Electricity bill doubled in six months

Akira

And nothing has changed to justify.
Hello, I don’t know what to do. We were in credit of £215 in July last year, and paying by DD our gas and eletricity. We had our meter changed by EDF in 2016 and, after a meter reading beginning of January this year, we received a bill two weeks ago for double what it normally is, and, as I said before, we were in credit! Contacted EDF as our bill increased from £200 to £400 a month, and they thought there was a fault with the meter and wanted to change it. Before that we received a call asking about energy consumption. Today we received an email from EDF saying that according to their records, there was an increase in units but it has been consistent over the period of time from when the meter was changed. Now we don’t understand because, if anything, we are using less electricity than before. Is there an independent body that we could write to or speak to as we are very worried EDF can just increase our bill and we are powerless to do anything? Another thing, we received a revised bill yesterday saying that from the 5th of January to the 16th of February, 43 days, another £648 was added to the balance. We are being charged over £4000 a year for gas and electricity, and we don’t know what to do. Thank you.

System

What sort of metering do you have now? Are the bills based on estimated or actual meter readings? Are you able to post some readings from the bills with dates?

You can complain to The Energy Ombudsman after 8 weeks or deadlock but you have to follow the supplier!!!8217;s complaints procedure.

House_Martin

you can always request a meter check from the supplier on the new meter. To do it properly they have to install a check meter alongside the new meter so there is a charge for this if its found to be correct.
I m not sure what the latest price is for this , it used to be around £60/£70.
You could run a one bar (1 kw ) electric fire for exactly 1 hour , with everything else switched off, inc freezer ,and it should register exactly i unit on the meter

ProDave

The most probable cause is your previous bills were based on estimates. In the process of changing the meter, they will have got the actual reading so you are catching up on arrears.

Just because your "account" was in credit does not mean you do not owe them anything, the account could just be in credit because of a long run of under estimated readings.

Have you been submitting actual readings regularly?

Do that 1KW heater for an hour check with EVERYTHING else switched off.

System

ProDave wrote: »

The most probable cause is your previous bills were based on estimates. In the process of changing the meter, they will have got the actual reading so you are catching up on arrears.

Just because your "account" was in credit does not mean you do not owe them anything, the account could just be in credit because of a long run of under estimated readings.

Have you been submitting actual readings regularly?

Do that 1KW heater for an hour check with EVERYTHING else switched off.

If fairness to the OP, £4000 per year for gas and electricity is extraordinary by any normal usage standards. That said, credit balances are often meaningless unless based on an actual meter reading. Even then the balance is only accurate for the day on which the meter was read.

Akira

Hello, thank you all, the bills are not estimated readings. We were told by EDF to send the meter reading every day for four days, the first two days were 37868 and then 37929. I have no idea what that means, only that it went up. We haven!!!8217;t sent today!!!8217;s reading yet. I have asked many people, and looked online for people with similar sized houses and not one of them pays £200 a month, let alone £400. One of my friends has 6 people in the house, we are four, they have one less bedroom than us, and pay £120 a month and they are not happy. We felt because we never contested the £200 a month, they are really taking the mickey now. We have not changed anything, or added anything to justify the increase, well, double. And when we queried the bill they asked us to read the meter again, gas and electric, so they then sent us a revised bill saying we owe another £648.77 for 43 days, on top of the bill. One person from EDF said it looks like there!!!8217;s a fault with the meter, but they haven!!!8217;t said anything since, they were supposed to change it but we don!!!8217;t know what!!!8217;s going on anymore, we keep getting letters threatening to put a pre-paid meter in, even though we were told that!!!8217;d be a stop on the account regarding letters. We had to complain, again. We don!!!8217;t have a 1kw heater to do that test, can it be done another way, please? Thank you.

Akira

Don!!!8217;t know what happened to my post, the numbers!??

Akira

Again!? There!!!8217;s a glitch I think?