Help please, with my EDF DD increase..

Dan32343

Hi, I have a serious illness, and live with an octogenarian.
EDF have increased my DD in January and February to £454 pcm.
It used to cost £251 throughout 2022, and Ive tried calling them, but I can only get through to the Philippine's or South Africa.
It seems to be impossible to get through to anyone in the UK.
The woman on the phone told me that I am in credit to the amount of £1378.29
(Which seems like a con to me? Why are they allowed to overcharge me, sit on my money and profit from it?!)
I have (sometimes) serious cognitive issues that come with my illness, confusion, memory loss, severe brain fog etc...
We are on a low income. What help should we be asking for?  Im not sure what to say to EDF?
I dont have a clue to what Im entitled to, if anything?
Also  dont understand why our bills are so much in the first place.
(Could it be something to do with the immersion heater Im now wondering?)
Any help appreciated? Give me an idea of who i should be calling and what i should be saying?
Thankyou.

Robin9

First you need to ensure that the facts are correct -  forget £'s for the time being  - what is important are the meter readings.

Can you look at your bills and find the meter reading bit  - what is the letter following the reading A, C, E , s, our read/your read.

Go back 12 months if you can and compare with todays reading - d you read the meter or do you rely on EDF.

Are you on the Priority Services Register

[Deleted User]

Dan32343 said:

Hi, I have a serious illness, and live with an octogenarian.
EDF have increased my DD in January and February to £454 pcm.
It used to cost £251 throughout 2022, and Ive tried calling them, but I can only get through to the Philippine's or South Africa.
It seems to be impossible to get through to anyone in the UK.
The woman on the phone told me that I am in credit to the amount of £1378.29
(Which seems like a con to me? Why are they allowed to overcharge me, sit on my money and profit from it?!)
I have (sometimes) serious cognitive issues that come with my illness, confusion, memory loss, severe brain fog etc...
We are on a low income. What help should we be asking for?  Im not sure what to say to EDF?
I dont have a clue to what Im entitled to, if anything?
Also  dont understand why our bills are so much in the first place.
(Could it be something to do with the immersion heater Im now wondering?)
Any help appreciated? Give me an idea of who i should be calling and what i should be saying?
Thankyou.

Try to speak to a Citizens Advice energy adviser. Their Extra Help team has access to CEOs’ offices. Let someone else take the strain.

Muttleythefrog

I agree with above... get help as reading between the lines some analysis needs to be done here regarding what you're actually using in terms of gas and electric and therefore what you should be getting charged and I fear you might not be well placed to do this. You might be able to get put onto direct debit where you only pay for what you actually use as I have for EDF. Remember gas and electric is very expensive right now so bills can be high... but your DD seems very high indeed. I'm conscious that EDF billing can be highly complex... in fact since becoming a customer of theirs last summer they've only just managed to direct debit me at all in the last week and having conducted extensive analysis I can see they have conned themselves out of hundreds of pounds because of billing errors. I'm also conscious that their advisors on the phone can give completely false information and bad advice hence they had to issue goodwill credit to me.

Much of the help you could be entitled to would be automatic... you should have gotten for example £400 help from October to this month broken down into six £66 or £67 payments each month to your credit.

But I think you need someone to help as advised above... this needs some proper analysis with real data like readings over time and from there advice can be given including if necessary perhaps regarding energy saving. If you do think you could be using excessive gas or electric and want to take quick action then giving some more information on what your household uses particularly the details for heating and heating water might be useful.

Dan32343

I never read the meter no. 
The DD amount was £110pcm in 2021, then £145pcm in 2021, then £251pcm in 2022, and the latest is £454pcm in 2023....??!!!!!
I will google 'priority services register' thanks.

Ive got a GAS bill here shows;
Period: 01Oct21 - 29thMarch 22
Previous Reading: 9909 ESTIMATED
Latest Reading: 621 OUR READ
(Dont know what the alphabetised letters youve written are referring to?)

And Ive just been out to look at the GAS meter which reads: 1444.8

Thanks for your help! 

