only get more expensive in the future. They have us plebs over a barrel.

With that in mind, do everything that you possibly can to cut your gas consumption. Learn how to read your gas meter. Take a gas reading every day at the same time for a fortnight. Keep a note of what the reading was, and which gas consuming appliances were in use that day and how long for. This will hopefully help you find which appliance is battering your gas, if any.

This is what we did with our electric usage, and after 2 months of over payments npower were happy to adjust my payment plan ndown again as we had cut our usage so much. I appreciate that this may be a little more tricky with gas, but it would still be worth a try.

Your biggest consumer of gas will be your central heating and hot water, assuming they are both using gas. Are you in rented or are you an owner occupier?