E.ON Next Winter affodability scheme

Ernest_Penfold

I have the same problem. 
I'm on the priority services register due to my poor health and in receipt of ESA. 
They were quite happy to accept my manually input figures 6 months ago but now point blank refuse to do anything unless I give them access. 
Giving them access does not limit it to the last 90 days though. They can access everything!

They're basically accusing us of lying about our income.

tifo

Ernest_Penfold said:

I have the same problem. 
I'm on the priority services register due to my poor health and in receipt of ESA. 
They were quite happy to accept my manually input figures 6 months ago but now point blank refuse to do anything unless I give them access. 
Giving them access does not limit it to the last 90 days though. They can access everything!

They're basically accusing us of lying about our income.

This is an unusual situation.

All i can say is that when i completed the paylink budget i chose to add the figures manually. While i've been put on the scheme, it may be because i was eligible under the WHD criteria, which they wouldn't accept, and a complaint to the ceo team may have changed this, i didn't need to complete the budget anyway, so it could be that if they were to look at my budget for the scheme then they might have also said access to bank account is required. I won't know.

However, paylink should not allow manual entry of figures if access to a bank account is required by eon. The fact that it does shows access is not required though eon say that it will be (when they send the email link to paylink) but it's not a published criteria.

I think their staff are getting it wrong, i've had this for a month before they allowed me to join the scheme. Even then some of the info i was told is wrong, different to their own published information and my email from ceo team. And the confirmation email with the winter 50 tariff rates was also wrong, it showed the full rate and not 50% discounted which is what the tariff is and is headed as.

Ernest_Penfold

tifo said:

Ernest_Penfold said:

I have the same problem. 
I'm on the priority services register due to my poor health and in receipt of ESA. 
They were quite happy to accept my manually input figures 6 months ago but now point blank refuse to do anything unless I give them access. 
Giving them access does not limit it to the last 90 days though. They can access everything!

They're basically accusing us of lying about our income.

This is an unusual situation.

All i can say is that when i completed the paylink budget i chose to add the figures manually. While i've been put on the scheme, it may be because i was eligible under the WHD criteria, which they wouldn't accept, and a complaint to the ceo team may have changed this, i didn't need to complete the budget anyway, so it could be that if they were to look at my budget for the scheme then they might have also said access to bank account is required. I won't know.

However, paylink should not allow manual entry of figures if access to a bank account is required by eon. The fact that it does shows access is not required though eon say that it will be (when they send the email link to paylink) but it's not a published criteria.

I think their staff are getting it wrong, i've had this for a month before they allowed me to join the scheme. Even then some of the info i was told is wrong, different to their own published information and my email from ceo team. And the confirmation email with the winter 50 tariff rates was also wrong, it showed the full rate and not 50% discounted which is what the tariff is and is headed as.

I've just been on the phone with them, they absolutely refuse point blank to do anything unless I give them access. According to the person on the phone it's a condition of the scheme that can't be changed.
My account used to be a joint account but despite being told this they still won't budge on it. I can't give them access to something that has someone else's information on it but they don't care about that!

wbowindy

Hi all, the Ombudsman found in my favour, due to poor service, after I rejected an offer of £75 from E.ON Next to settle the dispute. I was awarded £100, and a letter of apology from E.ON Next. As mentioned by another forum member the Ombudsman cannot force E.ON Next to change their business policy with regard to a customer consenting to Paylink being linked to the customer bank account. To answer another forum member, I was consistently told by E.ON Next that if I did not give consent to my bank account being linked to Paylink, E.ON Next would NOT be able to continue to process the application to the Winter Affordability Scheme. The findings of the Ombudsman will be reported to Ofgem by the Ombudsman (my opinion is: perhaps this act may influence the business policy of E.ON Next with regard to their business decision of compulsory linking a customers bank account to Paylink in the future)
 If anybody is interested to read the Ombudsmans decision please ask on this thread and I will put a copy of their decision on here. I will be sending a copy of the decision to MSE Money Matters Team as I think there may be many more vulnerable people who could benefit from this information.
Thanks to all of you who have posted on this thread, Merry Christmas.

wbowindy

NB Money and Mental Health team not Money Matters! (my mistake, apologies)