Should I go to Gas and Elec ombudsman? Help please!

confusedUK2016

Hi everyone

I'd be really grateful for any help or advice anyone can give me. To cut a long story as short as I can here is a summary of the issues I've had with British Gas:

*Bought a flat in May 2015
*Almost immediately received a bill from British Gas billing me for business use
*Made countless phone calls from then to get them to correct it to a residential account
*Nov 2015 - received a bill for elec and gas, and contacted British Gas who said to ignore it as the account hadn't been switched to residential yet
*Finally get a residential account in March 2016 and after more phone calls they agree to not charge me on business rates, issuing me a credit note and a tiny (laughable refund) of £13.04!!
*Thinking this long saga is over, I throw away my old notes logging details of calls made to British Gas (I know, that was a mistake now)
*Decide to let out the property in July 2016, my estate agency agree to sort out all final bills to my new address
*In October, receive a text from British Gas saying they want to talk to me about my account. Realise that my estate agency has given them another old address and that's why I haven't received any final bills. I correct British Gas giving them my correct address and confirm the meter readings and they tell me my final bill is £330 and I should receive this soon.
*Still no bill at end of October so I call again. They said it'll arrive soon
*Today: no bill so I call again and they say the bill is £947!! I explain that I was told £330 and the advisor says he has no record of this on the system and that it is impossible that I would have a bill for this amount given I have never paid gas or elec bill at this property. Getting angry and annoyed, I ask to speak to his manager. He goes through the telephone recordings and finds my earlier call where an advisor quotes £330, apologizing and saying that was human error. He offers me £150 compensation off the £947. I say I'll accept that amount off the £330. He then speaks to his manager and says the best they can offer is £204.77 off the bill for £947 meaning £700 to pay. I say that I don't think that is acceptable as I feel I am being asked to pay almost double for a mistake they made (and admit) and he says he'll send a deadlock letter out in the post to me and recommends me looking into referring it to the ombudsman.

Phew! that was longer than I thought, soz. My question is, am I being too stubborn about wanting to pay the £330 and not £700? Its such a big difference between the 2 and I do feel like I am being charged extra for their mistake!!

is the ombudsman likely to agree with me or with British Gas? they have agreed to send me a recording of the conversation where their advisor said the bill would be £330. I know cases are individual etc etc but just to have a rough gauge would be great!

Help please !!!!!!!!!!!! Thanks in advance

Cardew

Welcome to the forum.

If a firm, or customer, makes a mistake - even in writing - they have up to 6 years to correct that mistake.

If the correct bill is £947, then you owe £947. To get that bill reduced by over £200 is an excellent result - for you - and is a generous goodwill reduction.

I don't see any grounds for you going to the Ombudsman.

matelodave

Do you know what your meter readings were when you bought the place and the final reading - you should be able to work out how much you've used and therefore how much you owe.

If you haven't kept that info then it's really difficult to know how much you owe them and whether £330 or £947 is the amount you should pay
.
Going to the ombudsman without your own hard evidence will probably be a waste of time and you might end up having to pay the whole £947 if he doesn't agree with you, so I'd take Cardew's advice and settle for £700 odd. Unless you want the stress and aggro

Ectophile

Have a read of the billing code of practice http://www.energy-uk.org.uk/customers/energy-industry-codes/code-of-practice-for-accurate-bills.html

If British Gas made the mistake, then they should not be billing for more than one year's worth of energy. however, it looks as though the period you're talking about isn't much more than a year, so you may not get a huge discount.

But what really matters is what the correct bill should be now. You can only tell that by reading the meter(s) and doing a back-of-an-envelope calculation based on the price of energy.

footyguy

confusedUK2016 wrote: »

Hi everyone

I'd be really grateful for any help or advice anyone can give me. To cut a long story as short as I can here is a summary of the issues I've had with British Gas:

*Bought a flat in May 2015
*Almost immediately received a bill from British Gas billing me for business use
*Made countless phone calls from then to get them to correct it to a residential account
*Nov 2015 - received a bill for elec and gas, and contacted British Gas who said to ignore it as the account hadn't been switched to residential yet
*Finally get a residential account in March 2016 and after more phone calls they agree to not charge me on business rates, issuing me a credit note and a tiny (laughable refund) of £13.04!!
*Thinking this long saga is over, I throw away my old notes logging details of calls made to British Gas (I know, that was a mistake now)
*Decide to let out the property in July 2016, my estate agency agree to sort out all final bills to my new address
*In October, receive a text from British Gas saying they want to talk to me about my account. Realise that my estate agency has given them another old address and that's why I haven't received any final bills. I correct British Gas giving them my correct address and confirm the meter readings and they tell me my final bill is £330 and I should receive this soon.
*Still no bill at end of October so I call again. They said it'll arrive soon
*Today: no bill so I call again and they say the bill is £947!! I explain that I was told £330 and the advisor says he has no record of this on the system and that it is impossible that I would have a bill for this amount given I have never paid gas or elec bill at this property. Getting angry and annoyed, I ask to speak to his manager. He goes through the telephone recordings and finds my earlier call where an advisor quotes £330, apologizing and saying that was human error. He offers me £150 compensation off the £947. I say I'll accept that amount off the £330. He then speaks to his manager and says the best they can offer is £204.77 off the bill for £947 meaning £700 to pay. I say that I don't think that is acceptable as I feel I am being asked to pay almost double for a mistake they made (and admit) and he says he'll send a deadlock letter out in the post to me and recommends me looking into referring it to the ombudsman.

Phew! that was longer than I thought, soz. My question is, am I being too stubborn about wanting to pay the £330 and not £700? Its such a big difference between the 2 and I do feel like I am being charged extra for their mistake!!

is the ombudsman likely to agree with me or with British Gas? they have agreed to send me a recording of the conversation where their advisor said the bill would be £330. I know cases are individual etc etc but just to have a rough gauge would be great!

Help please !!!!!!!!!!!! Thanks in advance

If you are not happy with the outcome, then by all means ask the ombudsman to review the matter.

However, I have to agree with Cardew et al in that if you owe £947 for energy consumed, then you owe £947 for energy consumed.

To have been offered over £200 off this is a great result. I must advise that if you go to the ombudsman, that offer may be withdrawn and there is no guarantee the ombudsman would award you that, let alone even more
(although it would be unusual for the ombudsman not to allow you a full and final settlement resolution including the generous £200+ off that has previously been offered by the supplier)

However, as the supplier has considered your complaint and reached deadlock, they may start collection activities against you for the full £947 owed if you don't now pay the £700 they agreed to accept.

(It'll be months before the ombudsman suggests a resolution to you)

confusedUK2016

Hi everyone - thanks very much for all your replies, I'm definitely going to go ahead and pay. I don't want the stress and don't want to wait even longer for it to get all sorted out.

Quick update, I've received the deadlock letter now. I'm trying now to get in touch with them and say I'm now happy to pay - hope they'll accept this? the letter now says the matter is closed hope I haven't missed my chance to get it all overwith .....