British Gas lied to me

Kelt1967

As brief as i can be.  I was a Robin Hood/EON customer for my Gas and Electricity. About a year ago they were taken over by British Gas. Now, i have been abroad for the last 3 years and apart from a few months renting, the place has been vacant for well over 2 years.

I was on a no standing charge tariff with EON (which made sense due to the property being vacant) and paid EON £0 while i'm away.

When BG took over their 'Promise" was to equal or better my current tariff.  I received this guarantee through email AND when in a chat with one of their reps.

So i agreed to the switch. A year on they claim i owe them over £500 (standing charge only, as the place is still vacant) and are threatening debt collection. I have raised a case with the Ombudsman and informed BG of this, but they say they are pushing ahead with debt collection.

Despite forwarding the transcript between myself and their rep, wherein he guaranteed i would not be charged a standing charge to BG. Higher up the chain have totally dismissed this evidence.

Any advice?

Thanks in advance.

Aylesbury_Duck

Kelt1967 said:

As brief as i can be.  I was a Robin Hood/EON customer for my Gas and Electricity. About a year ago they were taken over by British Gas. Now, i have been abroad for the last 3 years and apart from a few months renting, the place has been vacant for well over 2 years.

I was on a no standing charge tariff with EON (which made sense due to the property being vacant) and paid EON £0 while i'm away.

When BG took over their 'Promise" was to equal or better my current tariff.  I received this guarantee through email AND when in a chat with one of their reps.

So i agreed to the switch. A year on they claim i owe them over £500 (standing charge only, as the place is still vacant) and are threatening debt collection. I have raised a case with the Ombudsman and informed BG of this, but they say they are pushing ahead with debt collection.

Despite forwarding the transcript between myself and their rep, wherein he guaranteed i would not be charged a standing charge to BG. Higher up the chain have totally dismissed this evidence.

Any advice?

Thanks in advance.

The promise to "equal or better your current tariff" is a little elastic, because of course they could reasonably argue that they've met that if the unit prices for gas and electricity were the same or less than your EON deal.  Your circumstances are fairly unusual, and a cheaper tariff would lead to lower bills for the majority of consumers using the same levels of energy as before.

However, if you have something in writing confirming there is zero standing charge, write to them to inform them of that and say that you will not be making any standing charge payments.  Just check what deal you agreed to if you did so after the webchat.  If, for example the contract included a standing charge, and you signed it without reading or checking it, I would have thought you owe the money. 

Kelt1967

Thank you kindly for your reply.

Regarding the 'something in writing'

I have a transcript from British Gas Chat service which the main points are as follows

"

Me : Will i stay on the same tariff?

Me : the answer given in the BG email page is

Me: "We’ll either match or beat the deal you’re on right now – including the standing charge and unit rate. Your tariff end date may be longer, but with no exit fees, you have nothing to lose by switching over to British Gas."

Me : so the standing charge remains Zero?

BG Rep : Yes it will

Me : then why in the email from BG welcoming me as a customer does it say gas standing charge 30.65..... and electricity standing charge 26.19p per day?

Bg Rep : Please do not worry.. This will be adjusted later " Me : So i can safely leave the transfer today from robin hood to British gas and expect no bills asking for standing charge like i have done with Robin Hood ? Me : if that is the case i will say thank you for your patience and understanding and help and request that this transcript be sent to me at xxxx.yahoo.com BG Rep: Sure.no worries..you can take this chat transcript as a written confirmation

The fact that they immediately started billing me for a standing charge certainly looks like they have reneged on this agreement judging by the content above.

Thanks again.

Kelt1967

Furthermore, i forwarded this transcript and the email from BG to British Gas stating:

"We’ll either match or beat the deal you’re on right now – including the standing charge and unit rate. Your tariff end date may be longer, but with no exit fees, you have nothing to lose by switching over to British Gas."

They response just seem to be very vague and dismiss this evidence, after which i started receiving debt collection notices.

IvanOpinion

Given the transcript that app[ears to be clear cut and BG don't have a leg to stand on.  If they do not clear the charges and cancel the debt collector then I would say you are in a good position to get some goodwill from them as well.

