Utility Point - Collections Barratt Smith Brown - Dispute

todayisagreatday

I've received a letter from BSB on behalf of Utility Point saying they want £700+ off us within 7 days.

This concerns an ongoing dispute we has with Utility Point for no reason anyone can fathom, we went from very minimal electricity use - just shy of £30 a month to all of a sudden receiving a bill for a huge increase. They calculated us using 5186 units of electricity between 15 November 2020 and 25 February 2021. We had no change in circumstances, to put into context we are a couple, no kids, work full time and our heating at this point was oil so no electric heating. We had been with Utility Point for at least 2-3 years and we had never encountered any usage like this before, in fact our annual usage had been nowhere near this amount.

Utility Point couldn't explain it and were as baffled as me but it didn't stop them chasing but I had all emails where I'd complained and we were having ongoing conversations about this, so I wasn't ignoring them but we hadn't resolved it - and then of course UP ceased trading. When we moved to Octopus from end of Feb onwards it came to light we had issues with our meter, infact we had a battle with Octopus where they realised the meter/billing (or something I can't understand) was basically doubling. We had someone come out to do something with the meter and something remote which sorted it out. We have since has an ASHP installed and are an all electric house and still our usage is nothing like Utility Point have it for those brief months.

I emailed BSB to put everything into context and outlining the dispute but not sent any copies of emails and details yet. I'm more than happy to go to Court and go through everything but 5000 units is ridiculous. Even in winter with an all electric house heating we were only using about 20 units a day!

Any ideas how I should handle this. I have an excellent credit rating and my mortgage is up for renewal this year so don't want to damage my credit rating but I shouldn't have to pay a bill that is definitely wrong!

pochase

Did you maybe get a catch-up bill? Did they estimate your usage for a longer time, and when they finally got a reading they recalculated your bills? In this case it would not be a very usage for just a few months, but a more moderate usage over a longer time.

In other words, were the 5186KWh between an estimated read and the real reading in February? Do you agree with the February reading or was it different from your meter?

todayisagreatday

pochase said:

Did you maybe get a catch-up bill? Did they estimate your usage for a longer time, and when they finally got a reading they recalculated your bills? In this case it would not be a very usage for just a few months, but a more moderate usage over a longer time.

In other words, were the 5186KWh between an estimated read and the real reading in February? Do you agree with the February reading or was it different from your meter?

It's a mix of some meter readings I took and estimated bills, but I think it's the meter itself that wasn't right. I have comprehensive information that Utility Point provided based on this info:

15/11-07/01 2932 units

07/01-29/01 925 units

29/01-05/02 384 units

05/02-25/02 945 units

pochase

That is just how they distributed the units internally. Do you agree with the reading that was taken on the 25th February, that the meter showed the same as they have on their bill? Are the 5186KWh the correct difference between the (estimated?) reading for 15/11 and 25/02?

Are you saying your meter is/was broken and gave wrong (higher) readings? Has the meter been replaced and was it checked to proof that it is broken, or did you keep the meter and it slowed down?

todayisagreatday

pochase said:

That is just how they distributed the units internally. Do you agree with the reading that was taken on the 25th February, that the meter showed the same as they have on their bill? Are the 5186KWh the correct difference between the (estimated?) reading for 15/11 and 25/02?

Are you saying your meter is/was broken and gave wrong (higher) readings? Has the meter been replaced and was it checked to proof that it is broken, or did you keep the meter and it slowed down?

Yep that's the reading we definitely took on 25 Feb.

I think the meter had issues, I don't know whether broke or faulty as when we moved to Octopus they sent someone out to sort it and also did something remote as we were getting double calculations on the amount of electricity used.

pochase

Can you maybe give a timeline here? SOLR supplier for Utility Point should be EDF, so did you change to Octopus before they went bust in September 2021?

Did you receive a final bill from Utility Point with the debt they are asking you for now?

As Utility Point has no longer a license, the ombudsman is also no longer responsible. It seems they have not handed over the debt to EDF, but the administrator are trying to collect here?

What exactly did Octopus do and can you get a confirmation from them?

What was your unit rate at Utility point? When you are saying you had in winter 20KWh per day, the £30 per month sound to low to cover your energy use.

todayisagreatday

pochase said:

Can you maybe give a timeline here? SOLR supplier for Utility Point should be EDF, so did you change to Octopus before they went bust in September 2021?

Did you receive a final bill from Utility Point with the debt they are asking you for now?

As Utility Point has no longer a license, the ombudsman is also no longer responsible. It seems they have not handed over the debt to EDF, but the administrator are trying to collect here?

What exactly did Octopus do and can you get a confirmation from them?

What was your unit rate at Utility point? When you are saying you had in winter 20KWh per day, the £30 per month sound to low to cover your energy use.

We moved to Octopus on 26 February 2021 I believe it was. The final bill is from Utility Point which we were contesting and had various email discussions about similar to what I'm mentioning here, but then with them going bust we heard nothing since until the collection letter from BSB so have had nothing from EDF. BSB haven't yet replied.

We had our heating system changed on/around 1 March 2021 to a heat pump (which is why we moved to Octopus as we are on a cheaper night Tarrif). I was referring to the 20kwh a day in winter SINCE moving to Octopus and our new heating system, so with an electric heating system as well as other normal electric in winter it was rarely over 20-25kwh. By comparison, how can Utility Point have us using almost double that a day when we had oil heating and no other changes. Our direct debit with Utility Point was £29 a month for at least two years and we were frequently in credit - until what happened between November 2020 and us leaving end of February and the huge bill. What we can't account for is why all of a sudden the meter readings shot up 

I'm not too sure what Octopus did but I have emails about our meter and some form of remote reset they did. We are also now able to see half hourly smart readings.

pochase

When Octopus did the remote resets did anything "visible" like change of the readings happen, or did it just go "there should be no longer a problem".

I assume you did not raise a official complaint regarding the final bill and went with it to the Ombudsman? So that route is most likely been blocked now. 

The argument it was only always £29 might also work against you if they were working from estimated readings, in which case the amount should be much higher. 

Do you still have your old bills? Can you go through them and make a list of the real meter readings with dates? What was the last real reading that was not an estimate and what was the meter reading and what is it for February? Was the February reading the one you submitted to Octopus as your start? 

Also what type of meter do you have?

Hopefully they will not go the way through court, but if they do you need as much hard data as possible to proof that something went wrong on the meter as it happens not very often, and normally it would be removed and than the meter would be analysed if and what went wrong.

todayisagreatday

pochase said:

When Octopus did the remote resets did anything "visible" like change of the readings happen, or did it just go "there should be no longer a problem".

I assume you did not raise a official complaint regarding the final bill and went with it to the Ombudsman? So that route is most likely been blocked now. 

The argument it was only always £29 might also work against you if they were working from estimated readings, in which case the amount should be much higher. 

Do you still have your old bills? Can you go through them and make a list of the real meter readings with dates? What was the last real reading that was not an estimate and what was the meter reading and what is it for February? Was the February reading the one you submitted to Octopus as your start? 

Also what type of meter do you have?

Hopefully they will not go the way through court, but if they do you need as much hard data as possible to proof that something went wrong on the meter as it happens not very often, and normally it would be removed and than the meter would be analysed if and what went wrong.

Unfortunately there was nothing visible that happened, but our bills were adjusted and Octopus did apply a £250 credit as it took so long to get resolved and me manually recording our usage from our heat pump every day.

I tried to raise an official complaint with the Ombudsman but you needed the official deadlock letter from Utility Point which I could not get from them - I have emails asking them for this.

My meter is a SMET2 one. I'll try and see if I can find my bills.