Deemed contract terms

jackiewood

I know ...I usually do. He just didnt look like a sales man. He went straight to the meter like he had been before, Just thought it was the current supplier.

espresso

I don't know the legalities of this situation but I would have thought that you should have a 'cooling off period' when you can change your mind. Perhaps ofgem can offer you advice if EDF will not back down.

Terrylw1

Hi Jackie,

We had a BGas salesman try this once and we kicked him out as he had used his BGas connectiosn to dupe one of my family into believing he was the gas reader. He was very apologetic then!

Meter readers & engineers are nothing to do with Suppliers. Some Suppliers belong to the same group of companies e.g. Npower group & MeterPlus/Asset & Energy Data or Eon being Powergen & Metering Services Ltd. However, Ofgem has clearly stated that they cannot plug their own Suppliers.

In your case you have been duped into a contract by a dodgy saleman. You can mak a complaint about this by stating that the guy passed himself off as a meter reader and gained a reading before asking for your details. I would take it straight to Ofgem/Energywatch though because your Supplier has got you bang to rights with a signature so unless you kick off enough, they won't want to let you go.

Sadly, when it comes to salemen on commission, they come & go and earn as much commission as they can in a short time. There are still standards in place though as there have been a lot of cases such as this in the past. Some Suppliers have sacked them or fined them where they have found such dodgy methods.

A lot of these Suppliers contract out their sales. If they do this, the Supplier may be more willing to help you since they will be attacking a contracted sales company rather than admitted their own liability as tey would with their own staff.

I'll warn you now though, they will insist you knew all about it and that you are the dodgy one.

Good luck, but be very assertive or you've had it.

I would also check your contract's T&C's because due to all these issues utility contracts should now have a 7 day cool off (but this only applies where you have signed, not sure on the verbal sign ups anymore???)

BTW - these salesman are supposed to show you their ID and explain they are salesmen. To add weight I woulc kick off claiming they have gained false entry to your property, deception etc.

Terrylw1

All, the debate on this one is raging on "bills addressed to the occupier" as Legaleagle is responding on that thread and not replying to this one...

Ken68

A damned good post LegalEagle, you got the experts interested.
If it ever got to court, a judge would probably suggest the law is changed in favour of more certain identification. Maybe a default contract to the property owner.

Ken68

....which begs the question, why this wasn't the answer originally when gas and elctric were freed up.
A million people moving each year and the best that OFGEM could come up with was to address bills to 'the occupier'.

Cardew

Ken68 wrote: »

....which begs the question, why this wasn't the answer originally when gas and elctric were freed up.
A million people moving each year and the best that OFGEM could come up with was to address bills to 'the occupier'.

Ken,
The whole point about deemed contracts in the Act on gas and electricity supply is that it is for the protection of consumers and not the supplier. The Utility companies must supply those utilities, so they are forced into supplying to an unknown person from an unknown date.

It would be too easy for the gas and electricity supplier(and water) to cut off those utilities when the outgoing occupant moved out. Then not reconnect until they had a signed agreement with the incoming occupant. Used to happen many years ago with some companies I am told.

How else can the Utility company address bills on change of occupancy? The Utility companies have no idea when(or who) someone has moved in unless that person tells them.

For the million(if that is the figure) changes in owner/tenant each year, the system works in the vast majoity of cases. We move in and gas, electricity and water are connected and working and we pay the bills. It would be a nightmare if these utilities were not working

If it shouldn't work like it does at present, what is your solution?

Terrylw1

Hi Ken,

Legaleagle's argument is badly flawed in many ways. The example of his client doesn't even tie with the point he/she is making, hence it can't be considered as a serious argument. Legaleagle has tactically avoided answering the questions raised or attempted to provide any solution.

ALL Suppliers up to de-regulation had the right to disconnect the electricity supply by pulling the meter fuses. This was in the days when engineers could come straight out and sort it for you because they were the same companies e.g. MEB, and not the companies they are now where they are seperate due to company splits and regulated seperately to avoid monopolies.

Contracts set in place with the Agents since try to prevent Suppliers from doing things this quick. This only serves to inconvenience those moving in.

The BSCP's set in place state that Suppliers cannot register MPAN's retrospectively.

The whole argument that Legaleagle has states that Suppliers must write off the periods up to a new customer agreeing to a Supplier and in the process evade the VAT on top. We all know that Suppliers would adjust their prices accordingly so the genuine customers would have to pay for those who play the system and do not nominate a Supplier for as long as they can get away with it.

