Underfloor Heating £1000 Ecotricity Bill

JMac3Turbo

I have used Ecotricity as my energy supplier since 1997/8 (Due to what you are about to read, I have just applied to join Good Energy - I want to support sustainable energy production, as far as that is possible). I installed underfloor heating to my property, completing the installation in November 2013. I had anticipated an increase in electricity usage (should have calculated it, I know), but thought I would wait to see how it affected my bills.

In February 2014, my electricity bill increased by £20. My gas bill simultaneously dropped by £20. I had been running the underfloor heating all winter, so assumed that this was the effect it had had on my bills, as I was using more electricity, but less gas (I should have checked… I know). I was confident that up-to-date meter reading had been taken / sent to Ecotricity, so they had all the information necessary to adjust my bill.

I continued to use the underfloor heating as necessary, using my radiators much less and my house has been much more comfortable, with a constant temperature around the property, rather than having hotspots by the radiators. I received further bills (after meter readings) in May 2014, August 2014, November 2014, February 2015 and May 2015. The price remained steady throughout this period. Apparently my usage had increased to 9742 kWh in total over the year!

Ecotricity had this to say: “When August’s agent reading taken on 06/08/2014 reached us, because it was lower than we’d calculated and because our system can’t automatically revise incorrect estimations, a lock was applied by our billing system to prevent an erroneous bill from being issued. We regularly report on accounts that haven’t been billed for two or more quarters but your account wasn’t looked at by our Billing Team until April 2015. We’ve recently experienced a higher level of customer contact than usual resulting in additional strain upon our Billing Team and slight backlogs in their response time frames – I offer this as an explanation, not an excuse and can appreciate the effect that’s had on you. Please be assured that we’re actively recruiting additional staff to help deal with this backlog and restore our service level to our usual standard.”

Finally at the end of June 2015, Ecotricity got around to reviewing my account. I had racked up a deficit on my bill of £1,086.43. Ecotricity said: “Although regular readings were being supplied by our agents, because of their work load, our Billing Team weren’t able to see that you hadn’t been billed and investigate the change in usage, until Matt got in touch in June. I’m sorry for the inconvenience but hope this helps to clarify the delay in registering your change in consumption.“

I complained by telephone and an Ecotricity agent applied the Back Billing Guidelines and reduced this bill to £872.29. Ecotricity have since said: When our agent “reviewed your account she incorrectly applied the back billing guidelines and reduced your bill by £214.14 from £1,086.43 to £872.29. The back billing guidelines set out by Energy UK are in place to protect a customer that hasn’t been billed for over 12 months through no fault of their own. Because we billed you after 11 months, not 12, these guidelines didn’t apply and shouldn’t have been followed. As a gesture of our good will we’ll honour the application however and simply pursue the £872.29 showing on July’s bill.”

My (dual fuel) monthly bill has now increased from £65 per month to £195. I am unable to afford the increase. I understand that this is ultimately my fault and that I should have had better awareness of my usage, but I also feel that I have been let down by Ecotricity. I have been a loyal customer, recommending them to my family and friends - I know of at least three households who currently use them as energy supplier thanks to my recommendation. I appreciate the “gesture of good will” they made, although I suspect they are covering up another mistake(?) made by their apparently understaffed team.

I do feel that there is more they could have done to make me aware of this huge spike in my electricity usage, meaning I could have adjusted my usage accordingly. I will no longer use the underfloor heating, apart from special occasions, or perhaps particularly cold snaps.

Do I have grounds to make further claims against the company? Or shall I simply roll over, apply for a credit card to pay off of the excess and continue my move to Good Energy (and recommend others follow me)? …oh, and learn the hard way that I need to have better control over my energy consumption!

geoffken

Yes roll over

Consumerist

JMac3Turbo wrote: »

. . . Do I have grounds to make further claims against the company? Or shall I simply roll over, apply for a credit card to pay off of the excess and continue my move to Good Energy (and recommend others follow me)? …oh, and learn the hard way that I need to have better control over my energy consumption! . . .

Sorry to hear of your experience. I doubt that you will have any recourse against the supplier.

I suspect that, by now, I will be preaching to the converted but it is usually so simple to read your own meters these days, particularly for electricity, and a few sums will quickly highlight expenditure before any statement is received from the supplier.

