Sottish Power being utterly useless

qqg3

:mad:

Start of 2015 I received letters from Scottish Power saying 'Welcome to your new gas account!'

• They didn't have my name on them, simply said 'Dear Owner/Occupier'
• There is no gas connection at this property (electric only)
• I've never had any dealings with Scottish Power.

I contacted them to point out their error and they said they would look into it and resolve it.

They didn't, over the next few months I kept getting letters demanding payment of this account. I just ignored them, my name wasn't involved, there were zero ties to me beyond my place of residence.

Then some sort of bailiff showed up at my doorstep and I simply gave a quick explanation and told him to sod off (politely of course), refusing to give him my name or anything.

That was about six months ago.

Then today I get a fresh letter from some law firm demanding payment on the account to the sum of £700 or so!

So I just rang Scottish Power to discuss this issue and had great difficulty explaining to the operator the situation.

He eventually acknowledged that I was adamant I did not have any gas hookup, his next instructions were for me to contact a different company to inform them I did not have a gas hookup.

I pushed back asking why it was me having to do this considering this account had nothing to do with me and had not been setup by me and it was an entirely an error in the part of Scottish Power. My exact words, "Why should I have to do this? This account has nothing to do with me?"

His response?

He disconnected the call.

Are you kidding me?

I rang straight back, spoke to some lady who seemed much nicer. She put me on hold for a bit, then came and said that she had contacted the Gas Connection team and that this account would now be fully removed.

So I guess we shall wait and see if that happens...

Blimey what a farse.

TLDR: Scottish Power randomly setup an account for my address for a utility it cannot get. Demanded payments, sent a bailiff round, customer services even hung-up on me, they now say they are going to sort it out, but do I believe them? No.

Hoof_Hearted

Unfortunately, this is the nature of the beast. Worst company I have ever dealt with.

angelin77

Keep on top of this. I had a similar problem (only the supplier opened an account in a false name) which resulted in the gas supply being cut off by the supplier. They took no notice of my communications apparently because I was not the named account holder and therefore they could not discuss the situation because of the data protection act.

pineapple

Hoof_Hearted wrote: »

Unfortunately, this is the nature of the beast. Worst company I have ever dealt with.

I once had a nightmare switching from Scottish Power and getting a final bill sorted. In the end they said I owed them despite me paying by direct debit and always being well in credit. Then after I had moved supplier, they quietly took a direct debit out if my account - I got the bank to recall this.
Been wary of direct debits since then and I will never go back to Scottish Power - which unfortunately is currently showing as the cheapest supplier for me to switch to. :mad:
To anyone with problems, I recommend making a comment on their Facebook page.

dogshome

Forget the phone.

Make a written Complaint to the address given on the bills, pointing out the number of times you have advised them that there is no gas supply to the property, and their
continued demands for payment amounts to 'Harassment' which is actionable in law

qqg3

UPDATE: I received a new letter today demanding payment on the account! I will now try the written letter approach to them complaining about the situation because this is crazy. 2 years now and they are still harassing the address. Unbelievable.

brewerdave

qqg3 wrote: »

UPDATE: I received a new letter today demanding payment on the account! I will now try the written letter approach to them complaining about the situation because this is crazy. 2 years now and they are still harassing the address. Unbelievable.

....You may not have any gas appliances ...but are you sure that there isn't a gas supply with a meter ,tucked away somewhere?
Just remember a similar story from the forums a few years ago - the property had been refurbished and made "all electric" but the gas supply hadn't been capped off, so the Utility co. still wanted the standing charges paid.:)

footyguy

So they wrote to you saying 'Welcome to your new gas account!'

They are now chasing a related debt using debt collectors.

So SP have presumably created a bill and that bill will have the supply details on.

Are you sure there is no gas supply to your property. If there isn't then it sounds like someone has wrongly registered a supply meter to your address.
Is there anyone nearby you can see has a gas connection that could have been inadvertently addressed to you.
e.g. Are you in flats/converted houses
If a relatively new build, have old plot numbers been used instead of latest house numbers?
etc.

£700 over 2 years would imply some level of usage by someone.

footyguy

qqg3 wrote: »

UPDATE: I received a new letter today demanding payment on the account! I will now try the written letter approach to them complaining about the situation because this is crazy. 2 years now and they are still harassing the address. Unbelievable.

Have you followed the advice previously provided to you in this thread 6 weeks ago???

System

Brewerdave and Footyguy are correct. I hear this all the time from people saying they "do not have gas " or a meter . There may well be a meter in the property for which standing charges need to be paid.Capped gas meters don t usually attract standing charges

qqg3

Thanks for advice guys.

Yes, definitely no gas supply as I have spoken to the landlord about this.

The property was converted from commercial use a few years back and as such gas has never installed (most commercial properties don't need gas).

My neighbours upstairs have gas, I have already asked around but haven't found anyway to resolve it thusly.

This is 100% on SP.

The only silver lining is that they don't know me, as all the communications is addressed to "Owner/Occupier", which is good as I don't want to be tied to this debt.