WARNING - You DON'T have much time - EDF may overcharge if you don't respond by 3 April !

Gerry1

Surprise, surprise, EDF admit that they experienced technical issues with their website which prevented customers submitting readings on 31 March.  If you missed the midnight deadline (the EDF system does not allow you give the date of the reading), EDF will have estimated the 31 March readings and applied your readings to 1 April (or the date when you were finally able to submit them).  If EDF under estimated your 31 March readings, they will overcharge you on the variance.

They have an online form where you can submit your 31 March readings, but you have only until 3 April to respond !

Call me cynical, but how do you even know you have been overcharged unless you successfully battled to get through to EDF and persuaded them to generate a new bill?  By allowing such a ridiculously short window to submit the online form, EDF will be profiting from overcharging caused by their website failure, e.g. for each gas unit that they underestimate, they will overcharge by £1.01 (Imperial meter) or 35.8p (metric meter).

Robin9

No problems in providing online readings as normal this morning

Gerry1

Robin9 said:

No problems in providing online readings as normal this morning

But those readings will be dated 2 April.

If you couldn't get through before midnight on 31 March and their estimate for that date was low, when you eventually see the next bill you'll find you've been charged at the higher rate on the variance, exactly what you were trying to avoid.

Ultrasonic

Surely the extra cost would just be on two days energy use, so hardly a huge deal.

Ultrasonic

Actually it's even less than that since there should be a prediction back to what usage was at changeover.

Gerry1

Ultrasonic said:

Surely the extra cost would just be on two days energy use, so hardly a huge deal.

Not if they underestimated by a significant amount.  It's the principle that's wrong, failing to allow customers to give the date of the meter reading and failing to allow a reasonable period for customers to submit the online form.

With over 5 million customers, overcharging by £1.01 or 35.8p for every unit under-estimated would be a nice little earner, and that's just for gas.

Robin9

I was surprised by one of the figures that a  supplier quoted - that the number of customer reads per day is usually 2,000  -  on the 31st they were getting 40,000 per hour. 

Perhaps the saga over the last few days will be a wake up call to those who don't bother reading their meter.

razord

Robin9 said:

I was surprised by one of the figures that a  supplier quoted - that the number of customer reads per day is usually 2,000  -  on the 31st they were getting 40,000 per hour. 

Perhaps the saga over the last few days will be a wake up call to those who don't bother reading their meter.

Wait until everyone gets real bills covering winter over the next few weeks and thinks they've been overcharged... Those who haven't submitted in years but saw all the press last week and finally did.

Ultrasonic

Gerry1 said:

Ultrasonic said:

Surely the extra cost would just be on two days energy use, so hardly a huge deal.

Not if they underestimated by a significant amount.  It's the principle that's wrong, failing to allow customers to give the date of the meter reading and failing to allow a reasonable period for customers to submit the online form.

With over 5 million customers, overcharging by £1.01 or 35.8p for every unit under-estimated would be a nice little earner, and that's just for gas.

I think you're overestimating any issue here but first of all I think it's worth noting that your screenshot shows EDF are being helpful here by allowing people to post a meter reading for 31 March over an extended period of time.

To go back to the big issue, the potential overcharging will not be based on how wrong any estimate for 31 March will be. Say someone doesn't actually post a genuine reading until 30 April. If there was a previous estimate on 31 March that is very low I wouldn't expect this to stay unchanged but rather a new estimate for this would be calculated based on the 30 April value. Do you know that this won't happen? It would normally. 

Ectophile

I really don't know what everybody is panicking about.  I have been an energy customer for long enough to have seen many price rises, albeit not as big as this one.

If you submit a meter reading before the price rise, and another some time after, then the energy companies will apportion the units across the two rates.

So if you submitted a reading a week before the price rise, and another three weeks after, then they would charge you for 1/4 of the units at the old rate and 3/4 of them at the new rate.  It won't be exactly right, but not only will it be pretty close, but it could even end up in your favour if you're lucky.

Could everybody stop running around like headless chickens and just submit a reading when you can.

Gerry1

Ectophile said:

If you submit a meter reading before the price rise, and another some time after, then the energy companies will apportion the units across the two rates.

So if you submitted a reading a week before the price rise, and another three weeks after, then they would charge you for 1/4 of the units at the old rate and 3/4 of them at the new rate.  It won't be exactly right, but not only will it be pretty close, but it could even end up in your favour if you're lucky.

You have a lot more faith in EDF than I do !