Forcing prepayment meters to restart

t0rt0ise

EDF, SP and Octopus are allowed to force fit prepayment meters again. Octopus say they won't at the moment, and other suppliers have yet to be given permission.

lohr500

Doesn't seem unreasonable to me.
Especially with the extra checks and contact requirements that are now supposed to be in place.(If the report I just saw on the BBC 6 o'clock news is correct). 

pete-20-11

Edit - since this post, realised the below is incorrect (must have been thinking of non-direct debit methods)


The unreasonable part is they charge more for energy don't they?

So you can't afford to pay, and end up having to pay more per kWh as an end result? 🫤

lohr500

Smart Prepay in our area (Yorkshire) for our EDF tariff is actually lower cost than monthly DD.

QrizB

pete-20-11 said:

The unreasonable part is they charge more for energy don't they?

No, in general they don't. The standing charge is a bit higher but the unit rate is lower.

The Ofgem tables are here:
https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/information-consumers/energy-advice-households/get-energy-price-cap-standing-charges-and-unit-rates-region

Netexporter

The unreasonable part is they charge more for energy don't they?

Paying quarterly, in arrears, is the most expensive.

Scot_39

pete-20-11 said:

The unreasonable part is they charge more for energy don't they?

So you can't afford to pay, and end up having to pay more per kWh as an end result? 🫤

Since last year Prepay has been capped roughly equivalent to DD rates - at least at cap TDCV levels.

Current rates 

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/energy-price-guarantee-regional-rates/energy-price-guarantee-prepayment-meters-regional-rates-and-standing-charges-january-to-march-2024


This has been done via EPG corrections in previous quarters.

Not sure final form of equalisation been sorted by Ofgem.

pete-20-11

Yeah, must have been non direct debit I was thinking of, rather than payment meters. 

MultiFuelBurner

Well for certain it will be a game of who's first to force a pre payment meter and grab the backlash of the media 😂

Stalemate. My money is on EDF cracking first

SAC2334

So what is the alternative to the people who refuse to pay what they owe in energy costs ? Just let them carry on not paying what they owe for another year or two ?.   From my vast experience at reading prepay meters for years and years it is mainly the young who get into arrears . In the poorer areas there would be mainly prepay meters installed . It was much  rarer to find an elderly person with a prepayment meter. The vision of an elderly old man or women starving and freezing is a myth as they are much more likely to cut their cloth to what they can afford.
.
There are also hundreds of thousands of meter bypassers who are eventually caught and forced on to a prepaymnet meter with a repayment plan of a max up to £14 a week but usually set at around £8 a week even if they stole thousands of pounds worth of energy for years .Prepay meters have the lowest repay rates applied rather than a repayment plan set up on a credit meter. A lot are just paying around £5 a week .
Todays smart meters are either in credit or repayment mode so mostly they don t have to be installed /force fitted 

tifo

SAC2334 said:

So what is the alternative to the people who refuse to pay what they owe in energy costs ? Just let them carry on not paying what they owe for another year or two?

Todays smart meters are either in credit or repayment mode so mostly they don t have to be installed /force fitted

"So what is the alternative to the people who refuse to pay what they owe in energy costs ? Just let them carry on not paying what they owe for another year or two?".

Ofcom has said it will allow the energy companies to add £16 a year to bills to pay for the combined debt owed. So the energy will be repaid through everyone else and still fit prepayment meters to take debt from the bill payer. Windfall.

"Todays smart meters are either in credit or repayment mode so mostly they don t have to be installed /force fitted".

Good for the energy companies. It may not be 'force fitted' by breaking the door down but it is 'force fitted' if the bill payer does not want it and the energy company gets a warrant anyway or changes it over, thus forcing the meter to be topped up and debt repaid.