This is what happened to my business electric

james290786

I bought a business in November 2015 which needed refurbishment. There were two electric meters on the premises which were classed as related in the central
ECOES database and initially registered with SSE.

In May 2016, after refurbishment we decided to go with another cheaper electricity supplier, at this stage we had refurbished the premises and effectively disconnected one of the meters from the electric supply. ( an old ferranti meter)

Extra Energy (EE) quoted the best price so we went with them, after they had sent all the details we realised that they had
only taken one meter, the meter with no electricity going through it. The other meter was still owned by SSE.

We contacted Extra Energy who said it was an erroneous transfer and they would sort it out. British Gas then took over the other meter in June 2016 and honoured the agreed rate that EE had initially quoted. Problem solved, or so we thought.

In July 2016 we received an electric bill from EE which was for the standing charge only, so we contacted EE. We called, emailed and started their complaints process but no one would take responsibility or even look at the issue. We then decided to go to the ombudsman who ruled in our favour in January 2017. We received our invoice money back, £50 compensation and EE were tasked with sorting it out.

In June 2017 we received a bill for 1 years standing charges from EE for the meter with no electric running through it followed by final demands and threats of bailiffs. Oh no here we go again.........and in the meantime the British Gas contract had run out and they upped the rate from 10.41 per unit to 22.55 (an increase of 116%) and the standing rate from 13p per day to 44.5p per day (238%) No other company could quote a new rate because the meters were still related and in effect British Gas had a monopoly.

Things were now desperate, however this time EE responded really well ( or so we thought) in July 2017 they arranged to remove the meter and initially promised 5 days, this turned into 5 weeks with a date of 22nd August provided to us. No one came, we set another date of 19th September, no one came. The meter was eventually removed on 28th September 2017. I am now waiting for the ECOES database to be updated to remove the unused and removed meter.....

I did contact the Ombudsman again and asked to re-open the case, they said I had to start a new one......is there an Ombudsman for the Ombudsman?

I am still paying the inflated British Gas bills ...... until I can change suppliers which I can’t do until the meter database is updated.

Latest: British Gas has refused to let
another supplier take over and Extra Energy sent me an email to say that another supplier has offered to take over the removed meter.


Who would believe this?????????

james290786

Any help or assistance will be greatly received

JJ_Egan

Its a business to business transaction different rules apply .
You want your legal guys to get involved.

james290786

In older properties where electricity is the only supply option a lot of properties have 2 meters to take advantage of economy 7 type tariffs. These are related centrally in the ecoes database where all meter info is stored. This is a case of a bad transfer and despite the ombudsman being involved earlier it’s gone from worse to worse. If you can’t get a result from the ombudsman where do you turn?

footyguy

james290786 wrote: »

... If you can’t get a result from the ombudsman where do you turn?

You got a result, and you accepted it in full and final settlement of your compliant.

Good luck!

james290786

the ombudsman agreement included Extra Energy to sort out the issue. They didn’t do this and even started sending bills for standing charges again and as a result of the related meters ( which they should have sorted) I am paying excessive charges for electricity. I have spent 17 months on this issue which was not of my doing. Still waiting for ecoes to be updated, but British Gas are now talking to me, re the monopoly supply.
Basically this is a problem I didn’t create, it’s took ages to get sorted an not even the ombudsman can assert its authority to its own ruling.