Oh God, British Gas

meg00

Having changed from EON's key paid meters to British Gas,(changeover today) I was told the change of meter I requested would take place today between 8am -1 pm. This did not happen, no one turned up. Having rang BG 4 times (wait time 10 minutes each call) I finally got through to Ben, who told me I needed to speak to billings (!), after 12 minute wait put through to Caitlin, who after 6 minutes of "bringing up my account" cut me off, they know who I am, and why I was calling, but no-one has rang me back. I have now spent 10 hours today waiting for BG to connect me (as a valued customer) to no avail.
Why are our utilities companies such c!!p.

[Deleted User]

Claim compensation. BG will pay out £25 usually if its their fault, which it is. They will probably deduct it from the gas bill.

GingerBob_3

meg00 wrote: »

Having changed from EON's key paid meters to British Gas,(changeover today) I was told the change of meter I requested would take place today between 8am -1 pm. This did not happen, no one turned up. Having rang BG 4 times (wait time 10 minutes each call) I finally got through to Ben, who told me I needed to speak to billings (!), after 12 minute wait put through to Caitlin, who after 6 minutes of "bringing up my account" cut me off, they know who I am, and why I was calling, but no-one has rang me back. I have now spent 10 hours today waiting for BG to connect me (as a valued customer) to no avail.
Why are our utilities companies such c!!p.

Customers are not valued by the likes of British Gas. Such organisations don't know the meaning of the word.

meg00

The challenge is getting someone to answer the phone. I have just tried again, wait time 20 minutes.

meg00

I have used BG, Npower, Scottish Power and Eon, Virgin Media, Talk Talk and BT in the past year. As originally posted, my experience of all utilities is they are absolute rubbish at customer service. The point of contact for customers is impenetrable if your query is something which needs a modicum of common sense.
Out of 5 options given by BG, 4 need a customer reference number, which I don't have.
4 mins response time!!!!!!!!!!
Not my experience by a long chalk.
Meg.
Thanks for your thoughts.

MeterMan

pressing the star key will bypass the need for a reference number and phone number linked with the account.

I guess you where waiting for a meter engineer to change your meter to a credit one?

meg00

Yes MeterMan.
Appointment for between 8am-1pm.
No show, but can't find out why, or which number to call.
Incredibly frustrating.

MeterMan

At least you still have supply. I heard of a customer with 2 young kids off supply for 2 days because the work was given to G4S and they didn't attend.

Mighty boys in blue came to that customers rescue.

I have a freephone number in the van, buts it gonna be tomorrow afternoon when I can post it. I will do unless you post here saying you've fixed it.

meg00

I have no supply anyway, I did not bother putting any credit on as the boiler is being replaced and re-sited. Thankfully the weather has been mild.
After spending a fruitless 20 minutes talking to the call centre yersterday evening, the advice was keep trying the 0800 number I had been trying all day.
I still don't know who the current supplier is, Eon or BG. I will try again at 8am.

meg00

Thanks Meterman,
Your tip about the star key got results.
The meters would never have been changed yesterday as they need one week from supply transfer before BG can action replacement.
They had no record of the appointment, even though I had (unsigned) posted documentation that it would happen, so no compensation due!.
Re-scheduled for next Tuesday.
Why are our utility companies such c!!p?
Meg.