Npower CSR blamed Ofgem

Consumerist

According to an <Ofgem leaflet> published Aug 2013 :-

. . . If you are an existing customer, your payments will be based on energy use over the previous year with adjustments if there have been any price changes. If you are a new customer, the payments will be based on a number of factors including previous meter readings and the number of rooms and/or the number of people living in the property.

Quoting to an energy supplier from the above leaflet should help settle any disagreement or else a complaint to the Ombudsman Service: Energy should resolve the matter.

pencekeeper

Consumerist wrote: »

According to an <Ofgem leaflet> published Aug 2013 :-
Quoting to an energy supplier from the above leaflet should help settle any disagreement or else a complaint to the Ombudsman Service: Energy should resolve the matter.

Thanks very much for that - will try if they respond to my email insisting on it being based on the next 6 months rather than 12. If they ever do respond that is.

undercover_peon

The extent of ofgems involvement is to say (a few years ago) that suppliers had to regularly review direct debits and they had to have some kind of process in place for automatic refunds.

How this was done was left to suppliers.

Npower direct debit system is setup to fail (even before their new billing system which is one giant epic fail).

You get a quote and sign up based on 12 months consumption. At some point the system does a reassessment to ensure you have a zero balance by the time of the next bill (and it is largely guessing at this point). Thus if you join just before winter you can end up with an absurd direct debit amount.

The variation is even worse if the bill has been delayed. If there is only one monthly payment left until the next bill the system WILL try to recover the balance in that one payment.

As an aside i feek the direct debit amount should be standadrized as, once again, power suppliers have shown they cant be trusted. Whilst i acceot there is a risk in this i feel the supplier should be limited to advising the customer what the payment should be for the first year.

nPower

pencekeeper wrote: »

Hi

Just had a direct debit change from Npower which made my eyes water. This looks to be because they are now setting the DD based on the next 6 months usage rather that the 12 months they did before. And of course we're going into winter so it will be much higher, and then very low during summer.

I phoned them and they said it had to be over 6 months and not 12 so customers didn't get a large debit or credit buildup, and this was based on Ofgem rules implemented in the last few months.

Is this true?

I appreciate for some people this may be better, and after all if you drive your car lots more in one half of the year than the other you pay differing amounts for fuel over both 6 month periods. For me the peak and trough DD system annoying and I really didn't want a 50% increase in DD for Christmas. I'd rather my DD was a 12 month average.

Still, if it really is Ofgem then it isn't Npower's fault (for once).

Also, https://customerservices.npower.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/492 seems to imply it should be set over 12 months:

Hi pencekeeper,

We review your account annually and check it approximately half way through your billing year, to ensure that your payments are on track for your projected usage.

When we complete your annual check we will set your payments based on your forecast for the next 12 months, however we will adjust your payments at the half way point in an attempt to prevent a credit/debit accumulating on your account by the time your annual check is due, if necessary.

I can see that you have emailed us about your query, however if you would like me to take a look into this to make sure your payments are at the correct level, please send me your details using the address in my profile page.

Thanks

Leigh

pencekeeper

nPower_company_representative wrote: »

Hi pencekeeper,

We review your account annually and check it approximately half way through your billing year, to ensure that your payments are on track for your projected usage.

When we complete your annual check we will set your payments based on your forecast for the next 12 months, however we will adjust your payments at the half way point in an attempt to prevent a credit/debit accumulating on your account by the time your annual check is due, if necessary.

I can see that you have emailed us about your query, however if you would like me to take a look into this to make sure your payments are at the correct level, please send me your details using the address in my profile page.

Thanks

Leigh

Thanks very much for the response Leigh, which I consider to be fair and reasonable. I note that this is not what your CSR said, who specifically made reference to a recent Ofgem change in the last few months which obliged Npower to set DDs based on a more short term basis (not to be confused with the mid annual term review).

To be clear I have just had my annual anniversary with yourselves and am 6 months away from the mid term review.

