Waterplus 8 January 2021 at 10:42PM in Water bills 1 reply 423 views

ArranThomas

Received a call a couple of months ago from a business I had never dealt with claiming I owed them money. They mentioned my old business name, but couldn't tell me anything other than I had an outstanding bill and so I bid them farewell and considered it a scam. But I thought to investigate just in case. 

I had left the business property back in 2016 sure I'd settled all my accounts.

Turns out this company have taken over the United Utilities business side for water supply in the area and failed to think this worth mentioning on the phone. 

I decided to consider the bill may be legitimate and so contacted them back for more info. 

They informed me that it was regarding a missed payment from April 2016, and subsequent missed payments since, a late payment fee and, after the previous conversation, a debt collector's fee as they supposedly paid for another company to take the reigns. total, £700+

They said they'd sent numerous letters and had tried to contact me a number of times by telephone.

For obvious reasons, I didn't receive the letters.

I asked for dates and details of the phonecalls made.

The first call was in 2017, over a year after the supposed missed payment, the second was the call only a couple of months ago.

The call in 2017 lasted some 30 seconds, and so I iterated that I hadn't received this call, that it may have gone through to my answer machine hence the short time, and that it was atrocious this was the first, and last, time they'd attempted direct contact until the above mentioned conversations.

They agreed that if I could prove when I left the property, they would clear the debts back to 2016.

I got in touch with the property holder who eventually supplied me with a copy of a signed and dated document detailing the termination of lease.

True somewhat to their word, they created a final bill taking the payments back to 2016, however, they are still attempting to sting me with £200 for bringing in the debt collectors.

Where would you say I stand?

Cardew

Welcome to the forum.

This is really a debt issue rather than a 'water' issue and you might get more help if you cut and paste' your post into a new thread in the 'Dept-free Wanna-be' section of this forum.