Switching from NPower to EDF

Judi11

We changed from NPower to EDF Oct 2013 with Cheap Energy Club. The Electricity switched fine but we had a problem with the Gas switch up until a couple of months ago (around Feb 2014). EDF have now billed us fully but NPower are still holding on to around £600 of our money! The account has been closed with them and we have repeatedly called them but they keep saying it will take around 50 days to sort out. We have now put a complaint in to the Ombudsman so hopefully we will get our money back soon. Lesson learnt - don't overpay any energy company, always owe them money.

So unfortunatley there are still problems with switching, but it won't stop us switching again if we see a better deal.

Scotsaver_2

Hi I am now in the same position, switched from Npwer to Eon. NPower have £919 of my cash, the account is closed, I have asked for it back but they just keep blanking my requests, I have even asked for £1000 for the inconvenience caused but as yet to no avail. I have taken screen prints from my account just in case they make it disappear. Does anybody have any advice that can help me get my cash back? Are they breaking any laws? Any help would be much appreciated.

Thanks:mad:

chanz4

have they agreed the final read yet, as this can take time

Judi11

In my case they have now agreed the final read for the Gas which is why EDF have now billed us and the account is closed with NPower, although when we ring NPower they say that the account is not closed???

Scotsaver - I will let you know when we hear from either NPower or the Ombudsman

Adibooizzietoo

I am in the same position I left Npower end of February and they received a meter read from me then and one from OVO on 12th March. I was told it takes up to 40 working days to produce a final bill! my 40 working days is Tuesday 6th May. They have a credit balance of £843.60. I know i am due a bill probably around £350 leaving a credit of just under £500.

heloid

Raise a complaint, wait 8 weeks then escalate to Ofgem. The Executive complaints team are the only ones that could probably generate a bill in the whole of nPower and they have a 7/8 week backlog right now.

Judi11

An update to our situation. To cut a very long story short after numerous calls, letters and emails with NPower and the Ombudsman (who seem to be just as useless), NPower have decided to write off the bill, because they can not work it out, but they still owe us £600! We have called and emailed to say we do not accept them just writing off the account and now wait to see what happens. We are just going to keep fighting this as it's now more out of principle, even if it takes another year.

We have decided that we are now not going to pay direct debit to any energy company and have cancelled this and we will now always owe money to the company.

Even my partner is now raging about this, and that takes a lot to make his blood boil!

naedanger

Judi11 wrote: »

An update to our situation. To cut a very long story short after numerous calls, letters and emails with NPower and the Ombudsman (who seem to be just as useless), NPower have decided to write off the bill, because they can not work it out, but they still owe us £600! We have called and emailed to say we do not accept them just writing off the account and now wait to see what happens. We are just going to keep fighting this as it's now more out of principle, even if it takes another year.

We have decided that we are now not going to pay direct debit to any energy company and have cancelled this and we will now always owe money to the company.

Even my partner is now raging about this, and that takes a lot to make his blood boil!

What did the Ombudsman decide?

I am also having awful problems with npower. In my case the Ombudsman agreed with me. However npower (despite agreeing to the actions proposed by the Ombudsman) has not implemented these actions and the deadline for doing so has long since passed.

The current position is that npower has closed my complaint and is not counting it correctly in its statistics. I suspect it is doing this with a lot of its complaints in order to appear like it is resolving them when it is not.

Judi11

The Ombudsman agreed and were sympathetic with us but my partner insisted on the full compensation pay out of £150. This we have actually received, but were then worried that this was paid very quickly. My partner clarified that this was just compensation, not a resolvement of the case, and the Ombudsman agreed. The case manager then went on holiday recently and we received the letter from NPower, while he was away, saying that the issue was resolved, which it wasn't from our side.

We have our own businesses and really do not have time to deal with incompetence when we are the customer, but I am actually, this afternoon, going through all our correspondence and documenting the time lines and correspondence from both parties, ready for the inevitable court battle.

I think NPower hope that they make it so frustratingly difficult for ex customers to get their money back that these ex customers eventually give up.

We will not.

I hope you also have the time to fight them too.

naedanger

Judi11 wrote: »

... we received the letter from NPower ... saying that the issue was resolved, which it wasn't from our side....

This is what has happened with me. Npower wrote saying they had implemented the Ombudsman agreed solution when they had done no such thing (and it was even clear in their own letter that they had not implemented what was agreed).

Npower is having to report its complaint statistics monthly to Ofgem. Here is a link to their latest monthly return.

http://www.npower.com/home/customer/#tab-3

This shows they had no "ombudsman remedies>28 days" at the end of June and the end of the July. However based on a sample of one (i.e. my own case) I know this is untrue as my Ombudsman remedy is still outstanding long after 28 days.

I hope you also have the time to fight them too.

Well I am still pursuing them through the Ombudsman but npower are still dragging their feet, ignoring questions etc.

Judi11

That's amazing that they can state that they had no Ombudsman remedies outstanding for June and July! We can add to your number so we know that there were definitely 2 not resolved cases. I think there will be many more ;o)

I've just finished writing out the time line of events and it has made me even more annoyed when I realise that NPower and the Ombudsman kept saying "Sorry but you do need to wait 28/30 days" for resolvement, and that has been going on for more than 90 days (being very, very conservative), from the Ombudsman's involvement.

NPower sent a letter to us 5.08.14 saying that any outstanding credit would be refunded and then 20.08.14 they decided to write off the bill and hope we were happy with that. Hmmmm happy that they now didn't have to pay us £600. I don't think so!