E.On - Changes Following Death of Account Holder

MrsWenger

Hi Malc and Helena, I hope you are both well.

Sadly, my neighbour has passed away very suddenly and, as he and his wife are good friends of ours, I am helping her with some of the practical elements at this difficult time.

The account was in Mr Neighbour’s name, paid by monthly direct debit from their joint account. His wife contacted the bereavement team who closed the original account and opened a new one in Mrs Neighbour’s name. They advised that they could not make a name change on the existing account and that Mrs Neighbour could not continue their current tariff so she has been moved to the standard option which is more expensive. Is this correct please?

The bereavement team also advised that the new usage would only be about half of the current usage, i am not sure why, and set the new DD at £48, it was previously £88. When my neighbour has logged in there is a message advising the DD should be changed to £105 per month.

She can no longer login to the original account to see her usage to allow me to check for alternative options.

As you can imagine, this is a very stressful time for my neighbour and she has many things to sort.

Any feedback you can share would be appreciated please.

Best wishes,

Tracey

Kitchen_Sink

MrsWenger wrote: »

Hi Malc and Helena, I hope you are both well.

Sadly, my neighbour has passed away very suddenly and, as he and his wife are good friends of ours, I am helping her with some of the practical elements at this difficult time.

The account was in Mr Neighbour’s name, paid by monthly direct debit from their joint account. His wife contacted the bereavement team who closed the original account and opened a new one in Mrs Neighbour’s name. They advised that they could not make a name change on the existing account and that Mrs Neighbour could not continue their current tariff so she has been moved to the standard option which is more expensive. Is this correct please?

The bereavement team also advised that the new usage would only be about half of the current usage, i am not sure why, and set the new DD at £48, it was previously £88. When my neighbour has logged in there is a message advising the DD should be changed to £105 per month.

She can no longer login to the original account to see her usage to allow me to check for alternative options.

As you can imagine, this is a very stressful time for my neighbour and she has many things to sort.

Any feedback you can share would be appreciated please.

Best wishes,

Tracey

I don't know about the simple change of name Mrs Neighbour requested, but now the account in Mr Neighbour has been closed and a new account opened in the name of Mrs Neighbour, there should be no reason Mrs Neighbour cannot change tariff with Eon, or even ditch & switch entirely to a new supplier.
There is certainly no reason she should languish on Eon's expensive standard variable tariff (whatever they call that)

In the circumstances, I can understand why Mrs Neighbour is unable to access the online account of Mr Neighbour, but presumably she can have her own online account (at least whilst she is an Eon customer). She should contact Eon to have it set up, obtain login details, etc.

Robin9

Marc and Helana of Eon - I do hope you can pick this one up. I don't think the bereavement team is coming out of this very well.

Should the lady not have been offered the best tariff available and where does the idea of your bills halving when a partner dies.

molerat

^^ Fully agree ^^

The_Big_Bamboo

Robin9 wrote: »

Marc and Helana of Eon - I do hope you can pick this one up. I don't think the bereavement team is coming out of this very well.

Should the lady not have been offered the best tariff available and where does the idea of your bills halving when a partner dies.

I agree.

As Mrs Neighbour is (presumably!) the surviving spouse and next of kin and she still lives at the address she shared with Mr Neighbour there is no reason why the account could not have been transferred immediately to the name of Mrs Neighbour and carried forward seamlessly;..especially as the bills were being funded by Mr & Mrs Neighbours joint bank account.

That is EXACTLY what happened when my Dad died three years ago;...my mother effectively took ‘ownership’ of the gas (British Gas) and the electricity (EON...coincidentally!) accounts and they continued unabated.

matelodave

I do find it difficult to understand why some companies can make things so incredibly difficult especially at a time like this when a bit of flexibility, sympathy and just plain common sense should prevail.

I've had to deal with so called "bereavement teams" and some have been really good and others have not been very helpful at all. Mind you for a lack of sympathy you've got a long way to go to beat the DWP.

mac.d

I had a similar issue with SSE's bereavement team. They said the contract had to end and a new one started, as that was contract law, so you effectively get treated the same way as a new tenant in the house and are put onto their standard tariff.

I can only commiserate with your neighbour, for me it was a very distressing experience at a horrible time, so as soon as I felt up to it, I signed up with another supplier.

I argued that a surviving family member (spouse, sibling, etc) living in the same house, with the same surname should not need a new contract, a bereavement team should be able to show a little consideration and make an exception in this case. It appears some will (at least for a spouse as per The Big Bamboo's post), sadly not all.

