British Gas "New" Billing System does not include variable direct debit

Gerry1

DullGreyGuy said:

Gerry1 said:

Dozy Ofgem should mandate that all suppliers should offer Monthly Variable Direct Debit.

Why should they?

Monthly billing and payment should be an option because six-monthly billing causes confusion with accounts seemingly well in credit suddenly going into debit after a big catch-up bill is issued.  By the time the bill arrives it's too late to do anything about the excessive energy consumption.

Variable DDs should be an option so that consumers can get a better indication of their usage and whether efficiencies and lifestyle changes are really reducing consumption.  Forumites are presumably more savvy than other energy customers, but almost every week there's a wail to the effect that 'My DD is fixed at £X per month, but it's suddenly doubled to £Y'.  Fixed DDs encourage the misapprehension that it's an All You Can Eat tariff.

Variable DDs would also make it more difficult for Ponzi companies to operate: when they go bust the excess credit amounts they hold have to be repaid by customers of all the other energy companies via the SoLR scheme.

A year ago Ofgem were heavily criticised by Citizens Advice for their poor performance which led to customers of recently failed companies having an average credit balance of £353, around £200 more than needed.  Supplier failures since Aug 2021 will cost consumers £2.6 billion - around £94 per customer.  The Government has also set aside a further £1.7 billion of taxpayer money for Bulb’s failure.

morhen

I would settle to just being able to see the british gas account right now, let alone being able to change payment details.  All I get is:

Something went wrong

Sorry, we're having technical problems at the moment. Please come back and try again later.

So much for the new system being better than the old one!  It's been like this for over a month.  Twitter DM's, emails and phone calls all go unanswered.  Can't wait for the government payment scheme to end so I can move my mothers account to a better provider.  She won't move before in case something goes wrong, and with british gas, I can't blame her really!

pseudodox

Gerry1 said:

DullGreyGuy said:

Gerry1 said:

Dozy Ofgem should mandate that all suppliers should offer Monthly Variable Direct Debit.

Why should they?

Monthly billing and payment should be an option because six-monthly billing causes confusion with accounts seemingly well in credit suddenly going into debit after a big catch-up bill is issued.  By the time the bill arrives it's too late to do anything about the excessive energy consumption.

Variable DDs should be an option so that consumers can get a better indication of their usage and whether efficiencies and lifestyle changes are really reducing consumption.  Forumites are presumably more savvy than other energy customers, but almost every week there's a wail to the effect that 'My DD is fixed at £X per month, but it's suddenly doubled to £Y'.  Fixed DDs encourage the misapprehension that it's an All You Can Eat tariff.

I firmly believe we should have a choice in how we pay for things.  Some people pay cash/instant card payment for everything, others put £££ on credit cards.  I use mainly my contactless debit card, but when I do use a credit card I always pay it off every month.  Despite a lifetime of low income & now just the state pension I have never been in debt because I have always lived within my means by carefully managing my finances.  I really don't accept that in my dotage I should hand over that control to some corporate Big Brother.

What really saddens since joining this forum 3 months ago is seeing just how many people come here with problems, which can only represent a very small minority of the numbers with problems (real or perceived) who don't know where to turn.  Of course we all know that people who don't have any issues will not generally be active on forums and people in difficulties will be a minority of the whole population.  But how many out there are happily tootling along on the "all you can eat" concept. Or how many will have ££hundreds of fuel payments in credit and not realise it is their money sitting in someone else's account? 

Looking at the number of advice posts repeating the same mantra here about "your FDD is NOT your bill" does seem to indicate that so many (of the sample population who post here) just don't understand how it works.  Look at how many who post have no concept of reading their own meters.  How many more are there out there?

Eldi_Dos

wrf12345 said:

 and had any credit moved back to my bank acc. 

Good luck with that part of the plan.

BikingBud

DullGreyGuy said:

Gerry1 said:

Dozy Ofgem should mandate that all suppliers should offer Monthly Variable Direct Debit.

Why should they?

Should they also mandate they accept UnionPay, Diners Club and AmEx credit cards too?

Allowing differentiation is what drives improvement

That's not even the same discussion, your comparison might be that we can use direct debit or credit card or cash to pay the energy bills.

However direct debit for what you consume is akin to paying off your credit card in full every month or just paying the CC company £150 irrespective of how much you have consumed. Clearly this is a problem for people who have found their DDs excessively high based upon crazy predicted usage and who only want a little more control in how and when they pay their bills.

It doesn't drive improvement it pays excessively more funds into the coffers of the energy companies and as usual the consumer gets turned over.

pochase

wrf12345 said:

BTW the cost of moving Bulb customers is not the same as before as they are not getting charged rates that result in a loss for the new company so the only reason for not reducing the s/c is greed.

Bulb were not allowed to hedge during administration, so they bought energy always at current prices and had often to resell with a loss.

So yes there is a huge loss that needs to be made up. In June 2022 it was 1.5 billion already, but I have also seen somewhere much higher numbers.

MattMattMattUK

pochase said:

wrf12345 said:

BTW the cost of moving Bulb customers is not the same as before as they are not getting charged rates that result in a loss for the new company so the only reason for not reducing the s/c is greed.

Bulb were not allowed to hedge during administration, so they bought energy always at current prices and had often to resell with a loss.

So yes there is a huge loss that needs to be made up. In June 2022 it was 1.5 billion already, but I have also seen somewhere much higher numbers.

£6.5 billion unfortunately. 

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/nov/17/bail-out-bust-energy-supplier-bulb-cost-taxpayers-65bn-octopus

Scot_39

wrf12345 said:

Be interesting to see what excuses Ofgem come out with for not lowering the s/c back to the old rate (£100-ish less) on electricity after they increased it for a year to get the money back for co's taking on displaced customers at a loss.

The only time Ofgem or the govn would react in customers interests is if there was a nationwide cancelling of DD's and possibly then all they would do is get the govn to extend their powers to take money directly off people for the energy co's.

The current Cornwall insights show a lowering of the cap from the current c46p average for electric - to c33p - so still higher than before the SofLR levy - but then it also shows gas up a few p more (28p Ofgem now - 30p in the table )  - if reading their figure 2 correct -

https://www.cornwall-insight.com/press/winter-2023-24-price-cap-forecasts-fall-further-below-2022-23-epg-but-long-term-prospects-remain-uncertain/ 

Astria

Gerry1 said:

DullGreyGuy said:

Gerry1 said:

Dozy Ofgem should mandate that all suppliers should offer Monthly Variable Direct Debit.

Why should they?

Monthly billing and payment should be an option because six-monthly billing causes confusion with accounts seemingly well in credit suddenly going into debit after a big catch-up bill is issued.  By the time the bill arrives it's too late to do anything about the excessive energy consumption.

Variable DDs should be an option so that consumers can get a better indication of their usage and whether efficiencies and lifestyle changes are really reducing consumption.

Agree 100%. Sainsburys/EON changed my variable DD to fixed DD back in October and set a DD of £246. After being nearly £800 in credit now they've decided to move me back to variable DD (at my request) and refund some £400 of credit.

I'm currently giving them a weekly meter read and so they are billing me weekly, taking from my current balance.