Help - SP say I owe money on payg meter

Sojiki

Ok I'll keep this fairly short.
I am with Scottish Power, (I can't change no energy company is taking new customers) and a pay as you go key meter.
brief history, I won a case through ombudsman against them trying to switch me, they had to pay compensation of just over 150, separately, last year for first time they failed to process warm home discount for me.(pure coincidence it matches the comepensarion they had to pay), instead they gave me a "good willl gesture" of 70 on the meter and 80 cheque, now they claim I have used £79 more energy than I have paid for. I have no idea how a prepayment meter can use more electricity than you pay for and top up weekly (so energy price fluctuations wouldn't account for the difference), and they want to take 13 a week extra to pay for it
I have written to them to ask for an explanation and raised complaint with them.
can anyone help on what my next steps might be - am I seriously going to have to raise another complaint with the ombudsman if they insist on this debt and have no satisfactory answer?
also how can I change company when no-one is taking new customers especially as to qualify for warm home discount this year I will need to be with said company in first week of July. I feel at a total loss with SP, im stuck with them and they seem to randomly generate debts to recoup compensation. And I can't get out 

SAC2334

Prepays can be in debt because you have nt topped up the meter often enough to cover the daily standing charges of ( in my area ) £3.35 p a week.
This could happen if the property was vacant for some reason or you were using so little electric for weeks and standing charges were more than the kwh rates  
 Also you can build up more debt by failing to repay a weekly  debt amount on the meter .This debt could be either standing charge debt , seen on screen A  or on the debt screen on one of the other screens  , " S " or " T"  I think it was for electric prepay 

Sojiki

Thanks, I was kind of aware of this and hence top up weekly to avoid such amounts accruing - last month bill states 5 owed this month it now says 79 despite topping up weekly even had I not have topped up weekly an increase of 74 seems tremendously high for 4 weeks

pochase

Did you top up a lot before the price change on 1st of April?

That was advised by Martin and others, but the advice was later withdrawn when suppliers said they can and will change the price later in arrears when the meter is credited the next time after new energy has been purchased on the key.

paulwalker82

i am having the same problem i never have under 50.00 on my meter and put 20.00 on every week without fail yet they now say over the last 3 months i have run up a 105.00 debt on it , it seems they are pulling some kind of scam to try and charge people up to the threshold set by regulator regardles if you use that amount or not

MWT

paulwalker82 said:

... it seems they are pulling some kind of scam to try and charge people up to the threshold set by regulator regardles if you use that amount or not

There is no regulated threshold for billing amount, so that is certainly not what is happening.

Hopefully one of you with this issue can get them to explain what the charge is for...

Sojiki

I think I have worked it out . They gave me a goodwill gesture of 70 credit in the form of a number to use on the key. This is not showing in the amounts I paid and therefore the difference between what I have paid onto the key and what has been used is 70 short. The other odd 9 is difficult to work through but can assume charges or similar

Sojiki

pochase said:

Did you top up a lot before the price change on 1st of April?

No I speoificaly avoided doing so for that very reason.

Sojiki

paulwalker82 said:

i am having the same problem i never have under 50.00 on my meter and put 20.00 on every week without fail yet they now say over the last 3 months i have run up a 105.00 debt on it , it seems they are pulling some kind of scam to try and charge people up to the threshold set by regulator regardles if you use that amount or not

I wonder if yours is a similar issue, did they give you any goodwill credit or the warm home discount. Is that showing as a credit on the bill, 

paulwalker82

Sojiki said:

paulwalker82 said:

i am having the same problem i never have under 50.00 on my meter and put 20.00 on every week without fail yet they now say over the last 3 months i have run up a 105.00 debt on it , it seems they are pulling some kind of scam to try and charge people up to the threshold set by regulator regardles if you use that amount or not

I wonder if yours is a similar issue, did they give you any goodwill credit or the warm home discount. Is that showing as a credit on the bill, 

no they didn't . they are telling me i am not topping up enough to cover what i use which is utter rubbish

MWT

paulwalker82 said:

Sojiki said:

paulwalker82 said:

i am having the same problem i never have under 50.00 on my meter and put 20.00 on every week without fail yet they now say over the last 3 months i have run up a 105.00 debt on it , it seems they are pulling some kind of scam to try and charge people up to the threshold set by regulator regardles if you use that amount or not

I wonder if yours is a similar issue, did they give you any goodwill credit or the warm home discount. Is that showing as a credit on the bill, 

no they didn't . they are telling me i am not topping up enough to cover what i use which is utter rubbish

Ask them for a statement if they have not already given you one so you can compare what they are recording as your payments and usage vs what know you have paid.

I would also suggest taking meter readings every week when you top up so you can properly compare with what they are claiming...

Also check that your meter is set to the same unit price and standing charge as they are using...