How to get my AFP as CASH not credit to my electricity account!!!???
CalJo99
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Hi, I'm new and joined to ask this question!
I have oil fired central heating, and EDF my electricity supplier has told me I'm receiving the government's £200 AFP. So far so good.
But, because I pay my electricity bill quarterly (the old fashioned way!), paying only for electricity I've used, they have said they will put that £200 as a credit on my electricity account. I use a credit card to pay (over the phone, not online)
But I want it in cash (ie, in my bank account), to pay for OIL, not electricity!
Do I have a legal right to get them to pay it on to me, and not hang on it themselves while I burn my way through £200 of electricity??? I want the £200 credited to my credit card, not my electricity account!
Yes, I know it will work out 'in the end', but as I say, I want the £200 now, to pay for oil, not save money on electricity in the future.
In general principle, are customers entitled to demand repayment of any overpayments on their electricity bills that go into credit?
Any guidance on if I have a right to get the cash off them would be appreciated - and of any experiences, good or bad, with EDF in this respect.
Many thanks
I have oil fired central heating, and EDF my electricity supplier has told me I'm receiving the government's £200 AFP. So far so good.
But, because I pay my electricity bill quarterly (the old fashioned way!), paying only for electricity I've used, they have said they will put that £200 as a credit on my electricity account. I use a credit card to pay (over the phone, not online)
But I want it in cash (ie, in my bank account), to pay for OIL, not electricity!
Do I have a legal right to get them to pay it on to me, and not hang on it themselves while I burn my way through £200 of electricity??? I want the £200 credited to my credit card, not my electricity account!
Yes, I know it will work out 'in the end', but as I say, I want the £200 now, to pay for oil, not save money on electricity in the future.
In general principle, are customers entitled to demand repayment of any overpayments on their electricity bills that go into credit?
Any guidance on if I have a right to get the cash off them would be appreciated - and of any experiences, good or bad, with EDF in this respect.
Many thanks
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Also, for certain billing types, they can only do a refund after a bill is generated. If you are unwilling to wait until your normal bill, they will need to force a bill using a current reading. And your account needs to be in credit after that before they will release any. If you pay your bill in arrears, that is probably unlikely. Although they can use the £200 towards it and refund any excess. That will leave you in the position you are after.
I want the £200 credited to my credit card, not my electricity account!
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I do, which is why I want EDF to put my £200 government AFP on it (or into my bank). I don't have a problem paying my electricity account (especially since I'm getting the electricity government subsidy as well right now), but with my oil bill!
EDF don't know my bank account, as I don't pay by direct debit, I just wait for the paper bill to arrive (after phoning in my meter reading) and then pay them on my credit card using their auto-payment telephone.
I'm happy to give them my bank details to get the £200 AFP paid to it, or to put it onto my credit card, I don't mind which - I just want the money in MY hands so I can use it to buy oil, not yet more electricity!!
I'm sorry to hear I don't have a legal right to demand that overpayment of my electricity account (which is what the £200 AFP represents) is refunded to me, which seems very odd indeed if I don't owe them the money for electricity I've used.
This is especially galling since the whole point of the AFP money is to help pay for alternative fuels, not for electricity!!!
Thank you for your answers though, but it looks like I'm going to have to tackle EDF directly, which will be, I suspect, a pain. The last time I tried to phone them (to tell them I had oil CH!), using the number on their correspondence, it didn't connect at all. Hey ho and here we go (sigh).
I will probably try and set up some kind of online account, I guess, that is probably the only way to do this.
It does seem fundamentally bizarre that the electricity companies are able to keep the money that the government is handing out for oil, for themselves. Nice little earner for them methinks!! (ie, they can sit on my £200 AFP until I've used up that value of electricity.)
However, the AFP is ill though out. Most alternative fuel costs did not justify tax payer support.
Dunston, trouble is, if everything else is costing more, then even if oil has restabilised in price, doesn't mean one can afford it without the AFP!! That's the issue alas.
If the elctricity companies are sitting on the £200 then we can't use it to buy oil.
Oil also has to be bought, as we know, in substantial amounts, whereas with Electricity, whatever the bill at the end of the month/quarter, we don't buy electricity in large amounts up front, as we have to do with oil.