Thank you for posting your experience. If it helps someone else to avoid the same pitfall then your post will have been worth your time.

matelodave

It's tough but in the end you used it and have got to pay for it and they've been pretty fair letting you take advantage of the back-billing provisions and in reality you should have taken more notice of your bills & consumption.

You will no doubt take a more active role in checking your bills against readings and will therefore be a lot more aware of how much you are using and when.

Armed with that info you'll be able to optimise the use of either gas/electricity for your heating.

Electric heating using peak rate electricity will always be 3-4 times the cost of gas unless you can use an off-peak tariff. I'm guessing that you've an overlay type of system rather than embedded in the floor slab which works like storage heating.

An overlay system doesn't store heat in the slab so needs to use electricity when it's on, which generally means peak rate, so you need to find the cheapest deal that you can.

naedanger

JMac3Turbo wrote: »

I have used Ecotricity as my energy supplier since 1997/8 (Due to what you are about to read, I have just applied to join Good Energy - I want to support sustainable energy production, as far as that is possible). I installed underfloor heating to my property, completing the installation in November 2013. I had anticipated an increase in electricity usage (should have calculated it, I know), but thought I would wait to see how it affected my bills.

In February 2014, my electricity bill increased by £20. My gas bill simultaneously dropped by £20. I had been running the underfloor heating all winter, so assumed that this was the effect it had had on my bills, as I was using more electricity, but less gas (I should have checked… I know). I was confident that up-to-date meter reading had been taken / sent to Ecotricity, so they had all the information necessary to adjust my bill.

I continued to use the underfloor heating as necessary, using my radiators much less and my house has been much more comfortable, with a constant temperature around the property, rather than having hotspots by the radiators. I received further bills (after meter readings) in May 2014, August 2014, November 2014, February 2015 and May 2015. The price remained steady throughout this period. Apparently my usage had increased to 9742 kWh in total over the year!

Ecotricity had this to say: “When August’s agent reading taken on 06/08/2014 reached us, because it was lower than we’d calculated and because our system can’t automatically revise incorrect estimations, a lock was applied by our billing system to prevent an erroneous bill from being issued. We regularly report on accounts that haven’t been billed for two or more quarters but your account wasn’t looked at by our Billing Team until April 2015. We’ve recently experienced a higher level of customer contact than usual resulting in additional strain upon our Billing Team and slight backlogs in their response time frames – I offer this as an explanation, not an excuse and can appreciate the effect that’s had on you. Please be assured that we’re actively recruiting additional staff to help deal with this backlog and restore our service level to our usual standard.”

Finally at the end of June 2015, Ecotricity got around to reviewing my account. I had racked up a deficit on my bill of £1,086.43. Ecotricity said: “Although regular readings were being supplied by our agents, because of their work load, our Billing Team weren’t able to see that you hadn’t been billed and investigate the change in usage, until Matt got in touch in June. I’m sorry for the inconvenience but hope this helps to clarify the delay in registering your change in consumption.“

I complained by telephone and an Ecotricity agent applied the Back Billing Guidelines and reduced this bill to £872.29. Ecotricity have since said: When our agent “reviewed your account she incorrectly applied the back billing guidelines and reduced your bill by £214.14 from £1,086.43 to £872.29. The back billing guidelines set out by Energy UK are in place to protect a customer that hasn’t been billed for over 12 months through no fault of their own. Because we billed you after 11 months, not 12, these guidelines didn’t apply and shouldn’t have been followed. As a gesture of our good will we’ll honour the application however and simply pursue the £872.29 showing on July’s bill.”

My (dual fuel) monthly bill has now increased from £65 per month to £195. I am unable to afford the increase. I understand that this is ultimately my fault and that I should have had better awareness of my usage, but I also feel that I have been let down by Ecotricity. I have been a loyal customer, recommending them to my family and friends - I know of at least three households who currently use them as energy supplier thanks to my recommendation. I appreciate the “gesture of good will” they made, although I suspect they are covering up another mistake(?) made by their apparently understaffed team.

I do feel that there is more they could have done to make me aware of this huge spike in my electricity usage, meaning I could have adjusted my usage accordingly. I will no longer use the underfloor heating, apart from special occasions, or perhaps particularly cold snaps.

