Recovering standing charge for electricity supply that hasn't been used.

Richy_Freeway

We're a small business and have two electricity meters. One that covers the whole building and one that is specifically for a storage heater.

There has been zero use of the storage heater for at least six years now, yet we've been blindly paying the standing charge of about £40 a month for the supply.

Does anyone know if it would be possible to claim it back?

Carrot007

No, it would be as per the terms of your contract.


It would also cost you a lot to get the meter /cutout removed in order to stop paying, which is probably why it is still there.

Richy_Freeway

Going forward isn't a problem, they've said they'll disconnect that meter and we'll not be paying anything in the future.

Not sure how that's going to work, whether they'll just stop billing us for it or come and physically remove the meter.

Thanks for the reply, always worth asking on here!

Richy_Freeway

I know what a standing charge is. As we've used absolutely nothing at all on this particular supply I was just wondering if we might be able to wangle a refund on it. It seems that we can't though.

Robin9

Energytwist - you may have missed that this is a business supply and that the supply is disused therefore no need to alter any wiring or change meters

AndyCF

I'd always assumed the 'standing charge' was just that, you pay it regardless of if you use the supply or not, so even if you do not use a single solitary unit of energy in a year or more, you still owe the standing charges.

A bit like how you have to pay line rental for a phone line, even if the phone never ever rings and you never use it to make any calls its still due every x period, even if you did not have a phone just the "live and active" socket there!

Unless its slightly different for the situation above given its two meters and business, however I'd of (without looking into it) assumed said charge would be due regardless.

Mind you no harm at all in asking about a refund or reduction! Worst is they say "no"


EDIT... Sorry! Somehow I -completely- missed most of the -existing- replies to this topic already. I have no idea how. Please ignore my reply as there's far more practical and useful information in others replies, probably.

Ectophile

Richy_Freeway wrote: »

Going forward isn't a problem, they've said they'll disconnect that meter and we'll not be paying anything in the future.

Not sure how that's going to work, whether they'll just stop billing us for it or come and physically remove the meter.

Thanks for the reply, always worth asking on here!

If you want them to disconnect the supply, then they will actually have to turn up and disconnect the supply. That will probably mean removing the meter and capping off the supply.


Otherwise, you could then turn on that unused heater and get free heating.