Edf trying to con £1400 for a quarter ??? SORTED THANKS

[Deleted User]

DawnCrush wrote: »

I'm sure I'm misunderstanding what you are saying.

Surely you are not suggesting that prosecutions do not result from the illegal abstraction of electricity? If there was no sanction, save for paying what is used if caught, I'm sure many more people would take their chances.

If you are simply saying it is not the supplier themselves that pursue the prosecution, I would tend to agree with you. Whilst private prosecutions are possible, they are not common and can lead to critisism from the courts; it's the CPS who usually take on prosecutions. Even if a private prosecution were commenced, the CPS have the right to take them over.

Just a few facts to assist:
In Northern Ireland alone, over the period 2014-2016 there were over 350 convictions for electricity theft.
Almost 50 of those resulted in immediate imprisonment of the offenders, whilst another 90 received suspended sentences.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-43318845


And here are the number of prosections for various other regions of the UK for the 2014-2015 period:

I have seen that quite laughable graph showing a minute percentage of "prosecutions " in the whole of the UK which is around 1500 in one year and only 28 in my county of South Yorks.. Personally I can show you streets in my home town of Doncaster where 28 properties are bypassing meters in one street alone !..only 150 for the whole of London ! More likely 100,000 are bypassing
Dundas Rd in Sheffield where I have worked as a meter reader had a gas explosion in 2014 and there is a press report , still available which I can show you , of British Gas Revenue Protection Officers entering 20 properties to check for more gas leaks and finding 7 out of the 20 properties bypassing either or both gas and electric meters..A number which shocked the hard bitten RPU at the scale of meter bypassing .Those 1500 in 2014/15 would most probably been associated with large scale cannabis farming .
Dundas Rd has approx 80 terraced properties, scale that up pro rata and there will be probably 28 properties fiddling in that street alone
Suppliers in the main do not pass meter bypassing onto the Police nowadays. Its too expensive and they end up losing more money employing expensive legal reps in the same way that shoplifting up to £200 does not get to prosecution stage..

bimma

dawncrush….I meant at the time the engineer came to the property. he didn't mention anything like that,

first mention is the bill

if I was guilty of tampering...I wouldn't be posting on here for help

[Deleted User]

bimma wrote: »

gerry1 no idea what that means lol.

Houbara thanks for this. At the time the engineer came out he did not mention anything about tampering. just replaced the meter as he said it was faulty.

he changed the meter. he said the £76 was strange as it should not have gone to that..it should have just cut out after so much in "debt". The former tenant had fitted a electric cooker (original gas) and therefore there was wire going from the kitchen along the wall to the fuse box. he said this should have been put through the ceiling. and said it needed sorting properly.


there was no mention of tampering at all.


Yes they will have payment history for the property. and I accept that it was a silly oversight not to change it over but as it was a card system and the property was empty it wasn't a priority of mine. I mentioned this to the lady on the phone when arranging the appointment for engineer to come out.


spoke to edf and they said call back Monday as they will speak to the 2 engineers who came out.

There was very little topped up from Oct 18 to now as the property was empty needed major top to bottom refurb. plaster, joists, underpinning, bath, kitchen. and from april 19-oct 19 there was the build up of the £76 on the meter due to no activity whatsoever due to family bereavement .


I will add a pic of the bill in a second

My colleague works on electric tampers and they do not like to mention that meters are bypassed but prefer to say it s "faulty " as they never know how some tenants may take accusations of theft. I m sure that EDF would not say that there has been theft of electricity without concrete evidence as you could possibly sue them .Detailed examination of electric meters would show that under the lower cover where the four cables enter even if the link wire had been removed , that the meter had had an illegal connection at some time,
Personally I think you should be showing some sort of evidence, such as a lease contract that the property had been under the account of your former tenant with the dates which would show that the payment history was extremely low for that period ..EDF should be chasing your former tenant, not you , but you have to provide some evidence.
Its extremely common nowadays for tenants to fiddle the meters .Landlords don`t have a right of access and can t be accountable for what their tenants are doing

DawnCrush

bimma wrote: »

...

if I was guilty of tampering...I wouldn't be posting on here for help

It is not for me to pass judgement, but that is what you are being accused of, hence my strong advice I provided you in post#3.

