British Gas - absolutely no idea what to do now - no answers!

ChrisJJ

la531983 said:

ChrisJJ said:

I'm not sure how to do that, I'm afraid. I don't use this forum very much.

I've reported the post and asked them to do it. 

Thank you :-)

Mobtr

The chances are Cadent haven’t told BG that the meter has been changed & wont have sent the flows needed to update your account with the new meter. 

Ring the complaints line on 0333 2029532 & stress you have had your meter changed. They’ll probably ask you to email in a photo of your meter including the yellow sticker that should be on there with the exchange details, & they’ll update it from there. Might take a bit of time though 

ChrisJJ

nnnnnnnnnnn

ChrisJJ

Oops. Meant to say; Will do as Mobtr suggests and ring the complaints line. Still haven't heard anything about the complaint they were supposedly getting back to me about withing 10 working days. Will look at switching suppliers too.

Jyana

ChrisJJ said:

Had to begin a new thread as I messed up on the quote facility and now I can't get rid of the text box but it won't let me post in it! Apologies...

To answer a question: the leak was on their side, no faulty appliances on my side. The Cadent engineer tried for a long time to fix the leak but was unsuccessful so had to change the meter.

Go to the link below and delete any draft response you do not want any longer

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/drafts

ArbitraryRandom

ChrisJJ said:

MeteredOut said:

Doesn't help with the immediate issue, but I presume you are keeping a record of the usage on the old meter, and the new one, so you know what your actual usage is, and can therefore work out what your bill should be.

I'd be getting that ready so when the bill does come in, you can validate it. 

The issue might be if the bill is calculated incorrectly, then the BG systems might automatically increase your DD (assuming that's how you pay) either up or down.

If the issue is not resolved within 8 weeks of your complaint getting raised, ask for deadlock letter and take it to the Energy Ombudsman.

I have a record of the final reading on the old meter. And I always gave accurate readings so they were not estimating my bills. I don't pay by DD, I pay on receipt of the bill. They are now asking for current meter readings, so I will give them the reading from the new meter of course, but they haven't even accurately billed me for my electricity usage. I have four bills in front of me, all wrong. Despite, on each occasion, giving them the correct readings. 

I'm fully expecting there to be an issue when I give the gas meter reading, something along the lines of "doesn't compute". 

I will do as you suggest, thank you for your input.

Can I ask if you/might I suggest you take pictures of your meters when taking readings? (make sure the meter serial number and the reading are both clearly visible). 

If you then receive an inaccurate bill despite having accurate readings you can raise a complaint (by email to their customer service address) and attach the pictures to get a correct bill issued. If it is happening repeatedly, complain about their handling of your account and you might get a token of good will (£30 maybe). 

Not a lot, but it all helps towards the bills nowadays. 

ChrisJJ

ArbitraryRandom said:

ChrisJJ said:

MeteredOut said:

Doesn't help with the immediate issue, but I presume you are keeping a record of the usage on the old meter, and the new one, so you know what your actual usage is, and can therefore work out what your bill should be.

I'd be getting that ready so when the bill does come in, you can validate it. 

The issue might be if the bill is calculated incorrectly, then the BG systems might automatically increase your DD (assuming that's how you pay) either up or down.

If the issue is not resolved within 8 weeks of your complaint getting raised, ask for deadlock letter and take it to the Energy Ombudsman.

I have a record of the final reading on the old meter. And I always gave accurate readings so they were not estimating my bills. I don't pay by DD, I pay on receipt of the bill. They are now asking for current meter readings, so I will give them the reading from the new meter of course, but they haven't even accurately billed me for my electricity usage. I have four bills in front of me, all wrong. Despite, on each occasion, giving them the correct readings. 

I'm fully expecting there to be an issue when I give the gas meter reading, something along the lines of "doesn't compute". 

I will do as you suggest, thank you for your input.

Can I ask if you/might I suggest you take pictures of your meters when taking readings? (make sure the meter serial number and the reading are both clearly visible). 

