British Gas the worst company

Yana10

Hi Martin and the readers
I moved into the new house in Dec 2022 with having British Gas as gas supplier. I notified British Gas straightway by giving them my meter reading by email. It had been a full year but no energy account was set up to my name. I kept receiving bills addressed to the occupier. I paid 2 bills amounting £450 for the first few months based on the estimated reading. I was unable to give any reading online or on phone as didn't have any account set up in my name. During 2023 I made numerous calls to them and was advised to wait until the switch to the new platform was completed which would happen in Nov2023. I waited but nothing happened. During all that time I was unable to move to the new supplier as there was nothin in my name set up. I did not even know the tariff I was on. 

After all that frustration I made a formal complaint in Jan2024. Then within 2weeks my gas account was set up and I started receiving all sorts of bills backdated amounting over £1,500. There was no mention of the bills of £450 I paid to the occupier's account. Eventually BG was able to locate that amount after me sending them the copies of the receipts. 
After a year my account was set up on a highest tariff ever. That amounted my bill to reach over £1,500 for a year. I was kept hostage all that time unable to move to new supplier all that time. I was kept in the dark of the charges that BG will put in my account. Not to mention the inconvenience they caused by breaching my customer rights.
BG did not take into account my opinion when I asked them to put me on the low tariff from the beginning as I did not know the tariff I was on all that time. 
The resolution of the complaint was a compensation of goodwill of £150 after putting me on the highest tariff ever. Within a day I was issued with a deadlock letter and was advised to go to Ombudsman. 

I took the case to Ombudsman where BG dropped the compensation of goodwill to £90 after saying that I did not inform them when I was moved in. I had already uploaded a copy of my email. It was completely ignored by both BG and Ombudsman. 
Ombudsman has made a decision and have increased the compensation back to £150 but I had to stay on the highest tariff. I have lost my trust in Ombudsman as It seems they both are working together. 
Therefore It seems they are making money by keeping customers in dark of their tariff charges. I feel I was kept hostage and still unable to switch until I made a full payment of over £1000. Ombudsman keep saying that British Gas is correct and they have made no error and it in their rights to withdraw the goodwill offered and also they are correct to charge you whatever the tariff they had put me on. 
I have had enough of both of them and therefore I'm here to ask all of your opinion of this case. 
I feel this is completely wrong and unlawful. It was all British Gas fault who did not set up my account at the right time. Therefore my tariff from the start should be the lowest.
Please advise what you all think. 
Any one else who had the similar experience from British Gas and Ombudsman should join in to share their experience.
Thanks 

CouldntResist

It would help if you said which tariff your are actually on and which one you wanted rather then just saying 'I wanted the low tariff'and the one you are on is 'the highest ever'....

Yana10

Hi 
First I know/knew nothing about the tariffs and how they work.
British gas put me on the tariff that cost me over 10p+ something from the date I moved in Dec 22 to Jun 23. Then moved me down to a tariff that costs 7.42p something. 
My argument is to put me on that low tariff right from the beginning of the date when my account has been set up. 
And due to the reason I did not receive any bills for that long period I was unable to see my bills to compare with the other energy providers and could make a choice. Or even reduce my consumption. 
Ombudsman and British Gas both have declined to take this in consideration. They both would like me to clear the outstanding balance and until then I am unable to switch. I feel like I'm kept hostage. I got only 2 days left to either accept or decline the decision made by Ombudsman. 
If I was on the low tariff I could have saved around £400+. 
With an offer of £150 goodwill compensation I'm losing but not getting anything. 
And this is all down to our Ombudsman. 
British Gas offered me a good will of £150 before I came to Ombudsman. After the case was registered and I received an initial phone call from Ombudsman the offer from British Gas was dropped to £90. Ombudsman asked me in the phone call if I had any record of me contacting British Gas when I moved in. I said no. 
But then I recalled that I may have an email which I was able to locate and I was able to send them as evidence. 
BG dropped the offer to £90 by saying that I did not contact them when I moved in. 
It seems clearly that they both are working together. Nothing is here that is in consumer's best interest.  
They just make the phone call to see how strong or weak the consumer is. 

BooJewels

Energy prices have been pretty standardised in the last couple of years, to keep in line with the Ofgem Energy Price Cap  - pretty much what was the standard variable rate tariff has been the same for everyone, with regional variations.  There weren't really any cheap tariffs to be had, unless you signed up for one of decent length before prices rose.

Prices went up a huge chunk initially and have started dropping now.  The prices you state of around 10p per kWh for gas and dropping to around 7p per kWh is almost exactly what I paid during those times - they've not just put you on a lower tariff now, prices for all of us have dropped in the same time frame.  The recent national average for January to March was 7.42p per kWh and from 1st April will be 6.04p per kWh.

If you'd like to give us your opening meter reading and a current or recent one, we can perhaps work out for you what your energy would have cost for that time period on the standard variable rate - which is almost certainly what you were put onto and we were all much in the same boat.  Nothing you've said makes me think that you were on an especially high tariff, just what we were all paying - prices were simply very high last year.

Ahmed

Mirrors my experience, they put out bill in the wrong name, numerouse emails to change it ignored. In the end complaint to the data commisioner and even than insisted on seeing passport, told where to go. Would not change it until I said bill not in my name and chase the person as I would be cancelling DD, hey presto, bill in my name, than discovered £1500 debt and increased DD to 330 from 133, would not change it to usage plus £60.
in the end complaint to ombudsman, BG offered £30 as goddwill, ombudsmand awarded £250 and upheld all points.

CouldntResist

It would outwardly appear that you are complaining about the rate of your tariff whilst being simultaneously unaware what the price of a competitive tariff at any point in time is? That's not really BGs fault is it?