DawnCrush

Houbara wrote: »

My colleague works on electric tampers and they do not like to mention that meters are bypassed but prefer to say it s "faulty " as they never know how some tenants may take accusations of theft. ...

So they don't want the company to earn £400 a pop?
Have you highlighted this to the chief accountant?

Theft of electricity is not a victimless crime.

[Deleted User]

DawnCrush wrote: »

So they don't want the company to earn £400 a pop?
Have you highlighted this to the chief accountant?

Theft of electricity is not a victimless crime.

I know its not but its out of hand now and has been for many years.. All what happens is that the losses are passed on in higher prices for the rest to absorb .
British Gas spend millions on Revenue Protection but they are about the only supplier to do that..EDF in my experience are very poor indeed and do not take revenue protection seriously with the smaller suppliers paying virtually no attention at all.
Meter tampering in the main takes place in the inner city and towns mostly in the poorer areas in terraced streets with a transient population coming and going .. in the more prosperous areas I visit, such as Howden and Epworth to mention two nice towns its rare to find a tamper but places like Hexthorpe and Edlington its rife

DawnCrush

Houbara wrote: »

I have seen that quite laughable graph showing a minute percentage of "prosecutions " in the whole of the UK which is around 1500 in one year and only 28 in my county of South Yorks.. Personally I can show you streets in my home town of Doncaster where 28 properties are bypassing meters in one street alone !......

:rotfl:

The graph does not cover the whole of the UK
- it is just a limited number of areas to give you an idea of the number of prosecutions in those areas

Also the data is from 2014-2015

If you are aware of a street in Doncaster where there are currently 28 different properties involved in theft of electricity, you should report the matter to the police there, and obtain crime references for each one.

Theft of electricity is not a victimless crime.
(but perhaps the CPS are not currently prosecuting, as doing so may compromise other active, more serious cases currently being persued there by them)

DawnCrush

Houbara wrote: »

I know its not but its out of hand now and has been for many years.. All what happens is that the losses are passed on in higher prices for the rest to absorb . ...

It doesn't help because of the alleged fraudulent activities of your colleagues, and you apparently being complicit in that.

Stop sitting there moaning about others, and take some positive action of your own. (if you have any evidence of the allegations you have posted here)

bimma

i will speak to them on monday again, ask for evidence of tampering if they have it i,e pics to be emailed to me and then go from there. they will have records of the previous tenants top up history and as i say since Oct 18 the property has been empty. hence little to no use.


thanks for the info . i will update on monday

[Deleted User]

DawnCrush wrote: »

It doesn't help because of the alleged fraudulent activities of your colleagues, and you apparently being complicit in that.

Stop sitting there moaning about others, and take some positive action of your own. (if you have any evidence of the allegations you have posted here)

Police are not interested in meter bypassing .I ve spoken to them often enough.They say they would take action if the suppliers asked them to.
Why are you accusing me of being complicit in fraudulent activities ?
Many of the residents of the streets I m talking about are from the EU and part of a close community group. But it is all nationalities including UK residents who indulge in meter bypassing They won t allow access to the meters at all nowadays and suppliers are loathe to take out warrants of access.
Every now and then BG do a purge on them but its a waste of time because they never end up getting any money out of them..BG RPU like to stick to raiding takeaways where they are much more likely to get back payment money from them.
I ve been complaining on the Energy Board on here for over 10 years about theft of gas and electricity making people aware just how lax the suppliers are . It boils my blood how they get away with it but I personally am powerless to do much at all.
Most of my colleagues are not interested in finding bypassed meters, and one says he s afraid of retaliation if he does report it. Others are not aware of the signs of meter tampers, especially the agency workers who are employed at certain times
If someone will not allow access to the meters when I call all I can do is pass it on to BG . I can t insist on entry so I pass it onto BGs revenue protection via their central office but the other suppliers such as EDF and EON , Npower Scot Power and all the smaller suppliers do not have much of a working RPU which take notice of either emails or telephone calls....All I can do is add a comment on my handheld data collector of suspect tampers..Then its up to them if they want to visit to check.
BG pay me £10 for each bypassed gas and electric meter I pass onto them , something which the other suppliers do not do.
By the way, those 7 out 20 bypassed meters which BG RPU found in Dundas Rd Sheffield, none of them were prosecuted.. They would have been asked to repay what they considered to be owed.

Here is the newspaper article referring to Dundas Rd Sheffield
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-25718447