Not charged for Gas

Smodlet

Robin9 wrote: »

Can we all put this on hold please until contact has been made with BG by the tenant ?

Sure... Assuming it ever is.

System

Smodlet wrote: »

Really need Hengus or House Martin for this but I'm pretty sure, from reading their posts, there is a duty on energy companies to read meters at least every 2 years.

Up until April 2016 all suppliers WITH THE EXCEPTION of British Gas had a Licence Condition that required them to read the meter at least once every 2 years. British Gas managed to negotiate a derogation that increased the time between reads to 5 years. The requirement to read meters was dropped from April 2016 onwards. Suppliers now have to obtain a meter reading once per year.

House_Martin

Smodlet wrote: »

Most of us (I assume) pay for every kwh we use, take responsibility for our energy accounts and do not commit fraud. I can't believe you, House Martin, actually seem to be condoning this unless I have misunderstood your posts in which case, I apologise for not being on the right page.

OP, if you equate being responsible and expecting others to be so too with being smug, that is your prerogative. I won't say how you come across to me as I am not about to be PPR-ed. Encouraging illegal activity is against forum rules, though.

I dont condone it at all but have years of watching the blank screeners who accept what they see as free gas getting away with it all the time, so I m a bit blase about it as are BG RPU . They don t seem to count it as energy theft.Meter readers could well have accessed the blank screen meter a few times over the years.Suppliers do not seem to bother much about a blank screen, at least the ones we read for. They do not take any notice if we notify them via a drop down list that there is a faulty meter
I ve been reporting these sorts of meters to BG RPU and other suppliers RPU s many times over the years.
I get £10 a time from BG for finding tampered gas meters but these flat battery ones do not attract a £10 bonus because the occupiers are not guilty of an actual meter tamper. They mostly have nt touched the meter because the battery has just gone flat and the valve has stuck open and stayed open.
They are just guilty of not reporting it to the supplier.
Different matter if the meter is examined (only by RPU, NOT a meter reader ) and deemed to be tampered. A huge back bill will be due.No prosecutions for 6 years energy theft just a rebill onto a new prepayment meter with a £16 a week repay.
The hard bitten energy thieves simply fiddle the new meter though and it continues for another few years.
Not prosecuting people for energy theft sends a message out that suppliers are mugs !.
I ve been complaining about this for over 10 years on here

House_Martin

Hengus wrote: »

Up until April 2016 all suppliers WITH THE EXCEPTION of British Gas had a Licence Condition that required them to read the meter at least once every 2 years. British Gas managed to negotiate a derogation that increased the time between reads to 5 years. The requirement to read meters was dropped from April 2016 onwards. Suppliers now have to obtain a meter reading once per year.

That is just not do able Hengus. Once a year meter reads wont be able to be obtained on everyone. They can "attempt" to read them but you would be surprised how often we get stopped accessing the meters.
Nowadays with millions of smart meters in place there is no need to look at meters for years.
We get constant refusals as well from occupiers who read their own meters.
Suppliers are not going to be taking out warrants simply to read a meter when no evidence of energy theft is there.
The way I interpreted OFGEMS latest rules is that they have taken away altogether a specific time frame to obtain a meter inspection from a 1 year,2 years or 5 years and cancelled them all and left it up to suppliers own rules which were already in place with their t/c s with every supplier to obtain a meter reading "as and when the supplier deems it necessary ". That would fall in with smart meters which do not need a physical inspection very often or at any time if they are operating properly.
If they are in smart mode, suppliers can see the evidence of dangerous meter tampers with the fault codes sent back to them from the various sensors on the meter.
They can also see if an occupier has completely bypassed the meter by an external bypass making the meter show no energy usage, like cannabis farms do, and would draw suspicion on the properties claims.

Smodlet

Thank you for the clarification, House Martin. I don't imagine you are too concerned about job security just yet...

scoey8

Thanks for the info.

I have now found out that although nobody has been to read the meter, A statement has been sent out each year from British gas which shows the usage as zero?! So strange that they can see this but have not questioned.

Joyful

The companies are now covered if they are asking a credit customer to provide a read once a year. As they do this on every bill then they are covered. They only have to now read every 7 years. If your friend has received a gas standing charge rebate, that is because the system assumes a very low or no usage. If this is the rebate you are speaking about she would have had time to speak with BG when they assessed her. She needs to call BG and there is a specialist team that will work out usage and put it on the new meter for her. If she is upstanding and wants to pay her way she should contact them asap.

Many people do have a zero use and that was why the Standing charge rebate was brought in. I also assume at some point she would have been written to asking if she was struggling to pay for her gas usage as they would be receiving no payments.

House_Martin

scoey8 wrote: »

Thanks for the info.

I have now found out that although nobody has been to read the meter, A statement has been sent out each year from British gas which shows the usage as zero?! So strange that they can see this but have not questioned.

Not strange to me.
A computer has probably been in charge of issuing the annual statements process and it does nt know any better.
I have seen people with stopped electric meters for years with BG, and other suppliers , but with a fully functioning gas meter and full modern gas central heating which has been correctly billed.
Despite all this , and the gas central heating needing electricity to function with the fan and pump, the auto billing systems used issue a zero usage of electricity and do not question it.
Standing charges are billed only with a stopped electric meter..
Their auto billing saves a lot of money for the suppliers but they must program them properly to spot things like this.
You cannot have zero use of an electric meter and normal use of a gas meter, or vice versa..
thanks Joyful for updating the Energy board on the frequency of supplier reads.
Once every 7 years seems correct for smart meters.
A poster on here maintains it is once a year, which is not possible with dumb meters or desirable with smart meters

indian_summer

Was it a fairly new build when she moved in?

This happened to me.

I moved in to a fairly new build council property.
I was told the electric was south west electric(something like)and the gas was british gas.I phoned to change my new address details with my provider.Duel fuel tariff.Scottish power.

My electric was prepaid so I just received statements for that.

Having not received anything about the gas after a few months I rang up to ask why.

They informed me that british gas didnt have the previous supply and that they didnt know who had the previous supply,so couldnt help me and that id have to take it up with transco.They could not find a gas supply at that address.

So what followed was many many calls to transco and scottish power back and forth,neither having a clue what the problem was.I gave up after months of trying.I had the proof I had tried with the many logged phonecalls I had,so I thought why should I waste my time and money if they cant be bothered to.

I think the problem boiled down to the MPRN

Your gas MPRN (Meter Point Reference Number) is the unique identifying number for your property. Your MPRN is sometimes referred to as a M Number. It is unique to your property and does not change if you change supplier. The electricity equivalent is the Meter Point Administration Number.
Your MPRN should be printed on your recent gas bill. Do not confuse your MPRN number with your gas supplier account number or the meter serial number printed on your gas meter. The format of a MPRN is standard. It is between 6-10 numerical digits long and should be in a similar format to the one below:

MPRN
4973421533

I think what had happened here is when a new build has a new gas meter installed the MPRN sticker must be removed from the meter and stuck in the gas fitters book.This MPRN is then passed to transco and your gas line is registered.

There was a big yellow sticker on the gas meter saying "must be removed by gas fitter" or something along those lines.

The MPRN wasn't registered at this addeess.

So I enjoyed free gas for 18 months
The previous tenants did.
And the new ones probably are too

scoey8

Joyful, sorry I didn't mean a rebate i was just referring to the £15 winter voucher they send out.

House Martin, thanks for the explanation. Seems British gas are not very pro active with this sort of thing. As I say no mention of a meter reading in 6 years.

Indian summer, thanks. However in this case the block is a grade 2 listed Victorian property.