High energy bill before account ser up

Alexkelly

I recently moved into a new build flat start of July. Every flat in the building had a smart meter installed by e-on and we were unable to look at any electricity deals with other providers until eon set up our account and gave us an account number. Because we had no account set up, we were unable to check how much electricity we were using, and our in home display wasn’t working properly either...

eon finally sent us a letter at the start of September (2 months after we moved in) with account number and we were able to submit a meter reading using their app (in home display still not working). Turns out we had been using a lot of electricity (about double what I estimated) but had no idea why and no way of checking without a working in-home-display or account. The water heater was set to permanently on rather than automatic which was the way it was set up when we moved in and this was the cause of the problem. 

Feels unfair that we have such a high bill that we wouldn’t have had if we could’ve seen our usage in the first week. Do we have any rights to get this bill reduced on those grounds? Or am I wasting my time calling eon to ask?

Thanks

Robin9

Can you give us some numbers - "double what was expected" - might well be normal to me.

The reading on the SMART meter itself (ignore the IHD) when you moved in would have been about 0000.0   -  what is it today. ?

What is the heating - storage rads, underfloor, panel heaters ?

I

MWT

Alexkelly said:

Feels unfair that we have such a high bill that we wouldn’t have had if we could’ve seen our usage in the first week. Do we have any rights to get this bill reduced on those grounds? Or am I wasting my time calling eon to ask?

What was stopping you from checking the usage on the meter itself?

... and why wouldn't you check your own hot water and heating settings the day you moved in?

Robin9

@Alexkelly  I think you have a good case for getting eon to rebill you for July - start of September on their best tariff rather than the standard one I think you have been billed on, Write a letter - don't email, don't phone - headed COMPLAINT - and make the request.

I assume you have switched suppliers now.

PS An all electric flat can be anything £70 - £100. a month

MWT

Just to be clear, did you phone E.ON the day you took possession to give them your details, opening meter reading and pick a tariff, or were you just waiting all that time for them to contact you?

Alexkelly

Robin9 said:

Can you give us some numbers - "double what was expected" - might well be normal to me.

The reading on the SMART meter itself (ignore the IHD) when you moved in would have been about 0000.0   -  what is it today. ?

What is the heating - storage rads, underfloor, panel heaters ?

I

It was £360 for the first 2 months. So £180/month!

now it’s running at about £100/month so top end of normal based on your next post.

The water heater just does the water. We haven’t had the heating on once as the flat is very good at keeping its heat in. It’s got a panel heater in each of the three rooms which haven’t been on once. I’m not certain about any other underfloor heating but I don’t think it has any of that.  The bathrooms have towel rails but we have barely used them at all either.

As for meter reading, I don’t know what it was the day we moved in but it must have been close to zero. Now it’s 03377 

Alexkelly

MWT said:

Alexkelly said:

Feels unfair that we have such a high bill that we wouldn’t have had if we could’ve seen our usage in the first week. Do we have any rights to get this bill reduced on those grounds? Or am I wasting my time calling eon to ask?

What was stopping you from checking the usage on the meter itself?

... and why wouldn't you check your own hot water and heating settings the day you moved in?

I was told (by the landlord) that eon were in the process of setting the accounts up. Assumed eon would be in touch soon. And the hot water is controlled by a console which is tricky to get the hang of. Assumed it was set up as a standard automatic setting.

Alexkelly

MWT said:

Just to be clear, did you phone E.ON the day you took possession to give them your details, opening meter reading and pick a tariff, or were you just waiting all that time for them to contact you?

I just spoke to the landlord who said we didn’t have any details to give eon due to no account yet set up so i had nothing to give them if I called  them up

Alexkelly

Robin9 said:

@Alexkelly  I think you have a good case for getting eon to rebill you for July - start of September on their best tariff rather than the standard one I think you have been billed on, Write a letter - don't email, don't phone - headed COMPLAINT - and make the request.

I assume you have switched suppliers now.

PS An all electric flat can be anything £70 - £100. a month

Thanks for the quick responses.

I’ll write them a complaint but I’m still with them as of today because I wasn’t sure if I needed to settle this payment before switching.

This is the first accommodation where I’ve had to sort bills like this myself so I’m a bit new to this!

Hasbeen

The correct procedure would have been to contact EON the day you moved in to get the account in your name. 
Give the meter reading and agree on a Tariff that would suit you. 

If you were planning to change energy providers then that would have been one without exit fees.

Suspect from your posts that did not happen as you did not look at meter until now? There was nothing to really stop you taking a reading at move in, usually a photo of meter to prove actual read at that time. You did not need an account to read the meter to check how much electric you were using.

If they have put you on their standard expensive tariff and it has taken them 2 months to give you an account then still worth a complaint to be backdated to a cheaper tariff. If you have actually waited on them to contact you then perhaps not?

You are in an all electric flat that will be expensive to run, but being a new build should be well insulated.
Whatever supplier you go with ensure that you actually take monthly readings to compare with what they are billing you as per your smart meter, which might not even work with other energy providers.

A meter reading now of 03377 would on my tariff cost £412 so something is using power if you have basically nothing on?

No underfloor heating in bathroom? Long electric showers? Tumble dryer etc.

Alexkelly

Hasbeen said:

The correct procedure would have been to contact EON the day you moved in to get the account in your name. 
Give the meter reading and agree on a Tariff that would suit you. 

If you were planning to change energy providers then that would have been one without exit fees.

Suspect from your posts that did not happen as you did not look at meter until now? There was nothing to really stop you taking a reading at move in, usually a photo of meter to prove actual read at that time. You did not need an account to read the meter to check how much electric you were using.

If they have put you on their standard expensive tariff and it has taken them 2 months to give you an account then still worth a complaint to be backdated to a cheaper tariff. If you have actually waited on them to contact you then perhaps not?

You are in an all electric flat that will be expensive to run, but being a new build should be well insulated.
Whatever supplier you go with ensure that you actually take monthly readings to compare with what they are billing you as per your smart meter, which might not even work with other energy providers.

A meter reading now of 03377 would on my tariff cost £412 so something is using power if you have basically nothing on?

No underfloor heating in bathroom? Long electric showers? Tumble dryer etc.

I took a meter reading the day they set our account up using the app as mentioned in my opening post. I could see the meter before that and the numbers on it but I couldn’t figure out how to translate that into a £ figure. Googled it to no avail but I must have been searching for the wrong thing.

Initially we were using the tumble dryer a fair bit but now we’re only using the wash cycle and only the tumble dryer for stuff that’s hard to dry on the maiden like towels, bedding etc which is maybe once a week. I’ve emailed the landlord to see if £100/month is what other flats are paying. 

Whenever the in home display goes up from 3p/hour to like 55/60p, I’ve switched the hot water off and it instantly drops down again, so it’s definitely that. I can’t figure out why that’s costing so much even on automatic rather than permanently on. There is a way of changing its schedule to a custom one, but the automatic one is basically: off during the night, then during the day it comes on when it detects the temperature of the water in the tank is below a certain level, and that seems right. Just didn’t expect it to have to reheat it so often.
I could set the custom setting to come on in the morning say 6.30-10, then go off. Then back on 5-10pm or something but if we needed hot water during the day (both of us currently working from home too) we’d end up with no hot water!