Collective Switch

Chordeiles

Switch gone smoothly as far as I can tell (apart from slightly inflated monthly payment as already noted).

But I had some 'phone calls from British Gas. First time asked if it was a good time to talk, but I was in the middle of my dinner. Most recent call (9 days ago) I was happy to talk to them but caller complained it was a bad line, could he call back ? Agreed and heard nothing since. A bit rude, really.

Now I'm wondering what this was all about. If the BG man is reading this I'd be interested to know if this is normal practice, or whether I've perhaps suffered spoof calls from someone purporting to be BG.

British_Gas_Rep_Jamie

derekupnorth wrote: »

Can someone please provide me with a link to the terms and conditions for the collective switch? I can't see them anywhere.

Hi derekupnorth, you can find the Terms & Conditions for the Collective Fix February 2017 at:

https://www.britishgas.co.uk/aem6/content/dam/britishgas/documents/tariffs/terms/Collective-Fix-February-2017.pdf

Cheers,
Jamie

British_Gas_Rep_Matt

razra wrote: »

I've heard nothing from British Gas since they asked for meter readings on the 3 March. Direct debit set up but no idea how much for or when it will be taken. Nothing from old supplier to say I'm leaving. However checking bill on old suppliers website suddenly shows a final gas bill figure but the electric bill appears to show supply continuing so no idea what is going on!

Hi razra, I'm sure everything's fine as once your account switches to us, it's normal that it can take a few weeks to agree the transfer readings with your old supplier. Please give our Collective Tariff Team a call on 0800 975 9712 and we'll double check that everything's on track. Cheers, Matt

British_Gas_Rep_Matt

jeallen01 wrote: »

Just logged into my BG a/c and that is now showing the G & E meter readings for 3rd March that I submitted earlier this month - so it looks like that aspect of my a/c appears to be sorted out (at least for the moment!).

OTOH, just logged into the SP account and the relevant Bank a/c from which the money is debited, and there is as yet no sign of:
- BG having debited the amount my a/c says that I in credit by!
- SP having taken the final payment for their a/cs (I think I probably owed them something of the order of £80-£100 for the G & E used since they took the last normal monthly DD in early-mid Feb).

So, still some outstanding loose ends on both of the SP & BG a/cs

Hi jeallen01, your payments will always show a little early as we credit your account with your DD payments when they're requested from your bank, which is usually around 5 working days before the payment's collected.

I hope any other outstanding issues have been resolved but if you've any questions our Collective Tariff Team will be happy to help on 0800 9759 712.
Alternatively you can pop your details on an email to talktous@britishgas.co.uk, including your MSE Username in the subject heading. Cheers, Matt

jeallen01

British_Gas_Rep_Matt wrote: »

Hi jeallen01, your payments will always show a little early as we credit your account with your DD payments when they're requested from your bank, which is usually around 5 working days before the payment's collected. .... Matt

Thanks for the info, although in my case it seemed to be more like 2-3 weeks than 5 days!

Former_MSE_Roxanne

Hi all,

Sorry to see that some of you are still having problems with this switch.

If you haven't already, I'd suggest contacting the specialist collective team at British Gas about this. This is a team that has been specially trained to handle queries relating to the collective tariff and has additional access compared to its normal customer service teams.

You can contact the team by calling 0800 975 9712.​​ They should be able to help you resolve the issue.

brush6136

I'm still waiting to see what's happening to my switch. I guess I'll have to ring up but the thought fills me with dread. I've submitted my take on figures on 3 different dates & despite getting "we've got your readings" emails, they still say they haven't got them.

Added to which I had a 12 month issue on a non related matter to gas supply which showed me how bad they are. Never again!

After this deal expires I'm off & in fact if I can get out of this I'll see if my previous supplier will take me back.The savings are not worth this amount of hassle.

I've never experienced such awful treatment. It's just not worth the time & hassle

jeallen01

brush6136 wrote: »

I'm still waiting to see what's happening to my switch. I guess I'll have to ring up but the thought fills me with dread. I've submitted my take on figures on 3 different dates & despite getting "we've got your readings" emails, they still say they haven't got them.

Did you put them in the correct place on the BG website, because new customers have to put them in a different place to existing customers?
See quite a few posts back for the info on the place to look for.

rockin_plumber

jeallen01 wrote: »

Did you put them in the correct place on the BG website, because new customers have to put them in a different place to existing customers?
See quite a few posts back for the info on the place to look for.

