Help! Scottish Power. Sanity in danger.

persister

Can anyone advise please? Two years ago I bought a flat whose previous owner had an account with Scottish Power. The ex owner asked SP to close his account. I asked them to open an account for me. SP have never closed down the old account or opened one for me. I have had many Kafka-esque exchanges with them. They claim that the bill for the flat is paid up to date, and that someone is paying those bills for the flat (it's not me, they have never sent me a bill, and it's not the previous owner). I asked them who they thought was paying the bills, but they couldn't say. They always promised that someone would call back within 7 days to sort out the problem. No one ever called.
I went to the Ombudsman 4.5 months ago. Ombudsman made me write to SP again, so there was another 8 week wait. SP of course didn't reply. Ombudsman then opened complaint, and wrote to SP asking for my account file in Nov 2015, but tell me SP hasn't even replied to them. Presumably because there is no account file. Ombudsman has now had complaint open for 10 weeks and tell me that I have to wait while they write to SP again. Ombudsman seems to be swamped.


Meanwhile, I have no idea if I am one day going to get an electricity bill for the flat. I have no idea how much SP are purporting to charge me (that's if they ever do charge me) because they have never provided this info. I cannot switch to a cheaper supplier, because they say they have to see a bill from Scottish Power. At the moment, I only have electric storage heaters. My flat is in dire need of renovation, which has been started. I need to install gas before I can get a working bathroom installed, and also want solar PV. I can't do either, until the Scottish Power bizarre-ness is sorted out.


V grateful if anyone could offer me any hope.

CashStrapped

Firstly, ensure you have an opening reading.

Whatever happens, you can work out yourself what you may or may not owe with this. Just ensure you put this amount of money aside.

If your not sure how to work it out. Give us your

1 )opening meter reading (one you took when you first moved in)
2) name of the Scottish power tariff you are on.
3)A recent meter reading

Back billing may apply in this instance.

For that information I defer to Hengus who I quote from a recent post:

Hengus wrote: »

Hi. Any credit or debit amount is meaningless unless the figure shown is based on an actual meter reading/s. There is a Backbilling Code but it is not enshrined in law.

When does the back-billing principle apply?

Each case is looked at on its own merits; however, the 12 month limit for back-bills may apply in these examples when your supplier has:

• Failed to bill you at all and you have requested bills from them;

• Billed you using estimated meter readings and instead of valid readings provided by you or a meter reader;

• Billed you incorrectly by mixing up meter readings, and failed to act upon information available to put this right;

• Failed to do anything about a query or fault you have raised regarding your account or meter and subsequently allowed a large debt to build up on your account;

• Failed to reassess a payment arrangement (eg. Direct Debit) within 15 months, or failed to reassess based on a reasonable estimate.

As you can see there has to be some customer action. Have you actually spoken to the supplier in the past year and asked for an updated bill? As above, have you responded to, and provided, actual meter readings?

So, based on your experience with Scottish Power. If you have made repeated attempts to try and pay you may not owe the full amount when they finally do bill you. Though it is not guaranteed, so make sure you put money aside.

As I said, if you would like to to make a rough calculation for you, post what I requested above.

footyguy

persister wrote: »

Can anyone advise please? Two years ago I bought a flat whose previous owner had an account with Scottish Power. The ex owner asked SP to close his account. I asked them to open an account for me. SP have never closed down the old account or opened one for me. I have had many Kafka-esque exchanges with them. They claim that the bill for the flat is paid up to date, and that someone is paying those bills for the flat (it's not me, they have never sent me a bill, and it's not the previous owner). I asked them who they thought was paying the bills, but they couldn't say. They always promised that someone would call back within 7 days to sort out the problem. No one ever called.
I went to the Ombudsman 4.5 months ago. Ombudsman made me write to SP again, so there was another 8 week wait. SP of course didn't reply. Ombudsman then opened complaint, and wrote to SP asking for my account file in Nov 2015, but tell me SP hasn't even replied to them. Presumably because there is no account file. Ombudsman has now had complaint open for 10 weeks and tell me that I have to wait while they write to SP again. Ombudsman seems to be swamped.


