Energy Ombudsman

JustAnotherSaver

Are they really that bad? Anyone here used them?


Recently used the financial ombudsman and the outcome was quite quick & positive.
My mother is having a nightmare with Economy Energy and i think it's 8 weeks before you can forward your complaint to the ombudsman? In which case it's 8 weeks at the end of this week and she's had no reply. They've made error after error for the entire 12 months.


I just Googled the energy ombudsman and they get a bit of stick on Google reviews. Many low scores saying how useless they are. Are they really that bad?

dogshome

To appeal to the Energy Ombudsman, you must first follow the suppliers Complaint procedure
1)Write or Email heading it COMPLAINT (Best in writing by Royal Mail) setting out the history of the problem
2)The supplier must then issue you with a Complaint number
3) If after 56 days they have not resolved the problem, you go directly to the Ombudsman

molerat

Used them twice. One took a while with the company dragging it out and the second resolved about 2 weeks after contacting ombudsman.

Terresa

I've used them a couple of times over the years too, and found them generally very helpful.

They have certainly avoided costly court action, and granted 'goodwill gesture' payments on both matters which a court probably would not have ever done.
Also it avoided a possible fear I had with a recent complaint that, even if I were to win a court action, I was worried the supplier would ignore that too and initial investigations indicated due to the complicated set up of the company, enforcement may be difficult anyway (i.e which legal entity do I sue, and does that one have any assets?)

The only criticism I would have of the most recent experience of the EO, was getting to the stage of the complaint being accepted by the ombudsman service for investigation. For some unknown reason, I was asked to issue a letter before legal action to the supplier, and only then would the ombudsman service accept the matter for investigation.
I don't think that was the correct approach, and indeed when I eventually spoke to the investigating officer, he too was unable to shed any light on why this was requested of me.

I think the EO are snowed under with work, and have taken on a lot of low skilled staff to handle matter initially ... and I suspect they are being tasked with putting off some of the complainants to reduce the workload on the investigating officers. But if you respond to their queries quickly, and follow any advice they provide, then it shows you are serious and the matter does get escalated to the investigation stage (at which point they write to tell you to stop sending them any more information about the complaint you have raised until they contact you again)

Terresa

dogshome wrote: »

To appeal to the Energy Ombudsman, you must first follow the suppliers Complaint procedure
1)Write or Email heading it COMPLAINT (Best in writing by Royal Mail) setting out the history of the problem
2)The supplier must then issue you with a Complaint number
3) If after 56 days they have not resolved the problem, you go directly to the Ombudsman

To clarify, if the supplier does not do step 2, you can go to step 3 anyway

In regards to step 1, you can use any approach specified in the supplier's complaint procedure to complain to the supplier ... but you need evidence (so using a form on the supplier's website, or a web chat feature if permitted, may not suit unless you get a receipt/acknowledgement of some kind)

Ensure you follow all steps of the supllier's complaint procedure. e.g. some suppliers ask you to escalate the matter if you do not receive, or are unahppy with an initial explanation given.

Terresa

The OP can find the Economy Energy complaint procedure here

https://www.economyenergy.co.uk/customers/make-a-complaint/

It does, as I indicated above, have the second stage of complaint process many other suppliers also have which Economy Energy call the 'Internal Review'

I'm not sure the OP has completed this yet, and if not, it would require waiting a further 2 weeks (10 working days) after submission for the supplier to respond before the EO will accept such a complaint for investigation (even if 8 weeks have now passed since the complaint was initially raised with the supplier)

As an aside, here are the complaints handling figures for 2017 by quarter by Economy Energy, representing the complaints received, and resolved by them (without the intervention of the EO)
https://www.economyenergy.co.uk/media/1406/annual-complaints-performance-jan-dec17.pdf

JustAnotherSaver

Terresa wrote: »

The OP can find the Economy Energy complaint procedure here

https://www.economyenergy.co.uk/customers/make-a-complaint/

It does, as I indicated above, have the second stage of complaint process many other suppliers also have which Economy Energy call the 'Internal Review'

I'm not sure the OP has completed this yet, and if not, it would require waiting a further 2 weeks (10 working days) after submission for the supplier to respond before the EO will accept such a complaint for investigation (even if 8 weeks have now passed since the complaint was initially raised with the supplier)

As an aside, here are the complaints handling figures for 2017 by quarter by Economy Energy, representing the complaints received, and resolved by them (without the intervention of the EO)
https://www.economyenergy.co.uk/media/1406/annual-complaints-performance-jan-dec17.pdf

My mother has emailed them complaints - which they've ignored.

She has been on the phone to them a ridiculous amount of times. Every time she notes the date, time & name of the person she's speaking to. She asks for a confirmation email to be sent to her of the discussion/issue. Some times this arrives some times it doesn't (although it's always promised).


She's had promises of call backs which never happen. She's been billed a sky high amount through summer when you obviously don't use as much, called to complain about it and told to ignore it as it's doesn't need paying and "they will sort it" only for an even bigger bill to then be emailed to her.


She has been told that her electricity is with another company so she calls that company (that she's never heard of) only to be told that (of course) she's not a customer with them.
She's been told her electricity is with another company different to the above company ... same outcome.


She switched using Uswitch on a dual fuel tarriff. It got handled so badly that her renewal dates are way out of sync (they should be on the same day).


She was refunded around £200 somewhere near the start due to another overcharging balls up that i forget the full details about.


She recently called and they have on their records that she left them mid contract and then returned. Not true.


Apparently she has about 5 meters at the house - also not true (she has 1 gas & 1 electric meter).


Though i think when writing to her they do get her name right. That's about the only thing.

twhitehousescat

recent case here https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5884390/eon-lowell-ombudsman-update sorted within matter of weeks

but do not expect them to award you large amounts of cash

the energy company will promise the earth , but fail , those guys follow it thru for you

JustAnotherSaver

Does anyone know the address for the Energy Ombudsman as the website is down?

molerat

JustAnotherSaver wrote: »

Does anyone know the address for the Energy Ombudsman as the website is down?

Seems to be working https://ombudsman-services.org/complain-now

JustAnotherSaver

molerat wrote: »

Seems to be working https://ombudsman-services.org/complain-now

Yeah i've just gone on now but it seems they've had a redesign and made it considerably more difficult to write to them.


I went on early afternoon and the site was up (before how it looks now) and the postal address was there. I really should've noted it down.


Took a break, wrote out the letter of complaint for my mother, went back to the site & noticed it was down. Back up now as you say but i can't for the life of me find a postal address, just a clunky web form.


After much searching i found something that MIGHT work, but the .pdf was dated from 2015 so i'm not too confident.


Ombudsman Services: Energy
PO BOX 966
Warrington
WA4 9DF


But like i say, that's from 2015 so not sure if it's any good or not.