No bills doesn't mean you can't check or limit your consumption, that's what the meter is for.

If the next question is that 'I thought the price cap meant I couldn't have a bill more than X' I will claim 'bingo'

Yana10

Hi
The main thing is the way they both treated me. 

BG offered goodwill of £150 and within a day after ombudsman’s call to me this goodwill offer dropped to £90. This is when I said that I may not have record of informing BG about my move. 

I asked the reason and ombudsman told me that BG had every right of withdrawing their offer. 

I’m not complaining about the bill or tariff or usage. Yes I do have a huge bill to pay which is all BG fault. 

I’m so upset about their behaviour to me as a customer. 

They both seem to think it was all ok and £150 will throw my out of their system. 

They don’t seem to realise the inconvenience they have put me through. How many times I have called them, how much I have been worried about and how much I have waited on long calls. Many times I left work early to get through BG before 5pm. 

There are many people who don’t watch their meters and I’m one of them.
it’s only from this experience I have started to understand how it works. 

Ombudsman seem to think that BG has done nothing wrong. I should have kept making payments to the unseen/invisible bills. 

All that time I thought that I was the only one going through this experience. Until now when I did some research and found out there have been many who went through the same experience. 

BG did nothing to make this right for the customers. 

Ombudsman is working for BG not for customers. 

BooJewels

You've obviously made your mind up and just want to rant.  Maybe BG were a bit tardy in sorting out your billing properly, but as an energy user, you also have a responsibility to keep track of your own usage and ensure that you can afford to pay for it.  If you really didn't know how to do that, plenty here would have been willing to help you with it.

£1,500 for gas from December 2022 until now does not sound an unreasonable amount - especially if you didn't understand the implications of keeping the heating on or with a high thermostat level etc.  My own was more than that.  I already explained the tariff - you were unlikely to be able to move to a better one, as everyone was offering the same prices in 2023.

CouldntResist

Yes, the Ombudsman and Industry are obviously all in it together to stick it to the consumer which must be why the Ombudsman made my supplier give me £100 compensation on two separate occasions for smallish billing errors and themselves gave me £100 for poor service on the second complaint.

Scot_39

Yana10 said:

Hi 
First I know/knew nothing about the tariffs and how they work.
British gas put me on the tariff that cost me over 10p+ something from the date I moved in Dec 22 to Jun 23. Then moved me down to a tariff that costs 7.42p something. 
My argument is to put me on that low tariff right from the beginning of the date when my account has been set up. 
And due to the reason I did not receive any bills for that long period I was unable to see my bills to compare with the other energy providers and could make a choice. Or even reduce my consumption. 
Ombudsman and British Gas both have declined to take this in consideration. They both would like me to clear the outstanding balance and until then I am unable to switch. I feel like I'm kept hostage. I got only 2 days left to either accept or decline the decision made by Ombudsman. 
If I was on the low tariff I could have saved around £400+. 
With an offer of £150 goodwill compensation I'm losing but not getting anything. 
And this is all down to our Ombudsman. 
British Gas offered me a good will of £150 before I came to Ombudsman. After the case was registered and I received an initial phone call from Ombudsman the offer from British Gas was dropped to £90. Ombudsman asked me in the phone call if I had any record of me contacting British Gas when I moved in. I said no. 
But then I recalled that I may have an email which I was able to locate and I was able to send them as evidence. 
BG dropped the offer to £90 by saying that I did not contact them when I moved in. 
It seems clearly that they both are working together. Nothing is here that is in consumer's best interest.  
They just make the phone call to see how strong or weak the consumer is. 

They put you on the deemed tariff - and those rates sound pretty much like the standard variable tariff cap - that the vast majority of suppliers were offering existing and any new customers at the time you joined them - and that not the Ofgem market rate - but the govt subsidized EPG rates.

Most had no fixed deals until far later in 2023 - and there is absolutely no guarantee in a rising price environment they would have been cheaper than the variable rate cap in any case - even if they had been on offer earlier.

The Ombudsman isn't their to defend you against everything you "think" might be wrong - it's their to ensure that the supplier is correctly treating you - fairly to both parties to your contract with supplier - you and supplier - under their licensing terms and Ofgem consumer protection - as limited as it is.

You clearly admit you have little understanding - and quote the lowest prices - including upto 6p per kWh unit used govt EPG subsidies per kWh in Jan - Mar  period - lower c2p quarters before / after - so again showing you had no idea of what was happening in the market at the time - and so suspect you presented no real evidence you were harmed financially.

See

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/energy-price-guarantee-regional-rates

BG offered you a voluntary amount - frankly I am amazed they didn't drop it to zero - suppliers normally reserve the right to do so - if you refuse offer - it costs them to deal with Ombudsman too.

As such the Ombudsman was arguably more than generous - to re-up the BG voluntarily offer - but that was I suspect mainly for delays setting up the account - not for the rates charged.

Edit

And the bill - assuming it's now a true reflection of your opening and to date actual readings is your bill.

You were using the power - you should have expected to pay for it - so banking the money in expectation - other than the c£450 paid in occupier name.

You should have been aware of the energy crisis - and UK domestic market pricing - the media / news was full of the Ofgem cap pricing and the govt EPG £2500 capped rate (Ofgem wholesale rate was over £4200 in the Jan-Mar 23 period).

https://www.electricityprices.org.uk/history-of-the-energy-price-cap/

wrf12345

Don't know if it is the same now but some years ago, after moving into a house with BG supply, I tried to phone them to set up an account and their phone system dead-ended you unless you had an account number! I had to open a bill from them to the old owner and "borrow" that number to actually talk to someone, who was very nice about it and sorted out a new account. Parts of BG don't really know what they are doing, other bits are ok.