E-ON not being helpful with resolving their mistake - help?

niktheguru

In fairness, this is a case of human error. Anyone can write a meter reading incorrectly. Once the proof was given it has since been corrected and the OP hasn't been put under any financial disadvantage. If the energy company had taken a huge direct debit out of her account then thats different. I know it seemed like a lifetime but it looks like it was solved in a matter of 3 days.

It is unfortunate that the OP in his/her personal circumstances was emotionally and psychologically affected by the error but that on its own doesn't warrant compensation. Anyone can make a mistake.

I'm glad the situation has been recrified and the OP can move on.

Anyanka1

Anyone employed to read meters should never read them incorrectly:  Why the hell don't they take pictures of them?

niktheguru

Anyanka1 said:

Anyone employed to read meters should never read them incorrectly:  Why the hell don't they take pictures of them?

They SHOULD read them correctly, but can you honestly say you've never made a mistake at work? Everyone is human. Frankly, i do think they should take pictures of the meter though, you're absolutely right. I know octopus did of my old meters before they were swapped.

[Deleted User]

niktheguru said:

Anyanka1 said:

Anyone employed to read meters should never read them incorrectly:  Why the hell don't they take pictures of them?

They SHOULD read them correctly, but can you honestly say you've never made a mistake at work? Everyone is human. Frankly, i do think they should take pictures of the meter though, you're absolutely right. I know octopus did of my old meters before they were swapped.

When a smart meter is installed, the installer is required to take photographs of both meters and such things as gas flame checks etc. The problem is that when a mistake is made, we all get angry and frustrated when the problem is not remedied immediately. A simple letter of complaint would have put a stop to any recovery action and it would have given the supplier time to investigate and respond. 

Robin9

@Anyanka1 One of our meter readers might like to comment about how many meters they read a day - perhaps 100.   Make a mistake on just one ..........

In fairness to meter readers many of the issues on this forum are people failing to read meters ending up with big bills. 

When mistakes do occur suppliers must put their hands up 

niktheguru

[Deleted User] said:

niktheguru said:

Anyanka1 said:

Anyone employed to read meters should never read them incorrectly:  Why the hell don't they take pictures of them?

They SHOULD read them correctly, but can you honestly say you've never made a mistake at work? Everyone is human. Frankly, i do think they should take pictures of the meter though, you're absolutely right. I know octopus did of my old meters before they were swapped.

When a smart meter is installed, the installer is required to take photographs of both meters and such things as gas flame checks etc. The problem is that when a mistake is made, we all get angry and frustrated when the problem is not remedied immediately. A simple letter of complaint would have put a stop to any recovery action and it would have given the supplier time to investigate and respond. 

It got dealt with in 3 days! It’s not really that bad is it.

welshmoneylover

You’d be surprised how many people demand and sometimes get compensation when the error is caused by the customer. It is so annoying as this cost is pushed onto customers who pay and manage their accounts correctly.
compensation should only be give if the company makes an error.
some people can’t be bothered to read meters or give wrong readings and are surprised at catch up bills.
I had one customer give me a reading that was not corresponding with previous reads so I got him to send me a photo .. he did and it was his water meter! Idiots out there lol

Hannimal

[Deleted User] said:

Hannimal said:

[Deleted User] said:

Anyanka1 said:

Good luck, Hannimal and please let us know the outcome, for all I think it must be a foregone conclusion.  Please ramp up the distress factor and extract every last penny you can in compensation because this appalling level of customer service is just not acceptable from any supplier, no matter how small.

We shouldn’t forget that compensation is paid for by a supplier’s customers in the form of higher bills. As experts are now predicting that the average energy bill will increase by £115 or more in October, the last thing that we need is more supplier failures that we all end up paying for. Yes, errors need to be corrected and where there is blame there needs to be some financial redress,  but it needs to be proportionate. This was a simple error which I suspect is replicated by many consumers - not just meter installers- every day.

I don't know if you quite appreciate how distressing this was for me. That bill was the size of a house deposit in some parts of this country and initially they refused to fix it for me. I was having some very desperate thoughts as a result. I have a lot of anxiety about money anyway and I go to therapy and I am medicated for it. This wasn't just some numbers on a piece of paper,  it was actually very distressing. 

I am not defending the supplier's actions nor am in a position to know what you said to the supplier or what was its initial response. Personally, when problems like this arise, I always want a paperwork trail. My point was that consumers should not expect to be paid vast sums of compensation for what was just a simple human error. Proving that there had been an error was a simple process for any consumer - it just needed a statement with an actual meter reading. That said, I accept that the person in CS could have been more helpful/proactive. Energy suppliers are though not alone in having poorly trained and unhelpful staff!

I know that people like to think that compensation payments come out of profits; sadly, they do not, they are seen as a cost of doing business and these costs are reflected in more expensive tariffs going forward. Bad debts alone put £23 on all our energy bills in April.

Sorry but big companies like this should not be making these kinds of 'human errors'. These seem to be FAIRLY common and could be fixed by just introducing a line of code that has someone double-check that it's correct. I also had to FIGHT for them to actually look into this as they refused to fix the bill when I first contacted them.

I think you are on la-la-land to compare £8500 to £23. If I had been overcharged by £23 I could pay it off and sleep at night while I wait to be compensated. If I am overcharged £8500 I cannot overpay it and wait for a refund, that is a life changing amount fo money for me. That's almost 6 months of income. It is just unacceptable to put someone under this kind of stress, they should've never sent a bill like this to me.

Hannimal

welshmoneylover said:

You’d be surprised how many people demand and sometimes get compensation when the error is caused by the customer. 

My only error here was signing up with e-on. The reading was recorded by them

Hannimal

All of you defending them, I am not blaming the guy who recorded the reading or any individual person. What I am blaming is their system that allows bills like these to be sent to people at all. The amount of energ y I was being charged for is impossible to use in a month in a house like this. It doesn't add up. It should not have been up to me to provide photographs and proof and argue about this with them over three days for them to fix their error. I spent a lot of time on this and to just say 'you shouldn't get compensation because it's human error' completely diminishes that this should've been up for them to fix and I should've never even known about the error. And even failing that, they should've apologised and fixed it for me without me sharing this on social media and getting re-tweets, which is the only reason they ever rang me back.