Electricity meter reading spike

theoretica

Jackiehobbs65 said:

We moved into our home on 3rd August 2020, it had the old dial meter and economy 7 and Scottish Power was the energy supplier, so we stayed with them until November 2020 when we changed to Peoples Energy. The final electricity readings of 42654 and 7732 were taken and given to Scottish power and in turn given to People’s energy via the 3rd party data company.
Between leaving one company and joining another our meter ( we talking one day) spiked by nearly 10,000 KWh and has stayed at the higher rate. PE then estimated our bills, saying my reading were in dispute and Scottish Power weren’t acknowledging this. They then suspended our billing, but continued to take the £98 DD per month

At that time we had several power cuts ( the area is prone to them regularly, usual a few minutes, but can be longer) and at the time we changed companies, there was a massive power surge in the area. 

We have received several bills saying we owe £2,400, the last one being this week. I am in dispute with PE and they seem to be passing the buck to SP but SP bills are in line with meter readings from the previous owner. 

We have been in this situation now since Feb 2021, and it is very stressful. I wrote a final email this week to PE telling them about the power surge etc and will refuse to pay the bill, as it is not electricity we have used. We don’t have any heavy use appliances like tumble dryers and immersion heaters, there’s just two adults in the house and we don’t work from home.
could the power surge and power cuts caused our meter to spike?
I had a smart meter installed last week and the engineer read the meter before removal, so I’m of the opinion that PE could calculate our bill using the reading of 51308 up to the engineers reading and put an end to this ongoing dispute.

One of those meters where dials turn left and right?  They can be really hard to read - and a misreading of the 10,000 figure comes to mind - can you share a photo?  You would probably do well to start the question again in a new thread of your own too.

Reed_Richards

Jackiehobbs65 said:

could the power surge and power cuts caused our meter to spike?

I think that is somewhere between very unlikely and impossible.  It's far more likely that the problem is a bad reading - for whatever reason.

If you want a detailed answer then you should start a new thread and re-post your question.  But the most important thing is whether or not Scottish Power used the same reading for their Final Bill as People' Energy used as their starting reading.  If they are both the same then even if the reading is wrong it won't cost you a huge amount of money because you pay one company instead of the other.  If the two companies are using different readings then you must complain about this specifically and it's up to PE put it right.  If you believe the reading of 51308 made by the engineer is accurate then that should help your case.