Robin9

A = Actual, C = consumer, E =  Estimated

Our read -  would suggest a meter reader has been around



Just ring EDF and ask to be put on the Priority Services Register and when you do give them the reading 1444 (ignore the decimal 8)

Muttleythefrog

Just as quick comment on those apparent gas readings.... (I assume the meter has gone to 9999 then to zero late in 2021).. these readings suggest to me you're a low to medium user of gas... around 8000 kWh over the 6 coldest months 2021/22... followed by a estimated annual usage of around 10000kWh. I think average household about 12000kWh. (Please note.. to avoid confusion... the meters usually measure cubic metres of gas and not kWh but roughly speaking a cubic metre is about 11kWh). So on the face of it your gas usage doesn't look excessive and unless you use excessive electricity then a DD of the level they've set seems too high especially if you are indeed already in notable credit on the account.

(The letters they were referring to by the way is because often on the bill they'll use a letter to denote (E)stimated reading or (A)ctual reading etc)

Important I think to say generally that giving regularly readings to supplier is useful (to ensure accurate billing and get better chance of sensible DDs) unless of course you have smart meters sending them readings automatically. EDF actually did an estimated gas usage for me that was well over 100 times actual usage - they can get these things very badly wrong without real numbers.

pochase

EDF is only billing every 6 months, in the meantime all your payments are added as a credit, but your use is not deducted. So a credit of £1378 is meaningless without knowing when you had the last bill. You might have used energy for £2000 while you paid the £1378 and have a debt in reality.

When was your last bill?

The other question is what type of gas meter do you have, an imperial *ft3) or a metric (m3) one? Is there somewhere on the meter a m3 or a ft3 written? 

The 823 unit sused might be either 9217KWh or 26085KWh depending on the type of meter.

If the meter is in m3 there is still the question what is you bill based on. If you find a 2.82/2.83 in the conversion formula from units to KWh on the bill they are charging you for an imperial meter.

Dan32343

Thankyou for putting usage into comparative terms, I didnt think we were excessive users of gas or electric, so low to medium user sounds right. No we dont have smart meters and no we dont use much electricity....
I will go out and look at the gas meter again in a while. IDK when my last bill was. I'll try and figure that out.

Muttleythefrog

Dan32343 said:

Thankyou for putting usage into comparative terms, I didnt think we were excessive users of gas or electric, so low to medium user sounds right. No we dont have smart meters and no we dont use much electricity....

It makes sense.... but if you could check your meter to make sure it is measuring m3 (cubic metres) rather than ft3 (cubic feet) as if it were the latter then you're possibly a very high gas user and that would need closely looking at. On the gas bill how many kWh do they say you used in total over those 6 months? Do you have any bills giving electricity readings?

I would like to think you've received a bill since then.... I wonder if they've got you down for online billing (no emails regarding bills since last March?)... so if you do contact EDF make sure to ask them to send bills in post and obviously ask to be put on Priority Services Register.

Dan32343

Yes, it is an imperial meter, FT3 written on it....

For 01Oct21-29thMarch2022 it states gas units used; 712=22897kWh
On the same bill is the Electricity:
Period: 21Dec21 - 29thMarch 2022
Previous reading: 53751 ESTIMATED
Latest Reading: 54560 ESTIMATED
Electricity units used 809kWh

The latest bill I have is:
Period:  30th March 2022 - 31st March 2022
Previous Reading: 621 OUR READ.
Latest Reading: 631 ESTIMATED
Gas units used: 323kWh
Charge: £12.25 (So presumably this is how much its costing per day, if the date states 30th March to 31st March?)

Period: 01April 2022 - 20thJune 2022
Previous Reading: 631 ESTIMATED
Latest Reading: 802 OUR READ
Gas units used: 5526kWh

This is for two (ill) people, (and a dog!) in a house, central heating comes on maybe 4 or 5 or 6 times a day for an hour per time...

Any thoughts? Are we high users then? Of gas elec? Are we being overcharged somehow? Why has my DD quadrupled in a couple of years?! How to judge it comparatively?
Cant get my head around it...