How to get EDF to correct billing?

RCBroughton

Dual fuel customer with EDF.

I have smart meters for Elec and Gas - both installed by EDF - but they can only get readings from the Electricity meter (long, other story on trying to get them to fix their issue with reading the gas meter - I can see all the data fine in the LOOP app on my phone)

Anyway.  2022 billing for electricity was done on automatic readings and gas was done on a combination of estimates and my submitted readings.

Beginning of March I tried to submit another gas reading (they have been consistently overestimating my usage, so wanted to make sure they had correct data).   The website gave an error - I though maybe because I'd only put in a gas read, so I also put in an electric read.  Still gave an error on the gas reading ("The Reading is Higher or Lower than expected" - very helpful).  I eventually had to send them a photo of the meter reading via Whatsapp for them to accept it.

2 days later a revised bill appeared on My Account.

They had completely reversed all the charges on my account back to January 2022 and then rebilled.  The new bill charged my electricity for 2022 based on ESTIMATES rather than the previous smart meter reads.

I spent half a day trying to work out what they had done.

Crucially, their revised ESTIMATES at price change points (particularly 1st October) were lower than the previous ACTUAL reads at those dates.  This effectively moved some of my consumption out of lower price periods into higher price periods.  Net effect was that the restated bill overcharged me for electricity in 2022 by using estimates rather than the actual reads.

Simple to sort out - right?  Nope.

Tried online Chat.  No agents.  Got transferred to Whatsapp chat.  Waited 24 hours for an agent to come on line.  Explained the problem that my bill for 2022 was incorrect.  "Can you please provide readings as at today".  Goodness knows how was that supposed to fix the issue with my 2022 billing but I provided the info at which point the chat cut off because when I asked another question I was thrown back to the account verification checks. 

I then waited over a week with no one coming back to me on the chat, so emailed customer services instead.   A couple of days later I get an email response saying that previous bills based on estimates have been cancelled and rebilled based on actuals.   I think, great, problem solved.   Nope.  No updated bills appear on my account.

Finally, after 10days, someone replies to my Whatsapp chat saying that my billing is up to date and quoting details from the incorrect bill.

It's like the agent just didn't bother reading what the issue was nor reading the extensive detail I provided of the incorrect readings.

It just feels like I'm going around in circles trying to get this resolved.  Either the CSAs are trained to deliberately obfuscate or they are imbeciles.

Do I now just wait 8 weeks and take it to the Ombudsman or are there ways to get EDF to actually listen, understand and correct the issue?

Robin9

Forget Chat and CS

ComplaintResolution@edfenergy.com