Huge innacurate bill passed to debt collectors

ronaldinho2024

Hi all,

My colleague suggested I post here for advice as I am really stuck with my energy supplier EON Next. I've been battling for 6 months over a huge bill which is simply incorrect and I'm being constantly threatened at the moment with legal action.

I moved into the property in March last year and the meter box which is outside at ground level was flooded and the meter unreadable. When the account was set up they therefore estimated a reading and for all of last year I made payments on the estimates they provided. Then in January I got a huge bill for around £900, when I looked on my account a manual reading had been applied. I called the company and they said a field agent had been round and read the meter. I'd never been able to read it and had reported it as unreadable, so I was surprised. The discrepancy between the original estimate and the field agents new manual reading was huge and caused this enormous bill.

The cause of this trouble is that they estimated my reading when I opened the account and the estimated reading they provided was around 5100. I don't know why they used this figure as the previous manual reading on the account which was logged around 2 years previous was 5500. So the estimated reading they've given me to start off my account was clearly hundreds of units lower than where a fair estimate would have been. This is clearly a mistake but getting to speak to someone on the phone who understands and has the authority to deal with this is impossible.

I've spent hours on phone calls and emails and been through one Ombudsman complaint already. The Ombudsman awarded me £300 compensation and required EON to replace the meter, however there is still the matter of this bill. I was told I would be rebilled once I had a new meter installed (done two weeks ago) but EON instead have immediately passed the debt to a debt collection agency. EON have today agreed that they will send my account to back-billing with an expected answer in 8 weeks but told me they cannot put a hold on the debt collection as they have already passed it to a collection agency, Field Debt Solutions. Field Debt Solutions offered me a payment plan but the agent did not want to put a hold on the debt while waiting for my back billing. I am making regular payments to cover my usage.

I have taken advice from the National Debt Helpline and informed updated my previous Ombudsman representative with the new information but I am not sure what I should do. Clearly a mistake has been made and I don't want to pay money I don't owe but I am worried about a debt collection agency threatening me.

Does anyone have any advice about what I should do?

Thanks for reading. 

elsien

Debt collectors are powerless until and unless they take you to court and win. They aren’t bailiffs, and they lie through their teeth about the powers they say they have. Just ignore all the threatening letters (unless a court one arrives) carrying on making your regular payments and wait for the Backbilling process to happen. 

If they are harassing you on the phone there’s a template somewhere to tell them only to contact you in writing. 

victor2

Welcome to the forum!

Have you tried Citizens Advice for a bit of help? It sounds a bit odd that Eon would sell a debt on if it is disputed, but maybe they considered it no longer in dispute after the ombudsman gave a decision on it and Eon gave you the compensation.

Did the ombudsman conclude that the bill was incorrect? In which case I would think Eon could not sell it on. Citizens Advice have better contacts with the energy companies and may be able to explain to you what has happened and why.

BarelySentientAI

I know little about debt collection agencies - perhaps the debt board can help you with that.  They're pretty good at knowing how to deal with such agencies and how to challenge debts.  It does seem pretty harsh that E.ON can't just call them up and say "don't chase this, it might be wrong" to me.  That's probably the most important thing for you to concentrate on at the moment.

On the energy side (not that any of it probably helps this time, but for others or for the future):

Nothing that you have said backs up your position that "clearly a mistake has been made" or "a bill which is simply incorrect".  I'd probably say it's more likely than not there was a mistake, but that's very different.  Always good to remember that the Ombudsman doesn't investigate, they just review evidence, so things like "it's obvious" don't hold much weight without backup.

Back billing is unlikely to apply in this case, as they billed you within 12 months.  I wouldn't expect anything to come from that team.

When did you find out about the estimated opening reading?  Did you challenge it at the time? - given that you seem to know previous meter readings from the property, that would have been possible.

If you say that the meter was unreadable, did you challenge the manual meter reading that they have somehow taken?  Otherwise, the supplier might well take the position that it wasn't unreadable and you could have had accurate readings months ago when the 'shock' would have been smaller.

What was your ombudsman complaint?  Just that the meter wasn't working?  Or something about readings/billing?  £300 is a lot of compensation for the EO to order, so that's a pretty severe slapdown for the supplier.  I wonder if there is any way to link this issue back into the old decision.

The bit they are saying about re-billing based on what the new meter says is normal practice when a dead meter is replaced - they take the curve now and apply it backwards (with a little bit of fudging), so be prepared to argue their fudging if you think it's wrong.