It is possible that the computer systems do not support your case but needs some to manually go in to sort it out but nobody has considered that yet.

Aylesbury_Duck

I agree, you have confirmation in writing that there was to be no standing charge.  I suspect the chat person made that statement in error, but that's not your concern because you queried it and they re-confirmed it.

Kelt1967

Well i'm hoping the Ombudsman's office sees it like that.

As recently as last week i contacted BG to inform them that i have opened a case with The Ombudsman, their reply was:

"Debt action will continue, as we have not received anything from the Ombudsman, this process can take several weeks for them to contact us. Debt action cannot be put on hold until then."

Thank you again for your response.

pinkshoes

Threatening debt collection? So a letter before action?

If that's what they have sent, write to them (and send with proof of postage) stating that as per the agreement, there was no standing charge so no money is owed and to please see copies of the transcripts that you are happy to use in court to prove you are not liable. Enclose copies of the transcript.

You only really need to DO anything if they then take it to court. You then just produce your transcripts of the conversation with them and you will win and get any reasonable costs paid. 

Kelt1967

pinkshoes said:

Threatening debt collection? So a letter before action?

If that's what they have sent, write to them (and send with proof of postage) stating that as per the agreement, there was no standing charge so no money is owed and to please see copies of the transcripts that you are happy to use in court to prove you are not liable. Enclose copies of the transcript.

You only really need to DO anything if they then take it to court. You then just produce your transcripts of the conversation with them and you will win and get any reasonable costs paid. 

HI Pink,

Thank you kindly for taking the time to respond.

In regards to your questions. I am still abroad, but a BG representative i was corresponding with mentioned they had sent a letter in regards to possible debt collection.

I have a friend checking on the property periodically to check the post, etc.

I did, on the other hand, receive an email containing the following:

"We have still not received payment of your electricity and gas bills.

If we don't hear from you in the next few days, we'll need to refer you to a debt collection agency - but we really don't want to do that.

Please pay your bill now. If you can't pay, keep reading for ways we can help you."

I have emailed a copy of the whole transcript to a Rep of BG, but they just basically dismissed it and said debt collection was going ahead.

pinkshoes

Kelt1967 said:

pinkshoes said:

Threatening debt collection? So a letter before action?

If that's what they have sent, write to them (and send with proof of postage) stating that as per the agreement, there was no standing charge so no money is owed and to please see copies of the transcripts that you are happy to use in court to prove you are not liable. Enclose copies of the transcript.

You only really need to DO anything if they then take it to court. You then just produce your transcripts of the conversation with them and you will win and get any reasonable costs paid. 

HI Pink,

Thank you kindly for taking the time to respond.

In regards to your questions. I am still abroad, but a BG representative i was corresponding with mentioned they had sent a letter in regards to possible debt collection.

I have a friend checking on the property periodically to check the post, etc.

I did, on the other hand, receive an email containing the following:

"We have still not received payment of your electricity and gas bills.

If we don't hear from you in the next few days, we'll need to refer you to a debt collection agency - but we really don't want to do that.

Please pay your bill now. If you can't pay, keep reading for ways we can help you."

I have emailed a copy of the whole transcript to a Rep of BG, but they just basically dismissed it and said debt collection was going ahead.

Debt collectors have no rights. They can knock and ask for money but can't do anything if you say no.

Only take them seriously if you receive actual court papers and they start court proceedings against you. You will DEFINITELY need someone checking the post on a regular basis for this as you wouldn't want to not respond.

MoneySavingNovice

I had a similar issue and eventually took British Gas (BG) to the Energy Ombudsman (EO).  The long and short of it was that I won and they lost.......key finding from the EO was  ".....(we) confirmed that as the contract was agreed prior to the migration and that British Gas had promised to match or beat the Robin Hood Energy tariffs that it was not reasonable for it to change the contract…..”

Bottom line after further exchange between myself and the EO and BG I ended up on a No standing Charge Tariff with a lower unit cost, which was 10 months longer than agreed with Robin Hood.

My view is don’t back down.   British Gas directly lied to me as well.  I had the proof and with that the EO were very scathing and critical of BG in their findings and effectively forced BG to adhere to the Robin Hoods contract with me.

Good luck