If you then receive an inaccurate bill despite having accurate readings you can raise a complaint (by email to their customer service address) and attach the pictures to get a correct bill issued. If it is happening repeatedly, complain about their handling of your account and you might get a token of good will (£30 maybe). 

Not a lot, but it all helps towards the bills nowadays. 

Yes, I used to do that, for my own records. Will do that going forward with the new one too. Am definitely looking into switching now as this is beyond a joke. Nothing on my account makes any sense at all, all the bills they've reversed, going back to February 2022. And not even billing me for the electricity (which is accurate as nothing wrong with that meter).

Thanks for the suggestion, am taking everything on board!

chris_n

Switching now is likely to cause more problems down the road. You will be trying to deal with two suppliers one of which you no longer have a contract with to sort the problems out. You are far better off waiting till everything has run it's course including going to the Ombudsman if required then make the switch. 

Annemos

Good evening

I have just had my own Complaint upheld by the Ombudsman (with compensation). My gas meter was changed to a replacement non-smart meter last October.  I fell through the cracks of the old Billing System. I am still waiting for the new meter to be attached to my account. BG now has 28 days to get it done and issue me with proper bills 

My advice is to go to the Ombudsman after 8 weeks. Also take your own readings of the new meter and also photographs of them in the meantime. I do it every month. You would also ask the Ombudsman to request for all your bills to be thoroughly checked and made accurate again with correct readings and payments history.  

=========================================================

Bit of background on my new meter not being connected to the account for months and months. 

I kept contacting BG with the readings for the new meter, but they could not be accepted because they were still looking for 4 digits and the new meter is 5 digits (metric.) So the system for submitting readings was kicking me out.  I saw that the meter number on my bill was also NOT the new meter number (it was still the old meter number). And the gas bills were being estimated. 

I finally got through (by being connected to the BG billing department!) to someone who was actually based in the UK. They said that the problem was this...... There is a big central database of everybody's gas meters. (That is not run or managed by BG).  She looked at the Big Database and saw that there were TWO gas meters now registered at my address. So the problem was, British Gas needed to request that the old one would be removed, so that only the new meter will be registered as the current valid meter.  Also she noticed that I had already sent BG the photo of the meter exchange card back in February, so they actually had all they needed for proper readings at the switch-over!! (The card that was left attached to the new meter, with the old reading off the old meter and the new meter reading on the new meter.) 

It takes British Gas about 4 months, apparently, to even do a search on the old account number. (I do not know if that is only the case if a customer has also been switched to the new BG billing system, like I had been. The 2 systems act as if they are independent companies! Maybe if a customer, was always on the old billing system it would not take so long??). So that process took ages, as they needed to get into my old account to look at it. 

I then found out that the person who was supposed to get that "changed meter" request actioned on the Big Database... had sent the request to the wrong place!! So the big database change was STILL not being actioned. (The BG chap who rang me up after the Ombudsman case was progressing told me that!) 

This is just to let you know a little bit of what is going on behind the scenes, when it all goes wrong. At several stages I thought they were on top of it and it would soon be sorted out... but then it just never got done..."Don't worry we are doing it"  over and over, they would tell me. 

I got so fed up, I went to the Ombudsman beginning of July. 

=================================================

Re the Gas leak... I am also in the middle of an Ombudsman case for my friend on one of those. But I cannot give you any pointers on it yet, as I have not had the outcome. This huge leak was ongoing for 9 months. One thing we are asking for, is for the Direct Debits to be corrected to remove the effect of the leak. (The lady is on a low pension income. The DD's are still based on annual usage which includes the huge gas leak of about 2000 pounds!)

British Gas told us that that the gas use on the homeowner's side of the meter is the homeowner's responsibility and not British Gas. This was a Gas Fire in the home. 

(Just seen your other bit of a posting. As it was their side of the meter, then BG will be paying for it. That must have something to do with all the credits. Are you on a Smart meter? I can see exactly what the size of the leak is on my friend's usage charts. A constant 80 kWh per day for 9 months!) 

MSE_Laura_F

(I've merged the two threads. Thanks, MSE Laura F)