Scottish Power bill error

Moonflowers

After a long conversation with Scottish Power as to why I suddenly had a bill for over £500, I've been told that their system didn't work properly & they failed to bill me for my gas for 5 months - hence the system has caught up & issued a huge bill.

I pay by monthly direct debit so I don't have to fork out the bill but it means my account balance of over £500 has been wiped out & I now have a debit of over £100.

I know I've used the gas they are charging me for but do I have some sort of argument against paying this?

Added to that it seems that the regular online meter readings I have been submitting haven't actually been received for the past year so they were estimating my bills. Unfortunately I can't prove I actually submitted them but again, surely this is their error?

Any advise would be appreciated.
Thanks

System

I fear not. The 'Back Billing Code' is not in play. Clearly, they have had a systems issue but that in itself doesn't give you an out. Provided you have given them an up to date reading then the bill will have been corrected to show the actual amount of gas used. Annoying, I know.

Moonflowers

Thanks for your reply.

That's a shame. I'm not happy & am definitely going to complain. They should notice these things without customers being affected.

Cardew

Moonflowers wrote: »

Thanks for your reply.

That's a shame. I'm not happy & am definitely going to complain. They should notice these things without customers being affected.

I pay by monthly direct debit so I don't have to fork out the bill but it means my account balance of over £500 has been wiped out & I now have a debit of over £100.

Agreed it is annoying. However as you pay by Direct Debit, your credit and debit balances are meaningless until the end of the billing cycle. i.e. the £500 credit was simply 'on paper' and you haven't been disadvantaged.

dogshome

Are you sure that the meter readings SP are baseing the bill on, really are true readings and reflect your actual consumption.

If they are, then it seems that your monthly D/Debit payments are too low to cover your useage, because at this time of the year your 'Gas Account' should be awash with money that has built up over the summer - Late billing will have dented the size of the Credit, but should not have eliminated it

RavingMad

I'm with SP and every time I submit readings online, they generate a bill a week later. Did you not see the discrepancies at the time?

Moonflowers

Dogshome - SP say they were underestimating my bills hence why my credit has evaporated.

RavingMad - I was entering my readings online & was getting the page on the online site which showed what my bill was for gas & electricity. So from that point of view everything was working correctly. The failure on my part was not checking my account regularly online to ensure that that the bill they created actually matched.

Lesson definitely learnt on my part. I will in future take screen grabs when entering readings so that I do have some proof about what I've done.

I've read in the paper today that SP had a new IT system last year & that apparently other people have had issues with that.

RavingMad

Plenty of people on this forum have had issues with SP and their billing that's why I'm a bit OCD with downloading my statements as soon as they're available online.

Keep a spreadsheet with your meter readings, that way you'll know how much energy you're actually using during the course of the year and not rely on the energy companies to guess it for you

Moonflowers

Thanks for the advise.
I'll have a search back on the forum to see what other people have been saying too.

matelodave

If you don't check your bills against meter readings (whether you've sent them in or not) how do you know if they are correct or not.
You really do have to take some responsibility for not correcting them and making sure that your payments are covering your consumption.

System

Just to re-inforce the point above. You can have a hard drive full of 'screen grabs' but they are absolutely meaningless in the greater scheme of things. Normally, when an Estimated Bill is produced then the simple expedient of providing accurate meter readings will generate an updated bill. In your case, it appears that this didn't happen so your credit/debit balance would be incorrect. As soon as the system got a correct set of readings your usage would be calculated using the readings that you provided minus the last known actual meter readings. The amount due will then be taken from the balance. Remember energy companies only have to read your meters once every two years so it is in your interest to chase them for a correct bill.