MSE News: Symbio Energy rapped over 'threatening' response to negative reviews

Swipe

I've been with Symbio for 18 months now. Very cheap electric rates but after reading all these reviews it sounds like these clowns are on their last legs. I'll be very surprised if they make it until the end of summer.

niktheguru

hd216 said:

When you don't have issues they're fine, but the moment there's a problem they are the devil to deal with. Yes they certainly do provide cheap electricity, but it definitely seems to come at a cost and that's clearly in the customer services and common sense departments. There's no arguing that the billing can be confusing because of the whole month-in-advance thing, and yes it does reconcile after a while; but when a company starts over estimating your electricity usage to the tune of some 400KWh each month, despite supplying meter readings, it starts to get a little tiresome. The final kick in the teeth is their policy of blocking switches away from them because they tell you that there is a "debt" on the account. You're held to ransom to pay a month in advance to continue the switch, only for them to (hopefully!) refund the advanced months payment - its a ridiculous policy!

Do not pay a month in advance at the end to stop them blocking the switch. Stand your ground, work out your consumption minus their  advanced estimate and see if your account is in credit or debit. If its in credit then you must insist with customer services that they are not allowed to block your switch and that they must let it through. That's what I did and the switch went fine.

Jeremy_Klein

There's a further twist to this story.  Symbio appears to try to limit its customers' freedom to use social media to criticise the company.  Here is the relevant clause in its consumer contract.  

16.2.2 We at Symbio Energy ensure that we resolve all customer queries within a reasonable time while providing one to one service. We are committed to continue providing excellent service to all our customers and competitive tariffs within the UK. However, customers who choose to use social media to denigrate a company are engaged in cyberbullying, and it is not something that we at Symbio Energy support. Suppose you approach social media without contacting us or allowing us to resolve your query. In that case, Symbio Energy may encourage you to find another provider if you are unhappy with our services. 

Swipe

Not quite sure how they'll cross-reference @JoeBloggs69 on twitter to one of their actual customers.

CRISPIANNE3

Well there replies on a particular site are still as threatening as before

Swipe

CRISPIANNE3 said:

Well there replies on a particular site are still as threatening as before

Not surprised. They just don't care. What's the worst that can happen for them?, they have their Trustpilot company entry removed and all the bad reviews get erased from the Internet.

Gerry1

Swipe said:

CRISPIANNE3 said:

Well there replies on a particular site are still as threatening as before

Not surprised. They just don't care. What's the worst that can happen for them?, they have their Trustpilot company entry removed and all the bad reviews get erased from the Internet.

Trustpilot should leave negative reviews about Symbio in place, but delete Symbio's replies that break their rules, just as Twitter did with Trump.  If Trustpilot fail to do this they will lose any remaining credibility that they have.

gessa12

Trustpilot operate a Content Integrity Team where Companies can challenge Individual reviews if they feel that they are malicious or that there is no customer relationship. When a review is challenged the reviewer is asked to provide documentary evidence of their customer relationship and any communication with the company in regard to the dispute. If the reviewer fails to do this then their review is deleted.

Therefore there is really no good reason for Symbio to have behaved this way on Trustpilot replies as there is a defined process for them to weed out disingenuous reviews. Clearly the amount of reviews about the billing process indicates that this is not accidental but is part of their business model to improve cashflow with advance payments for electricity as yet unused.

Jeremy_Klein

Trustpilot has now deleted all of Symbio's replies and posted the following message on the Symbio Energy page

"Warning! We’ve detected misuse on this page
This company has been publishing public replies that are in breach of our guidelines. 
We strongly oppose any attempts to silence consumers’ freedom of speech. As a public, open, review platform we believe strongly in consumers having the ability to leave feedback - good or bad - about a business at any time, without interference.
We have removed the business’ public replies that breach our guidelines and we'll continue to monitor this profile and take additional actions if needed."

As the reviews have been piling in on Trustpilot, some of them are truly shocking.  Almost all come back to the same basic issues:

• Grossly inflated forward estimated used for billing
• Arbitrary direct debits in excess of customers' reasonable expectations
• Poor or non-existent response to emails
• Impossible to get through by phone
• Heavy handed and unjustified threats of court action

Several reviews have asked why Ofgem is apparently content to let this misbehaviour continue.  It certainly looks like Ofgem could have been more attentive to this growing set of consumer concerns.  

Jeremy_Klein

Further to my previous posting on this subject, Trustpilot is still allowing Symbio to add its replies which had already been determined as being against Trustpilot policies.  Neither Symbio nor Trustpilot come out of this very well.  Symbio for its continued flouting the rules (as it does with Ofgem too) and Trustpilot for being toothless.