EON held credit on account and final bill produced 9 years later

Gorrier

I received a letter from EON saying you've not paid your final bill from 29/04/21 £446.48.  When I looked at the letter it was addressed to my current address in my old name but the usage was refering to the house I moved from December 2013. 
When I spoke to EON they said they did not know why it had taken 9 years to produce the final bill, and after looking they could see that I had £640.32 in credit in a holding account.  They have said they will refund me the difference after deducting the final bill costs.
Not sure if this is legally correct that they have held my money for so long, and I know they should bill within the year of use, but not sure where I stand with this?
Rachael
  

MWT

The usage pre-dates all the back-billing rules and the various penalties for late final bills & refunds, so I'd just take the refund they intend to give you and move on...

Reed_Richards

I wouldn't try to anything about the £446.48 until you have the £193.84 balance safely in your bank account. 

I would not have thought that the fact that the usage predates the back billing rules invalidates the applicability of the back billing rules - but that's a legal/regulatory issue about which I have no expert knowledge.  

MWT

Reed_Richards said:

I would not have thought that the fact that the usage predates the back billing rules invalidates the applicability of the back billing rules - but that's a legal/regulatory issue about which I have no expert knowledge.  

If there had been an additional charge being made I would probably agree, but given there is a credit already on the account it is highly unlikely that there is any mileage in trying to reclaim the credit while denying the charge.

Reed_Richards

...which is why I recommended reclaiming the credit first.

Cardew

Reed_Richards said:

I wouldn't try to anything about the £446.48 until you have the £193.84 balance safely in your bank account. 

I would not have thought that the fact that the usage predates the back billing rules invalidates the applicability of the back billing rules - but that's a legal/regulatory issue about which I have no expert knowledge.  

Actually the back-billing rule was introduced in 2007 it was originally for a 2 year period.

However the purpose of back-billing was so the customer did not get a shock and have to pay a huge bill. There have been plenty of cases on MSE where the customer was paying by DD and their company was at fault for not producing a timely bill. As the DDs had put the customer's account in credit the back-billing rule had no effect.

With the 6 years Statute of Limitations I suppose, technically, Eon could not be made to pay you anything. So, as suggested above, take your money and run!

MWT

Cardew said:

Actually the back-billing rule was introduced in 2007 it was originally for a 2 year period.

If I recall correctly it was part of a voluntary code of practice back then, it only became a rule for all licensees in May 2018, but that is academic, as I agree, the focus of the Ombudsman has always been on 'bill shock' and in numerous decisions the position has been that making DD payments on account amounts to being billed so as long as the amounts taken are sufficient to cover the accurate bill there has been no 'shock'

It is only when the supplier seeks additional back payments that the rule seems to have any force....

GunJack

Once you've got the credit refunded, ask them for compensatory interest on it of 8% per year for each year they've had it, bit like the PPI claims??? I would think some compo/goodwill gesture should be in order...