British Gas prepayment meter

Gibbo7680

Hi I have a elec and gas prepayment meter I have ran up debt and agreed to pay it back at £5 a week at 1st seemed ok but now I seem to be topping up my elec by £10 every other day which I can't afford .......can I ask for some advice as to whether its best to top up £10 a time or say £20 do you get charged a percentage of your top up and is it cheaper to stay out of the emergency credit? And also when elec is running low it says charge of say £6 £7 what is this???

Thanks for any help

Nada666

No, you are not charged a percentage of your agreed debt repayment - it is set at whatever per week. (In your case £5). Plus when you are on emergency credit the debt repayment is not taken off either.

However, if you do miss top-ups, especially coming out of summer, you may have built up a separate backlog for the ongoing standing charge. This can be taken off at 70% of top-ups until you catch up.

However, again, that should only occur with the gas meter. Your electricity meter should always be in use so you will not accumulate back standing charges. (But you can miss your arrears repayments on emergency).

Stick your key in the meter and see how many of the readings you can decipher - repayment levels should be there.

You should also keep a record like a normal meter. Take readings in kWh every week and see how much you use. That way you can get a clearer idea of what you are using and how much it should be costing - just relying on the last time you stuck a fiver on can be confusing.

It is not cheaper to keep out of emergency credit but it is less confusing - when on emergency credit you are not charged for standing charges so again they can build up. You have to pay those back plus the fiver so your first top-up of a tenner can easily be eaten up.

Again, a written weekly note of readings can help reassure you are not being ripped off.

spiro

The thing with having a gas ppm is you use loads more gas in the winter (heating) so ideally you should top it up every week so you have built up a good level of credit before the cold weather arrives. You can work out how much by looking at your old bills.

SwanJon

To see the information on the gas meter, press and hold the red button until the screen change changes.
The screen will have a number in the corner and will change each time your press the red button.
The screens you want are 27, 25, 26, 00, 01, 02, 03 - this will tellyou the outstanding balance (GD remaining), weekly payment (WRR) and what happened to your last top up.
For electricity, press the blue button to change the screen. The letter will change.
The screens you want are F (Standing charge + WRR), S (balance remaining), T (WRR).