Additionally the billing system looks to be greedy. I should point out that I do owe Npower £35. Using Npower's own forecast of my energy costs for the next 12 months from my bill of a few days ago, the system has set my DD 55% higher than the predicated monthly average including how much I owe you - (12 months predicted costs + debit amount)/12. I appreciate Npower may want the full debit amount earlier than in a years time, but the bill stated that even if I pay off the £35 now, then DD would still be 44% higher than the predicated monthly average. Again, this is not a mid term review designed to put a customer's payments back on track.

I will wait for the response to my email from Npower CS and, if it does not agree with what you have said in your post, may take you up on your offer to look into this further.

Thanks again for your post.

undercover_peon

The billing system IS greedy, given the exact same figures it WILL come up with a higher figure than the previous billing system. It is all about minimizing debt, though how not being able to bill customers at all supports this is beyond me

I wonder if the Npower rep would care to comment on why the mid term reassessments are routinely way higher than the 12 month figure given by a comparison using accurate consumption figures???

pencekeeper

nPower_company_representative wrote: »

Hi pencekeeper,

We review your account annually and check it approximately half way through your billing year, to ensure that your payments are on track for your projected usage.

When we complete your annual check we will set your payments based on your forecast for the next 12 months, however we will adjust your payments at the half way point in an attempt to prevent a credit/debit accumulating on your account by the time your annual check is due, if necessary.

I can see that you have emailed us about your query, however if you would like me to take a look into this to make sure your payments are at the correct level, please send me your details using the address in my profile page.

Thanks

Leigh

Hi Leigh

Unfortunately despite calling Npower again, they steadfastly refuse to base DDs on 12 months rather insisting on a high winter and low summer DD. The CSR stated this is was company policy. No matter how I explained what they said on their own webpage, your response above and the fact I was at my annual review the CSR sais she couldn't let me go into debit.

I asked to take this further and the CSR explained her manager could not overrule this nor could the manager's manager. I asked for a note of dissatisfaction to be placed on my account and was told I could not speak to anyone else regarding the complaint.

I will email the address on your user page Leigh, and see if you can assist.

I note the email I sent to Npower (helpline@npower.com) on the 10/12/13 has still not been answered.

Consumerist

I've just been reading about <npower's £1 penalty by Ofgem> because of breaches of it's Licence Conditions.

Ofgem, in the form of the Ombudsman Services: Energy, may be interested to hear about your issue.

It seems that this particular leopard is refusing to change its spots.

silverwhistle

Thanks consumerist - just had a (very) quick scan of that document and although there are plenty of things that I might have noticed if I were reading closely, this is the only thing I noted: the estimating "matrix only took into account two factors: the number of bedrooms and the number of occupants per household"

So the fact that my house is well-insulated and I have solar panels (meaning no gas consumption between roughly late April and October) would not be taken into consideration?

I've not too long moved so ended up with Npower, but I can't see any reason to stay with them. Fortunately from the point of view of administration (if not unit rates) I'm on pay-on-receipt-of-bill: 4 months and waiting...

The Npower representative here tries to be helpful, but does any of this c**p get through to senior management, and if so what TF are they doing about it? Certainly not empowering their own staff. They're all that is bad with modern management, and I'm speaking as an ex-ESI employee with a little involvement with large scale billing systems and data migrations.

(Sorry - Electricty Supply Industry)

scaredofdebt

tomthered wrote: »

Claim the money back under Direct Debit guarantee rules. They have to give you 10 working days notice to change a direct debit. If they dont you can ask the bank to reclaim the money. Its quicker than waiting 5 weeks!!

:beer::beer:

Absolutely true.

However, if the bank returns a Direct Debit from nPower, for whatever reason, nPower then cancels the Direct Debit so you need to get in touch to reinstate it.

If it is returned by the bank due to insufficient funds, nPower will try to claim it again a few days later, if that fails then they will cancel the Direct Debit.

That is quite useful to know if you are affected.