shock gas bill

boofever

I opted to pay my gas bill by direct debit 4 years ago because I hate recieving paper bills. What a huge mistake on my part! British Gas tried to collect over £4000 by direct debit even though I have a variable direct debit with them and they were collecting money on a monthly basis. My meter was being read on a regular basis even though there are apparently a few estimated readings. Imagine my complete horror and distress to find that I allegedly owe this huge sum of money. Has this happened to anyone else on here? The most confusing thing is that I received an annual statedment from British Gas one month before the £4k bill saying my annual bill for the whole of 2012/2013 was £1164.

Nada666

Even if you have been negligent in checking your meter an average £1000 per year over for gas only is difficult to use. Is this a dual fuel account or just gas? If gas only check for imperial billing when your meter is metric mix-up. If neither of these is the case then it is your fault - you cannot unknowingly use an extra £1000 of gas per year - you must have been suspicious and should have double-checked.

There must be a mistake somewhere - check number of digits used, opening reads, and what type of meter (metric or imperial), and position of decimal point etc.

Cardew

Welcome to the forum.

In the 4 years since you opted to pay by direct debit, have you checked your meter readings, given on the on-line bills, against the actual meter readings that you read yourself?

The £1164 statement is perfectly understandable if your bills were based on estimated/incorrect readings.

Your on-line bill would have informed you that BG intended to collect £4,000 by DD.