British Gas - Double Refund After Home Move

chris_gray1980

Hi,



I wonder if anyone could please help with me with an issue i am having.


We moved house just over 1 year ago, we were with British Gas (dual fuel) but our new house is Oil so i decided not to switch with British Gas, every was settled OK and we were in credit by around £160, however i have recently received final bill requesting we pay £134, then we recieved a letter stating they have made an error and paid our credit back to us twice and are requesting that we return the money! i have checked back and i can see that they have paid us out twice and also took an extra direct debit out in between the two payments (even though it was canceled and settled) we never noticed the extra payment due to lots of money coming and going with us just moving.



My question is do i have to pay this money back to them due to it being their error and over 1 year ago? (or at least payback in one lump sum) its a lot of money to find in one go especially at Christmas time!! (they have offered a £25 reduction due to their error so we are in debt to them for £134), i have just recieved two emails with final bills (one Gas and one Electricity, they are now saying if we do not pay within 14 days its going to their debt department when we havent done anything wrong and its taken them over a year to realise their error!!



I look forward to hearing from someone.



Thanks

spiro

Yes you have to pay them, they have 6 years to correct an error. If you search this forum you'll find several posts on the topic.

matelodave

Would your attitude be the same if you discovered that they owed you £160 and you asked for it back.

Would you think it reasonable for them to question whether they pay it back or should keep it because you or they didn't notice it at the time.,

Would you be a bit forgiving and offer to knock £25 off as well.

I doubt it.

They and you have up to six years to correct any errors and it looks as though BG are having a bit of a purge as there have been several posts of a similar nature in the last few days.

You coud ask them to allow you to pay it in instalments

The excuse of a lot of money coming in and out is a bit feeble - you should be on top of these things especially when moving.

dogshome

You are not alone
Over recent weeks there have been at least 6 posts from BG customers with exactly the same 'Double Credit Payment' problem.

It would be nice if BG had to pay for their slapdash accounting, but the rule is that they have up to 6 years to adjust previous billing erorrs

MoneyMate

Hope you get this case solved soon, have you thought of writing to British Gas with Resolver ? It's working for me at present with ID MOBILE.

It's free and easy to use :beer:

Cardew

It is a common misconception that if a firm - any firm - has made a mistake in accounting that they have no grounds to recover that money.

At said above they have up to 6 years to reclaim that money, as you would have if you overpaid.

The £25 reduction is a 'goodwill' offer. If you don't pay it will go to a debt collection agency, you will lose the £25 and get a black mark on your credit record. If it did go to court, you would almost certainly lose.

chris_gray1980

Thank you everyone for your quick responses any answering my question.

Chris

badmemory

I consider it totally incredible that these large energy companies are so completely incompetent. How much is their incompetence costing all of us? If they got it right the first time, how much less would it cost all of us? I'm not just talking money here. Even if you can afford it the stress of a bill turning up years after the fact is huge. Wouldn't it be nice if they had a gov body to oversee them? Sorry, forgot they do, don't they? Need to fire the lot & start again then!

Cardew

badmemory wrote: »

Wouldn't it be nice if they had a gov body to oversee them?!

They do! It is called Ofgem

https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/about-us

PixelPound

If you read the Direct Debit Guarantee it usually states that if you receive a refund you are not entitled to that you must pay it back when asked to.
https://www.directdebit.co.uk/DirectDebitExplained/Pages/DirectDebitGuarantee.aspx