EDF putting monthly bill up from £79 to £169 per month?

pochase

james_uk said:

My last online bill shows:

For 15 November 2021 - 04 February 2022 (82 days)
You paid us
credit
£237.00
(3 payments of £79.00)
Your charges for this period (including VAT) £81.01
Your new account balance £155.99
in credit

This does not make real sense.

Standing charge for the 82 days would be on the EDF Standard Variable around 43, leaving £38 energy been used, which equals 185Kw Electricity, or 2.3Kw per day and no gas at all.

Did you give a meter reading to them on 4th of February and the one for 15th November was estimated, maybe reported wrong by your former provider?

Looking at the above you have only paid 3 debit orders and have one bill on the account, difference between credit from the 3 DO and the bill is exactly the 155.99 you are in credit.

The £169 new DO would work out for the estimated use, but does not take into account that from 4th of February to 31th of March you are still on the lower old Standard Variable, nor the £156 you seem to be in credit.

james_uk

Just to update on this, I phoned EDF yesterday to ask about this.

The girl i spoke to said yes that does sound like a big jump and asked me to hold, was on hold for a few minutes, girl came back on and said she's looked at the figures and isn't sure why its predicted we will use that much, so is happy to drop the DD back to the original price of £79 as she could see we was £150 in credit anyway.

Makes you wonder how many other people they do this to and they either don't question it.

MWT

james_uk said:

Just to update on this, I phoned EDF yesterday to ask about this.

The girl i spoke to said yes that does sound like a big jump and asked me to hold, was on hold for a few minutes, girl came back on and said she's looked at the figures and isn't sure why its predicted we will use that much, so is happy to drop the DD back to the original price of £79 as she could see we was £150 in credit anyway.

Makes you wonder how many other people they do this to and they either don't question it.

Keep a close eye on your balance though, and if you want to build up any sort of buffer for the winter it will not happen if the payment stays at £79 much past April 1st...

EssexHebridean

If they genuinely didn’t give you any notice of the change in amount of your DD then I believe the DD guarantee can be invoked. Do check that there wasn’t an email that you missed, or a bill with a changed amount on it first though! 

Fred2712

£79 pm is not going to be enough when the prices go up In April so I would increase you DD now if I were you, to save the pain later.

Sea_Shell

james_uk said:

Just to update on this, I phoned EDF yesterday to ask about this.

The girl i spoke to said yes that does sound like a big jump and asked me to hold, was on hold for a few minutes, girl came back on and said she's looked at the figures and isn't sure why its predicted we will use that much, so is happy to drop the DD back to the original price of £79 as she could see we was £150 in credit anyway.

Makes you wonder how many other people they do this to and they either don't question it.

As others have said, if you insist on lowering your DD, you need to keep a VERY close eye on your balance each month, along with how much you're actually using (being billed for) over the summer.  

Every £ you underpay by over the summer months, will need to be clawed back, in addition to your usage come next winter!!

Even if your DD matches your usage over the summer, it will mean that you have no credit buffer come winter, and your DD will have to be much higher than £150 to compensate.

Realistically, credit balances are going to have to be allowed to get uncomfortably high by October, to stand a chance of covering winter, at an affordable monthly payment.

Here's an example...

Annual estimated cost £2000
Monthly DD should be £166, level throughout the year.
Over summer (6 months) you only pay a DD of £80 (which covers summer usage), so £86 "short", each month
This means you'll have paid £480, towards your annual bill of £2000
This leaves a balance of £1520, to be paid over the remaining 6 months (high winter usage)
DD now has to be £253 to make up the shortfall. 


This is why, unless you can easily afford that higher DD next winter, it's not wise to reduce your DD if at all possible.

EssexHebridean

Put aside the extra from your own estimate of the costs to you of your energy over the next year into a savings account to be used to pay lump sums to cover the increased cost as and when needed. But for goodness sake make sure you’re not tempted to dip into it for other things - if you think you might be then an increased DD starting now is probably a safer plan.