Electric Pre-Pay Meter

caeler

We brought our first home about a year ago and we have a pre-pay electric meter. Previous owners said it works out cheaper so we decided to stick with it to see how we get on. When we moved in we put £80 on, we figured we wouldn’t have to worry for a few months.

Anyway last night, I realised that I hadn’t even thought about electricity since we moved in just over a year ago. We’ve had no separate bills, electricity supply has been fine so I thought I would check what the meter says. It says we still have £6.23 left from our original payment!! So in just over a year we’ve used £80 for electricity. We have a washing machine, dishwasher, electric hob……surely a years worth of electricity should be costing us more??

Perhaps this is me being naïve, but this is the first time I’ve had to worry about bills and with everything else that comes in monthly I didn’t miss the electricity bill, looking back I should have realised there was something not right but now I’m really worried about what’s going to happen. I had a letter a few days ago saying I had to arrange for them to come in and replace the meter as they have to every few years because of the Utility Act 2000 to make sure I get accurate bills!

So my question, how do I find out if I owe anything? How much more do you think I should be paying?

Really worried I’m going to get a massive bill for used electricity which I can’t afford to pay. Sorry for the long post.

caeler

I have just been reading through the electricity cost per month poll and now I'm really worried! http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=72789&page=1

Newstart_4

check the meter, there should be a display and button to cycle thru various pages, you should be able to get a meter reading of how many units have been used, your unit price, daily standing charge, etc. as long as your units tally with how much you put on the card, as genral idea i tend to put about 10 quid a week on my eleci,

powercard meters are in no way cheap, but if you dont like to use direct debit, or trust your self to save the dosh each week/month for the quaterly bill, they go along way to keeping you out of trouble.

also dont wory about getting a massive bill, most powercard meters are forced onto people who have debt with the power companies, they will just reprogram the meter so that for every 10 quid you put on, a few quid will go towards the debt, wich is a prety good way of doing it, as its much better than being cut off for not paying your bill.

tripled

The prudent and honest thing to do would probably be to write to the company explaining so they can look into it, work out how much you owe them and arrange to spread the payments for you.

Having said that, personally if I was in that situation I would just let them change them meter, sit tight and see what happened. As mentioned above if they spot the debt they should let you pay it off gradually through the keymeter.

In the long run I'd recommend coming off the card/keymeters as they are more expensive than credit meters (unless you are with Ebico).

Newstart_4

im about to request mine be removed now the bank have given me an overdraft and im feeling better about using direct debit. only so i get get a better deal on enrgy tho, all things being equal, i prefer pay as you go.