Meanwhile, I have no idea if I am one day going to get an electricity bill for the flat. I have no idea how much SP are purporting to charge me (that's if they ever do charge me) because they have never provided this info. I cannot switch to a cheaper supplier, because they say they have to see a bill from Scottish Power. At the moment, I only have electric storage heaters. My flat is in dire need of renovation, which has been started. I need to install gas before I can get a working bathroom installed, and also want solar PV. I can't do either, until the Scottish Power bizarre-ness is sorted out.


V grateful if anyone could offer me any hope.

I wish someone would pay my energy bills. If you ever find out who is paying yours will you let me know their details please ... especially if they are willing to pay mine too

Ombudsman has always said it can take about 3 months from receipt before they even look at a complaint - but they sometimes do so earlier.

Still whilst you are not paying anything ... and don't forget about the 12 month back billing rule

macman

Have you cross checked the meter serial number with them to see if it matches? Wrongly ID'd meters are common in apartment blocks, if that is what the property is.

AnotherJoe

Rather than switch, can you not cancel?
Then start again with someone else?

persister

Thanks Cashstrapped. Sadly, Scottish Power have never given me an account at all, and never answered my question re what tariff are they charging for electricity at this flat. So I haven't any basis at all on which I can estimate a possible bill.

I suspect the reason they won't do anything to sort it out, is because they keep telling me that their system says they are generating bills and that the bills are being paid. No bill has ever been sent to me, so I would hazard a guess that either they have been taking payments from some poor innocent unconnected person who was daft enough to let SP have their bank details, or their whole accounts system and database are in a colossal mess and are flogging up false information some other way.

In May 2014, 7 months after the previous owner had told them to close down his account, they sent him a bill, in his name (to another address of his, not to this flat). He forwarded the bill to me and asked me to pay it, which I did. At that time I spoke to SP and asked why they were still sending bills to the previous owner. They promised to call me back to set up an account for me (I had already asked them to set up the account when I moved in) - but they didn't contact me and I've had that same conversation with them several times since.

Thank you very much for telling me about the Back Billing rule. I didn't know about that. I certainly think I qualify! I have spent about 3 days of my life trying to get any response from SP and they are holding me prisoner! - I can't chose a tariff or get an account with another supplier.

Scotlands_Lite

The timeline of your SP problems (and those of the previous owner) would seem to tie in to the disastrous migration to their new accounts / billing system. As an example, they completely corrupted my account some time between Nov 2013 & May 2014 and its taken me until this month to get it properly sorted, over many calls, complaints and a none too helpful intervention by the Ombudsman.

ToomanyPies

In the mean time take monthly meter readings.

Do you stilll have a copy of the first bill you paid? Check that the meter serial number on it is the same as the one on your meter.

Have you tried to set up online access to the account with SP? It's worth a try.

Are you located in the South East? If so you might be able to use the ukpowernetworks.co.uk site to identify your supplier and MPAN, which should be the same as the first bill you paid.

Pincher

persister wrote: »

Two years ago I bought a flat whose previous owner had an account with Scottish Power.

If you can grab the meter reader when he turns up, you might be able to confirm the meter is correctly set up for the address. I had to wait for two years for the meter reader to turn up after switching to Scottish Power, so it's about time.

pineapple

I found Scottish Power a nightmare to deal with when I closed my account and it was well before their new system troubles. I finally got some action when I posted on their Facebook page.;)

persister

Thanks Scotlands-Lite. Sorry to hear the Ombusdman was not very helpful. Would you be willing to say more about that? I can't say I'm very hopeful of getting the help I need. Scottish Power was supposed to reply to the Ombudsman within 2 weeks and apparently they didn't bother, so they don't seem to be terribly concerned about any decisions the Ombudsman might take. Unless of course SP is in such a state of chaos that they actually couldn't organise themselves to reply. How do these people get licences to provide a power supply? Not too sure about the new nuclear power building programme when the energy suppliers can't even send a bill.