I can assure you this doesn't work...


I entered my gas & electric readings on this form but received no confirmation.


Two weeks later I logged in to check progress and it appeared they had my gas reading but had 'lost' my electric reading.


It doesn't occur to such a reliable company to contact the new customer about a missing reading, and really why would a customer only enter one reading anyway???


This has obviously resulted in my old account taking more time to be closed and my refund taking longer to process, and I still have restricted access to my 1 month old British Gas account due to them losing my electric reading.


Oh the joys of changing suppliers, but this has been the worst!

liviboy

This really is all getting a bit boring now.

I signed-up on the 5th February through MSE CEC.

I received my welcome e-mail from British Gas on the 9th February which gave an estimated supply start of the 25th February.

I then heard nothing until the 24th February when they requested my meter readings. I supplied these through the form, as others have experienced this was rejected. I tried again and it was again rejected. I then tried calling the 24-hour number but was told the office was closed. So I e-mailed BG my readings. I received a reply from "Chandan Singh Shyam" on the 4th of March who stated the following:

I have checked your account and assure you that we have started supplying gas and electricity at your property from 25 February 2016.

I have now made a note your electricity opening meter reading as 02150. We’ll consider these reading for opening the account with us. Please reply to my email with your gas meter reading as on 25 February 2016 if you have and I'll be happy to help.

I replied giving my gas reading again and had a reply on the 8th March from "Karishma Rokade" who stated:

I've now stored the meter reading of 2723 for gas on the account. It will be used to open the account in the account. It usually takes up to date 28 days from the supply start date (25 February) to completely set up the accounts.

So all was well until my old (still current) supplier informed me my gas was now on a single-fuel tariff with them.

I called the collective switch team and spoke to a lovely girl in Cardiff (can't remember her name). She told me there had been an issue with my gas switch and it was now set to transfer on the 30th March! At this point I asked to open a complaint because I had been given wrong information from the e-mail team and due to the general lack of communication from British Gas.

On the 31st March I received an e-mail from "Vicky Morris" in the collective switch team. She stated she was dealing with my complaint and confirmed my gas was switching on the 5th April. I replied asking her to call me.

On the 1st April, Vicky Morris called. We had a 30 minute conversation and said she was going to talk to "Andrew" in the switching technical team as it appeared my gas may have switched already. She confirmed she would call me the following Tuesday (5th April) to confirm the situation.

The 5th came and went without a call so I sent Vicky Morris an e-mail. This went unanswered all day on Wednesday.

So yesterday I decided to call up the Collective Team to be told that Vicky Morris no longer worked in that department and had, in fact, been given a new job within British Gas. My complaint had now been transferred to another handler called Nadine Morgan-Staples. However neither Vicky or Nadine were available to speak to and Nadine hadn't bothered to contact me, as agreed on my complaint notes, on Tuesday.

I eventually spoke to another manager (Mike I think his name was) in the collective switch team. He firstly informed me that my gas STILL hadn't switched over. There were no notes on the system at all to indicate why or that anyone had even looked into the situation. He agreed the service received from Vicky and Nadine was well below standard. It's not as if Vicky walked into the office on Monday to be told she no longer worked there. She was off at the weekend so there is no way on Friday when she promised she would personally manage the complaint that she didn't know what she was actually doing was telling me a load of porkie-pies! The manager I spoke to has e-mailed Vicky and her managers to that effect. He also e-mailed Nadine to ask her to contact me first thing this morning...however I'm still waiting on that call and won't hold my breath!

In the end it has been agreed that I can switch away from British Gas immediately upon my gas switching over penalty-free. They *could* reverse the transfer but said this can cause billing headaches and the easiest thing to do is let the switch happen and then go elsewhere. It has been agreed that I will be charged from the 25th February by British Gas in the form of calculating the difference in what I have paid to OVO (current supplier) to what I would have paid to BG and BG refunding the difference. There was also talk of OFGEM compensation/good will payments but in the end I have said that I'm happy to pay for what I owe...I'm just unhappy at the lack of contact from British Gas, I'd be unhappy at paying extra to OVO because of BG's incompetence at switching my gas over and that customer services in India (e-mail team) need to be retrained so that they don't tell lies to customers! However BG seem hell-bent on offering me "compensation".........

I wish I'd never switched to British Gas now. It's been such a hassle already!