Did your neighbours not get an annual summary through the post at any time? She can use that to get the details of usage, or if not, although its not going to be as accurate, just use the Direct Debit figure of £88 (although reduce it slightly to take account of her using slightly less electricity) to get some alternative options via the switching websites.

The_Big_Bamboo

mac.d wrote: »

I had a similar issue with SSE's bereavement team. They said the contract had to end and a new one started, as that was contract law, so you effectively get treated the same way as a new tenant in the house and are put onto their standard tariff.

I can only commiserate with your neighbour, for me it was a very distressing experience at a horrible time, so as soon as I felt up to it, I signed up with another supplier.

I argued that a surviving family member (spouse, sibling, etc) living in the same house, with the same surname should not need a new contract, a bereavement team should be able to show a little consideration and make an exception in this case. It appears some will (at least for a spouse as per The Big Bamboo's post), sadly not all.

Did your neighbours not get an annual summary through the post at any time? She can use that to get the details of usage, or if not, although its not going to be as accurate, just use the Direct Debit figure of £88 (although reduce it slightly to take account of her using slightly less electricity) to get some alternative options via the switching websites.

Good post that.:)

With reference to my post #5 I’m quite surprised that Mrs Neighbour had such problems with EON;...I’ve only ever dealt with this situation once (on behalf of my mother) and the process was simple and painless in my dealings with both Br.Gas and EON. i.e. the polar opposite of Mrs Neighbours’ distressing experience

There was certainly no mention of ‘contract law’ or any potential legal complications whatsoever;...however, that was 3 years ago and perhaps there’s been a definitive law change since then,..., or perhaps they all interpret the law more rigidly nowadays,..or maybe it’s just the luck of the draw and it depends which bereavement team operator answers the phone. I really don’t know and I certainly don’t profess to be any sort of legal expert in this area.

I’ve had no dealings with EON since my mother herself died in December but looking around the comparison sites EON’s prices do not look very appealing these days;...so perhaps the OP could do the same as you and help Mrs Neighbour negotiate a cheaper energy deal. :money:

There are, sadly, myriad things to do when someone dies and in my experience many departments/people are extremely helpful and sympathetic,...others perhaps not so much.

Cardew

To be fair to the energy companies, I understand that that there are problems in transfering an account that has a fixed tariff with, say, penalties for leaving early. This becomes a bigger problem if the tariff is no longer available for new customers.


That said the bereavment team should be imaginative in ensuring that the widow is not financially disadvantaged. e.g. put her on the best available tariff and make a 'goodwill' payment to compensate for any loss.

E.ON_Company_Representative:_Helena

Good morning MrsWenger,

I'm really really sorry to read this and it's very kind of you to be so supportive.

I also fully agree with everyone on the thread, that this is a difficult time and we should be doing everything we can to help.

I do know that the current account does have to be closed, the re-opened with the person now responsible for the bills.

I would advise the neighbour to set up a new online account, with the new account number, then they can use the Direct Debit manager tool and adjust the payment amount.


I’ve had a word with the bereavement team for you today and they have said that it depends what the previous tariff is. If it was a go online or similar then they can’t put a new account on the same tariff. So, I think this is what’s happened here.


The best thing to do now is to look online and the comparison sites and get the best tariff.


I think that if the account had been on certain fixed tariffs we may be able to credit the account, if there is a difference.


I’m actually not in the office today, but I’m in tomorrow and will have a word with a colleague.


I can then also help get your neighbour in contact with someone again and they can go through all of this and try and make things a bit clearer.


Helena

MrsWenger

Hi everyone,

Thank you all so much for your posts and for the support and information provided.

Both I and Mrs Neighbour do understand that processes need to be followed and, to be fair to the bereavement team, they were courteous and sympathetic and said my neighbour could ring back if she had any further questions.

I think she was a little taken aback by the apparent inference that losing her husband would reduce the bill by half, not an unnatural sensitivity in the circumstances I think. The team actually provided calculations on what they thought the new usage would be as my neighbour had it written down.

We will definitely use the previous DD information to make comparisons and to find the best deal in the coming weeks.

Helena, as always thank you very much for your help, especially when you are not even in work today.

I shall catch up with my neighbour later on and check which deal she was on. As you might imagine, her mind is full of many things at this time and I have the impression, but I am not 100% certain, that they had recently changed their tariff.

She has definitely logged into the new account as that is where the details about the DD value were showing.

Thank you all again.

Best wishes,

Tracey