Scottish Power - Back Billing

Twinbat2

I sold a holiday home I had back in 2019, I was with Scottish Power as my energy supplier. Upon completion I gave them a final meter reading, they said I was in credit on my account and sent me a cheque for £350.00. This week I have received a text message from a company called ACI, saying that they are managing my Scottish Power account and that I owe £4700? 

Gerry1

Welcome to the forum.

It sounds like a scam, especially if it doesn't address you by your full name and include all the relevant details.

I'd ignore it for the time being, but submit a formal written complaint to SP, asking them explain what's going on. You can then go to the Ombudsman after eight weeks (or on receipt of a deadlock letter) if they don't sort it out.

Twinbat2

Thank you, I have today received a letter from Scottish Power confirming that they have assigned all benefits in relation to my account to Perch Capital Limited, and Perch Capital have appointed ACI to manage the collection of my outstanding balance. How can I have an outstanding balance when the account was closed nearly 4 years ago with final meter readings? 

ariarnia

Twinbat2 said:

Thank you, I have today received a letter from Scottish Power confirming that they have assigned all benefits in relation to my account to Perch Capital Limited, and Perch Capital have appointed ACI to manage the collection of my outstanding balance. How can I have an outstanding balance when the account was closed nearly 4 years ago with final meter readings? 

hi twinbat. 

if sp have confirmed the letter from the debt collector is valid then the best thing to do in this situation is to have a look at this thread and the template letter there. 

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/2607247/letter-when-you-know-nothing-about-about-the-debt-aka-prove-it-letter

you can add a line in about the debt being more than 12 months old and under back billing if you werent billed for it correctly at the time sp can't collect it. 

if i were you i would send it to both sp and the debt collectors and i agree with gerry you should start a formal complaint with sp that they didn't contact you about this before selling your debt (assuming they didn't) 

make it clear you expect sp to sort this and that you dont appreciate being chased by debt collectors when as far as you are concerned you have paid what you were asked to pay (again assuming thats right)

Twinbat2

Hi,
Thank you for the link, it looks exactly what I need, I do recall getting a couple of text messages from 'Scottish Power' at the time asking me to get in touch, but because the account had been closed down and I had received my cheque, I just assumed they were either a scam or their marketing team trying to get me back as a customer so I ignored them, and I haven't heard anything from them in over 2 years, until this week. 

pochase

I am not sure that backbilling rules apply if they find that they made an error in the final bill and corrected it.

Especially if they did so in a timely manner.

ariarnia

yeah. back billing is really confusing but nearly £5k doesn't sound like a basic final bill error. that level of usage from several years ago is probably 2 years worth of energy for a 'average' house lived in all year and this is a holiday home. 

not impossible but also worth following up/referring to it either way. 

pochase

@Twinbat2
You should really send the proof it letter as fast as possible.

You need a copy of the revised bill to see what this is about.

Twinbat2

What I don't understand is how they made a mistake when they were given meter readings? And sent me a cheque to close the account? And I haven't heard from them since 2019? Also it was a holiday home/let that was on economy 7 storage heaters? 

MWT

I wouldn't complicate matters by getting into the back-billing debate yet.

Keep it very simple and go with the 'prove it' letter then you can deal with issues like back-billing once you know how they have got to that figure, if they are even able to respond meaningfully...

[Deleted User]

MWT said:

I wouldn't complicate matters by getting into the back-billing debate yet.

Keep it very simple and go with the 'prove it' letter then you can deal with issues like back-billing once you know how they have got to that figure, if they are even able to respond meaningfully...

I agree. Final bills are dealt with in a separate section of the Supply Licence from bills and BackBilling.

Provision of final bill

‘Electricity

27.17 Where the responsibility for the supply of electricity to a Domestic Customer transfers from the licensee to another Electricity Supplier or otherwise terminates, the licensee must take all reasonable steps to send a final Bill or statement of account of the Domestic Customer’s account within 6 weeks of the supplier transfer or termination of the Domestic Supply Contract.

27.18 Where subsequent information becomes available to correct an error in the final Bill or statement of account issued pursuant to paragraph 27.17, the licensee shall send a corrected Bill or statement of account as soon as reasonably practicable after the subsequent information becomes available.’

The onus would be on the bill payer to prove that the supplier didn’t use reasonable endeavours to issue a corrected bill. The OP admits that texts from the supplier were ignored. Note: there is no reference to sending the corrected bill within 12 months.