MP1995

ronaldinho2024 said:

Hi all,

My colleague suggested I post here for advice as I am really stuck with my energy supplier EON Next. I've been battling for 6 months over a huge bill which is simply incorrect and I'm being constantly threatened at the moment with legal action.

I moved into the property in March last year and the meter box which is outside at ground level was flooded and the meter unreadable. When the account was set up they therefore estimated a reading and for all of last year I made payments on the estimates they provided. Then in January I got a huge bill for around £900, when I looked on my account a manual reading had been applied. I called the company and they said a field agent had been round and read the meter. I'd never been able to read it and had reported it as unreadable, so I was surprised. The discrepancy between the original estimate and the field agents new manual reading was huge and caused this enormous bill.

The cause of this trouble is that they estimated my reading when I opened the account and the estimated reading they provided was around 5100. I don't know why they used this figure as the previous manual reading on the account which was logged around 2 years previous was 5500. So the estimated reading they've given me to start off my account was clearly hundreds of units lower than where a fair estimate would have been. This is clearly a mistake but getting to speak to someone on the phone who understands and has the authority to deal with this is impossible.

I've spent hours on phone calls and emails and been through one Ombudsman complaint already. The Ombudsman awarded me £300 compensation and required EON to replace the meter, however there is still the matter of this bill. I was told I would be rebilled once I had a new meter installed (done two weeks ago) but EON instead have immediately passed the debt to a debt collection agency. EON have today agreed that they will send my account to back-billing with an expected answer in 8 weeks but told me they cannot put a hold on the debt collection as they have already passed it to a collection agency, Field Debt Solutions. Field Debt Solutions offered me a payment plan but the agent did not want to put a hold on the debt while waiting for my back billing. I am making regular payments to cover my usage.

I have taken advice from the National Debt Helpline and informed updated my previous Ombudsman representative with the new information but I am not sure what I should do. Clearly a mistake has been made and I don't want to pay money I don't owe but I am worried about a debt collection agency threatening me.

Does anyone have any advice about what I should do?

Thanks for reading. 

How long hasthis been going on?

ronaldinho2024

Thanks for the replies. I've been arguing my case for 6 months.

When I moved in last year I reported the meter unreadable 3 times and it was only dealt with through the Ombudsman. The compensation was for their failures to respond to my reports of meter problems.

The Ombudsman said they could only offer remedies that EON can complete within 28 days, so could not enforce the re-billing but advised I could re-open a case if they didn't re-bill.

Citizens Advice couldn't really help on the energy side as I'd already gone to the Ombudsman and the debt advice line kept dropping my call so I went to the National Debt Helpline instead.

Re: the initial estimate - I didn't challenge at the time as I had nothing to compare it too and I was happily paying estimates, I only discovered the previous meter readings when I queried the £900 bill and asked what the previous readings they had on file were.

I've provided multiple examples of proof in video and photo form of the meter being readable at different points throughout the year. I have every email saved and every phone call since January recorded.

If backbilling won't help, any idea which department I need to speak to in order to get the rebill looked at?

Thanks

ronaldinho2024

ronaldinho2024 said:

I've provided multiple examples of proof in video and photo form of the meter being readable at different points throughout the year. I have every email saved and every phone call since January recorded.

This is meant to say I have proof of the meter being unreadable

Brie

Do you have regular readings possible now?  In which case I'd argue that they should review what your actual use has been on the actual readings not on vague estimates for a meter that didn't properly work.  

BarelySentientAI

ronaldinho2024 said:

If backbilling won't help, any idea which department I need to speak to in order to get the rebill looked at?

Hmm, good question.  It's not covered by the backbilling rules, but you could be right that the internal team dealing with rebilling old accounts could have the same name.

ronaldinho2024 said:

I've provided multiple examples of proof in video and photo form of the meter being unreadable at different points throughout the year. I have every email saved and every phone call since January recorded.

Sounds even stranger that they somehow managed to get a manual reading.

Qyburn

BarelySentientAI said:I 

Nothing that you have said backs up your position that "clearly a mistake has been made" or "a bill which is simply incorrect".  

If the meter red 5500 two years before, then the 5100 estimated start reading can't be correct.

BarelySentientAI

Qyburn said:

BarelySentientAI said:I 

Nothing that you have said backs up your position that "clearly a mistake has been made" or "a bill which is simply incorrect".  

If the meter red 5500 two years before, then the 5100 estimated start reading can't be correct.

If.  That's not a reading from this account, nor is it clear that it's an actual reading (could have been an incorrect customer-provided reading).  Could even be a previous customer's estimate given the mess that's been made here.

Seems likely the estimate is wrong of course though.