Small Farm & Yorkshire Electric/Ecosave ripping us off?

Glebe01

Hi, Please could someone help. My father in law uses a company called Ecosave to look for the best electric prices for our small farm. It was all going fine until they put him with someone called Yorkshire Electric/Gas and now they are ripping him off. They are taking £200 advance electric costs (last month we only used 53 units) and have said it will cost him thousands to come out of the contract? Ecosave say they will look for the best deals but never gave him any options and he never received a contract and a welcome pack after they we complained and said where is the contract. Can anyone advise on what to do. The audio recording has my father in law being bullied and saying you have read the T & C's which he said yes but they hadnt even been sent. He believed that Ecosave got him the best deal. Now looking into Yorkshire gas & water they are constantly doing it to people? Where do we go from here? They have said they will charge us £50 if we cancel the DD and thousands to stop the contact but he never signed anything? HELP 

Robin9

I'm sorry but I don't think this forum can help - it's essentially for domestic users rather than business.

One for your your FIL's solicitors .

Sandtree

A contract doesn't have to be signed... how many times when you've gone to Tesco to do your weekly shop have you been asked to sign a contract of sale? Or when picking up milk from your local corner shop (assuming your not a dairy farm)?

As a farm you are a commercial buyer and as such have much less statutory protections than a consumer... businesses are supposed to know to read the small print and get a lawyer if your not sure etc whereas consumers have to be protected from themselves. That said, if you are a micro business some protections do spill over, eg you can use the Energy Ombudsman if your balance sheet is less than £2m.

You need to get the terms and review the cancellations section to validate what you signed up to and the "thousands" being discussed. 

J_B

When I signed up with my current domestic utilities supplier, they took a double DD for the first payment (this was clearly explained when I signed up with them)

Surely, you need to look at meter readings and usage and give these to Yorkshire rather than getting hung up on one DD

Don't cancel the DD.

nev5

Glebe01 said:

Hi, Please could someone help. My father in law uses a company called Ecosave to look for the best electric prices for our small farm. It was all going fine until they put him with someone called Yorkshire Electric/Gas and now they are ripping him off. They are taking £200 advance electric costs (last month we only used 53 units) and have said it will cost him thousands to come out of the contract? Ecosave say they will look for the best deals but never gave him any options and he never received a contract and a welcome pack after they we complained and said where is the contract. Can anyone advise on what to do. The audio recording has my father in law being bullied and saying you have read the T & C's which he said yes but they hadnt even been sent. He believed that Ecosave got him the best deal. Now looking into Yorkshire gas & water they are constantly doing it to people? Where do we go from here? They have said they will charge us £50 if we cancel the DD and thousands to stop the contact but he never signed anything? HELP 

I have recently fallen victim to this company and they have tripled my bill, lied to me about the rates and even passed a signed contract which i have not signed. James who was my salesman called me on another phone and told me what to say on the company recorded phone and said he would even give me another 10% off my bill. I only believed him as I was talking to nother james from another company and thought it was him. they have taken almost a years budget for my utilities in just 3 months and will not look into the fraud, ombudsman is not on the case so hopefully this can be sorted out