£856 electricity bill shocker

nyermen

It's quite possible their system refused to accept low readings (dumb as that is).  When I lived in woking in a flat until a few years ago, I had dual rate electricity (no gas), which just covered the storage heaters (not the boiler for some reason, which was just on an immersion).  Since the shower was electric, I boiled the kettle to wash up, and I was travelling so much on business (plus first floor flat got heat from below) that I just used a small fan heater in the bedroom where needed.

Result was, my nighttime meter pretty much never changed, which meant they rejected the readings from it every time (even those read by their own staff), and it took ages, plus photos etc, (pretty much the final bill) before they accepted the real numbers over their "estimates".

seaswimmer

Yes, this basically was our experience, with the added difficulty of the next supplier not knowing which starting numbers to rely on. You can bet that if usage went *over* the estimates, suppliers would be very quick to base their bills on meter readings. Absolute crooks.

born_again

Did you not have to supply new supplier with your reading when you moved. I know we did when our supplier Igloo went bust & we were moved to EON.

seaswimmer

Yes, we did - but the new supplier (Octopus) also inherited an opening estimated reading, which was much higher than the real one, and which Pure Planet would not review - even though we had shown ample evidence that nobody had been living in the house. The small amount of energy used was had been to power builders' drills etc. It has taken more than a year to sort the whole thing out. Octopus came through well, but Pure Planet should have renamed themselves Pure Stupid Greed.