Do I have grounds to make further claims against the company? Or shall I simply roll over, apply for a credit card to pay off of the excess and continue my move to Good Energy (and recommend others follow me)? …oh, and learn the hard way that I need to have better control over my energy consumption!

I don't think you should be borrowing on a credit card to repay the debt. Calculate the level you can afford to pay per month and ask your supplier if they would let you repay that amount until the debt is repaid, in other words a smaller repayment over a longer term.

If they don't agree complain in writing and ask for a copy of their complaint procedure.

JC_Derby

You don't say whether you installed underfloor heating yourself or paid for someone else to do it....but yet you are unable to afford an increase in bills?

Consumerist

naedanger wrote: »

I don't think you should be borrowing on a credit card to repay the debt. Calculate the level you can afford to pay per month and ask your supplier if they would let you repay that amount until the debt is repaid, in other words a smaller repayment over a longer term.
If they don't agree complain in writing and ask for a copy of their complaint procedure.

I think the OP's problem is that he/she wants to change supplier; in which case the bill will need to be settled in the short term, assuming, of course, there is not an objection to the transfer.

naedanger

Consumerist wrote: »

I think the OP's problem is that he/she wants to change supplier; in which case the bill will need to be settled in the short term, assuming, of course, there is not an objection to the transfer.

Fair point. My suggestion was based on the assumption the OP would be prepared to remain a customer of Ecotricity if they were prepared to offer a longer debt repayment term.

spiro

Have you been billed for the £800, if yes and you haven't paid then I suspect you switch will be objected to or if they let you go because you pay by DD you will have to pay the full bill within 28 days of receiving the final bill or get a black mark on your credit file.

Hazzanet

While hindsight is an exact science, I think that any large installation or easily identified change in habit warrants monitoring of meters for at least a couple of months to see whether it's going to affect bills adversely. Certainly for electricity, calculating the cost of consumption isn't particularly difficult, and things such as an OWL monitor are quite helpful. Seeing the pence per hour rise on that certainly focuses the mind.

Several things can be taken away from this:

- Generally the cost per kWh of electricity is 3-4 times the cost of gas.
- A change in usage needs to be closely monitored by the user to understand the cost implications.
- Ecotricity are not particularly competitive price-wise so the OP was probably paying through the nose in the first place.

It appears that they have been quite fair in their offer to honour the back billing discount, so if you do wish to leave them for pastures new, you will have to roll over and settle the debt with them before they will allow the move. Unfortunately, if using the credit card is the only way of doing so, then that's ultimately what you will have to do.

Nada666

Hazzanet wrote: »

While hindsight is an exact science, I think that any large installation or easily identified change in habit warrants monitoring of meters for at least a couple of months to see whether it's going to affect bills adversely. Certainly for electricity, calculating the cost of consumption isn't particularly difficult, and things such as an OWL monitor are quite helpful. Seeing the pence per hour rise on that certainly focuses the mind.

Several things can be taken away from this:

- Generally the cost per kWh of electricity is 3-4 times the cost of gas.
- A change in usage needs to be closely monitored by the user to understand the cost implications.
- Ecotricity are not particularly competitive price-wise so the OP was probably paying through the nose in the first place.

It appears that they have been quite fair in their offer to honour the back billing discount, so if you do wish to leave them for pastures new, you will have to roll over and settle the debt with them before they will allow the move. Unfortunately, if using the credit card is the only way of doing so, then that's ultimately what you will have to do.

The OP is not interested in saving money - they want to switch to Good Energy which is just as expensive as Ecotricity. Pretty much every other supplier would be cheaper than these two (by several hundreds of pounds for the cheapest and for continued high consumption.)

OP, why are you switching to another company that is just as expensive and considering risking putting £850 on a credit card when that could be paid off interest free with Ecotricity?

You have been treated more than fairly - a 20% discount off the arrears. If you are not interested in the cheapest electricity then it makes no sense to switch away from Ecotricity.

If you think your usage will change substantially then you can pay quarterly with Ecotricity. Or just pay the £195 - if your usage changes you will very quickly catch-up and can then start paying less.

I see no point in charging it to a credit card. Even if you stick it on a zero percent one that is still £67 a month to avoid charges on top of your ongoing usage - it that likely to average less than £120?

If you plan to switch to someone other than Good Energy then paying the balance off with a card may make sense. But not if you are not going to switch to a cheaper supplier.