Changing supplier with debt

mclellans10

Hello,

I was wondering if anyone has changed from Eon with a debt of more that £500. I currently have £700 of debt on my account - which seems to have come as a shock and out of nowhere. They have changed my direct debit to £210.00 a month which I simply cannot afford. They refused to help me out and said I either pay it or I go on a prepayment meter. I then switched last night to OVO after hearing such good reviews for them and wondered whether anyone had changed from EON with this amount of debt before? I am changing to a prepayment metre with OVO so I can pay the debt gradually.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Nada666

The chances of it going through are very low - Eon will block the transfer application. How do you expect they expect to receive any money from you if you leave? The £500 threshold is for those already on prepayment meters, anyway, not for those on credit meters - their threshold is £zero.

If you don't want to pay £210 per month then switch to prepayment meter.

Whichever you end up with make sure you now and in future check the readings on your meter every so often so that you know how much you are using and if an adjustment is imminent (whether offered by you (preferable) or suddenly manifested by them (unwanted but avoidable.))

E.ON_Company_Representative:_Helena

Hi mclellans10 and welcome to the forums.

It's highly likely that your switch will be objected to, due to the amount of the balance outstanding on your account.

I think the first thing to do is to understand why the debt is there, has the account been underestimated for some time? Have you maybe been underpaying?

Looking at your bills will show you the meter reads we've been using to bill you. Have you been providing your regular meter reads?

Once the reasons for the balance are understood, you can talk to us to make sure you're on the best tariff for you and ask us about the best way to clear the balance along with covering your usage.

If you did decide to have a pre-payment meter with us, you can pay the balance off through your meter weekly, you'd then also be able to change supplier once the debt is below £500 if your new supplier would like to accept this.

Hope this helps a little.

Helena

macman

How exactly did you intend to pay off your E.on debt 'gradually', by using an Ovo PPM? Ovo won't pass on any payments to E.on. If the switch were to go through (which it won't , because it will be blocked) , you would receive a final bill from E.on, which would require settlement for the full amount of debt immediately.

mclellans10

You can switch whilst in arrears providing the new supplier agrees to accept you as a customer.

macman wrote: »

How exactly did you intend to pay off your E.on debt 'gradually', by using an Ovo PPM? Ovo won't pass on any payments to E.on. If the switch were to go through (which it won't , because it will be blocked) , you would receive a final bill from E.on, which would require settlement for the full amount of debt immediately.

modsandmockers

Nada666 wrote: »

make sure you now and in future check the readings on your meter every so often

Every so often is not enough - you need to read your meters every month, keep a record for yourself, and submit the readings to your supplier.

You also need to know how to convert your monthly readings into the cost of that month's energy consumption. Prices vary hugely between different suppliers and different tariffs. Always make sure that you know the precise name of the tariff which you are on, as well as the prices. Unless you are with Ebico, there will be a daily standing charge for each fuel, as well as a price per kWh (kilowatthour) for each fuel. Always check that the supplier's figures match your own, because they don't very often read the meters for themselves and if you don't provide them with the numbers, they will simply make it up for themselves.

macman

But the outgoing supplier won't release you with a debt of £700.
And even if they did, the OP seems to imagine that they can pay an eEon debt off via an Ovo PPM.

mclellans10

EON state on their website that if you're £500 or below you can transfer your balance to another supplier. I have learnt that since posting this as you can see above that I can't transfer with a £700 balance.

macman

That would only be the case if the incoming supplier were willing to accept the debt-what supplier would want to take on new customers with an immediate £500 debt on their account?

keith1950

OP.... from experience they will usually only allow a switch if the debt is below £200 and you have a good payment history.

Even if they did allow you to switch the debt would stay with eon and you would only have few weeks to settle the final bill or it would be passed to debt collectors.

undaunted

macman wrote: »

That would only be the case if the incoming supplier were willing to accept the debt-what supplier would want to take on new customers with an immediate £500 debt on their account?

It's a reasonable enough question but perhaps you ought to address it to Ofgem - they make the rules & seem to think that this increase was a helpful one to customers in debt :rotfl: