British Gas Smart Meter

Chooru

Hi all,

I've recently bought a property. We've been in for 3 days. The previous owners were on a pay as you go top up smart meter, which we need to keep for 30 days before we can move to a "normal" credit account. Today, however, the smart meter is showing ridiculous charges for gas. 

By 6am this morning, the charge for gas was already £4 - the heating was scheduled to come on at 05:30, so it was only on for 30 minutes. By the time I came home at 17:00, despite no one being in the house and despite the heating being turned off, the charge was at £12 for gas alone. At around 8pm, I put the heating on and by 20:10, the charge for gas jumped to £31. We're in a two bedroom flat. 

British Gas are being quite unhelpful about this...They just keep repeating that as the reading on the smart meter and the reading on the meter match, it must be accurate. There is no gas leak in the flat. Obviously because it's a top up meter, I'm having to keep topping up... 

Any advice would be great.

Ectophile

Do you have a new account in your name?  It's not unknown for suppliers to load the previous customer's outstanding debts onto a top-up meter account.  So most of what you pay disappears in paying off the debt.

QrizB

The charges on the meter might be completely unrelated to the charges on your account. BG need to send updated tariff info to your meter and that doesn't always happen immediately.

Ignore the monetary values for gas for a moment. How many cubic metres or kilowatt-hours of gas have you used since moving in?

Obviously because it's a top up meter, I'm having to keep topping up

You say it's a smart meter. Are you topping up your BG account on-line (here) / through an app? Or is it an older meter that uses a card or key?

If on-line or app-based, what does it say there?

Phantom151

Can you not move to your previous supplier? Those charges sound bonkers! Do you access to your physical meter to check the reading?

wild666

Try turning down the temperature on a combi boiler to 55 degrees, maybe slightly lower 53 degrees, the temperatures it's put to after an annual service is way too high. Before I changed mine the meter was using 11 kWh or more per hour.
Turning the temperature of the boiler and thermostat down will use less gas the thermostat turned down one degrees will save about £30 per year, the boiler turned down to 55 degrees will mean it take a little longer for the heating to get up to temperature but not that much it is likely to be a problem.

Go through the settings on the smart meter and see if you're being billed for debt of the last occupants, if that is the case demand all the taken off as debt payments are refunded. I had to threaten court action against BG in 2011 to get over £3500 of debt taken off the meter that was being taken at £4 per day.   

Scooby40

You can press and hold button a and it sort of beeps then you can keep pressing it after that and the writing keeps changing one of those screens tells you if any money I'd coming of for any outstanding debt, did you get a new card for your machine after you moved in or are you using one that was left which I basically the previous people account and debt