This is why the electricity utilities used to pull the fuses? Well...

1 - safety
2 - prevent energy theft e.g. squatters
3 - to ensure that any new customer had no choice but to contact them!

Now this is seen as a very shaky concept thesedays. There is nothing to stop Suppliers doing this now, the Utilities Act does not prevent it as provision of supply is still there with a registered Supplier. The fuses can be left out & Ofgem support it eitherway. However, it costs them a fortune in visits and lots of potential complaints about no supply on.

As far as a default contract to the property owner, thats what Legaleagle is disputing as that is already the way it is. Legaleagle is challenging that fact with very little knowledge of the industry.

Suppliers are very limited thesedays. Back in the "good old days", Suppliers were part of the whole system hence they had access to your council tax records, credit records etc. Nowadays, they don't have as much to use, hence they have no idea when people move in or out except for when they get readings to show the meter is moving.

From there they do whatever they can. The first step being to send an "occupier" letter out to alert the customer of their Supplier and to ask them to get in touch. They can't help it if the occupier chooses to ignore this, essentially scamming their electricity/gas for as long as they can.

The Supplier then gets the bills going as they know they have a customer who is ignoring them. Once they ignore the bills, off it goes to the red letter stage. After that they pass it (in the case of the Suppliers I know of) to Agents under Condition 19 visits or via private Agents they employ to chase debt. They will still give you the chance to sort it out with the Agent however if you don't, expect a PP meter or debt collectors.

At the end of the day, it's not just wholesale prices that push your bills up. Paying for those intentional dodgy customers forms part of it as in any industry.

Ofgem would need to grant Suppliers additional monitoring powers or enforce fuses out policies. Unfortunately, part of this is denied under the Data Protection Act and the rest Ofgem are too afraid of enforcing due to how many complaints they would cause in the industry.

Regards

Terrylw1

In the case of electricity - my way round this would be:

The registration process needs to be backdated. This could be achieved by ANY Supplier making an industry change proposal (or industry body such as Ofgem, Elexon etc)

This document would then be circulated nationally to all members of the BSC (all electricity Suppliers, Meter Operators, data Collectors/Aggregators, LDSO's etc) who would decide on their companies official position and mail it back by the agreed deadline set in the proposal.

From there a series of the usual industry led workshops would reason it all out and submit amended copies of the BSCP that governs Change Of Supply.

Supplier & LDSO (MPAS side) systems would need updates tp allow this process to take place.

LDSO's would also need to be forced to relax their "Retrospective Amendments" optional policy (or reduce the wildly over inflated charges they currently have, which is why Suppliers refuse to use the process) to allow other data items to be amended ONLY where a backdated registration has taken place under this new policy (easily achieved with a code in the request)

This would cause lots of problems with data that affects energy settlements as Supplier ID codes could change meaning a lot of backdating but as long as all this was achieved within 14 months, it would not cause major upheaval to the industry or resulting Supplier energy payments.

The trouble is, this is a very big change and it would takes years to get it in.

So, how committed is Legaleagle to the cause. I suspect, not that much...

Some "lock in clause" would still be required though via Ofgem e.g. if you get an occupier letter and fail to respond with X days, you are stuck with the current Supplier. Based on the Utilities Act it would be very easy to add this alone, but I guess Ofgem see it as a common sense issue.


Ken - in response to your comment over courts making a change in the law. Suppliers request Rights Of Entry warrants in these circumstances already and they have to put all the details forward as to why they are requesting it. So, they already see it. I've asked Legaleagle to comment on this in the other thread but he/she has so far tactically avoided answering the question and tried to send things off at a tangent by discussing energy theft warrants which were not even mentioned...guess we'll await with baited breath...

Ken68

You could both be right, bill the 'occupier'.
The argument must have been rattled to death anyway by OFGEM lawyers on privatisation.Fancy them inventing a 'deemed contract'.
Routing the bill via the property owner (in the case of tenants) could lead to abuse but there is a need for more definate identification. You can't sue an occupier.
My guess is that pressure was applied by the big property owners, and the many absentee landlords.
You don't understand lawyers, you have to pay 'em if you want a response.
Then it would be a seperate contract.:-))
You remind me, Legal, of Bill Thomas on The Jimmy Young Show.
A million was guess, Cardew, tho I thought the figure was in a post.