Eon and massive direct debit

amason63

Hi there,

I have a question about direct debit. We have had our direct debit for gas and electric suddenly increased massively and inaccurately by Eon. They haven't taken any meter readings for over a year and have suddenly hiked the monthly payment from £79 to £536 which they took out last month without us realising.
The next direct debit is due tomorrow - we cannot contact them today but have sent an email and recorded the actual meter reading on their website. Should we put a stop to the direct debit before they end up with £1000 of our money, or would that put us in a worse position?

Thanks

Angela

amason63

Our house number is 20 and there is a 20a next door - I am wondering whether they have read the meter to the wrong house? Also, I need to correct the above statement - they did take a meter reading in February which had higher readings than our meter is at now ! Either somebody came out who cannot read meters or they read the wrong meter.

Skools_Out

amason63 wrote: »

Our house number is 20 and there is a 20a next door - I am wondering whether they have read the meter to the wrong house? Also, I need to correct the above statement - they did take a meter reading in February which had higher readings than our meter is at now ! Either somebody came out who cannot read meters or they read the wrong meter.

Why not go and make your own check? :huh: :cool:

Skools_Out

amason63 wrote: »

Hi there,

I have a question about direct debit. We have had our direct debit for gas and electric suddenly increased massively and inaccurately by Eon. They haven't taken any meter readings for over a year and have suddenly hiked the monthly payment from £79 to £536 which they took out last month without us realising.
The next direct debit is due tomorrow - we cannot contact them today but have sent an email and recorded the actual meter reading on their website. Should we put a stop to the direct debit before they end up with £1000 of our money, or would that put us in a worse position?

Thanks

Angela

Good to hear you've got £400+ quid you could spare hanging about in your current account. And that you haven't bothered to do anthing about it for the past month.

Make sure you have enough money in your account tomorrow to meet the collection, and contact the supplier when they re-open to resolve your issues.

Still raining where you are? :cool:

D_M_E

Were all

Were all your bills estimated since there seems to be a loooong period between readings?

Are they trying to bill you for both your and 20a's consumption?

Have they transposed day and night readings (if on economy 7)?

Have they billed for cubic feet consumption on a gas meter when in fact the meter is metric?

Read the meters yourself at least once a month and give the readings to the supplier.

Check the serial numbers on the bill - do they match the numbers on YOUR meters or are they the numbers from the meters at 20a?

Why did you not ask your bank to get the £536 back as it's vastly more than your £79?

I would have immediately cancelled the DD when the £536 had been taken, that would have got their notice.

matelodave

If the supplier has taken more than they should then invoke the DD Guarantee with your bank to reclaim it.

You could actually help the situation by reading the meters yourself and sending the readings into your supplier, preferably once a month rather than accepting what seem to be estimated readings.

Checking your on-line account regularly and making sure that only actual reading are being used (and getting them corrected if they aren't) would ensure that not only would your supplier have up to date info but you'd also know what was going on as well.

Take charge, it's your bill and your money

Former_E.ON_Company_Representative:_Malc

amason63 wrote: »

Hi there,

I have a question about direct debit. We have had our direct debit for gas and electric suddenly increased massively and inaccurately by Eon. They haven't taken any meter readings for over a year and have suddenly hiked the monthly payment from £79 to £536 which they took out last month without us realising.
The next direct debit is due tomorrow - we cannot contact them today but have sent an email and recorded the actual meter reading on their website. Should we put a stop to the direct debit before they end up with £1000 of our money, or would that put us in a worse position?

Thanks

Angela

amason63 wrote: »

Our house number is 20 and there is a 20a next door - I am wondering whether they have read the meter to the wrong house? Also, I need to correct the above statement - they did take a meter reading in February which had higher readings than our meter is at now ! Either somebody came out who cannot read meters or they read the wrong meter.

Hello amason63 and welcome to the Forums.

I can understand how an increase like this must've come as a shock. Already some great advice on here. Thanks all. If you let us have up to date meter readings, we'll rebill the account to these. If the wrong readings were used before, the rebill will cancel these out. We can then re-assess the monthly payments based on accurate information to make sure they're covering the ongoing usage. Any credit balance at this point can be refunded.

Should there still be a debit balance, we can include this in the ongoing arrangement and spread it over a more manageable period.

As D_M_E says, check the meter serial number on our bills is the same as the one on the meter itself. If not, this could be what's known as a crossed meter. This is where we're billing to a different meter to the one actually at the property. They tend to happen on new builds or after a meter exchange. We've a specialist team who look after crossed meters. They investigate what's been mixed up, sort it out and rebill accounts using the right meter and readings. If the numbers don't match, I'd suggest talking to this team. Let them have the meter serial number (from the meter itself), up to date readings, the full Royal Mail postal address including the post code and, if a new build, plot details.

Also agree with D_M_E and matelodave on regular meter readings. These will help keep the account on track and, as you did the other day, can be entered online through our website. Once this issue has been sorted, you'll also be able use the Direct Debit Manager on our website to help make sure payments are covering usage. This includes being able to change the monthly payments to better suit different circumstances and avoid shocks with unexpected bills.

Hope this points you in the right direction. Let me know if you need any more information as happy to help.

Malc