Proving to Utilities companies that your flat is Residential not business

fuzileer

Help dear "forumites".  A family member is moving into one of a block of 6 residential flats but the electricity and gas supplier insists that his Meter is "Business". That sounds expensive in the current market. I've heard elsewhere that the way to resolve this is to get Council Tax paperwork showing that the block is residential and present this to the Supplier. Is this the case? I'd hope that the letting agent would sort this out. 

Bigphil1474

The council wouldn't charge council tax on a commercial property. If the letting agent can't sort it, then maybe it's not the right place to be moving into? They could ask the council if they can provide some information which they can share with the energy company, but unless it's a new build wouldn't the previous tenant have sorted it? Either way it should be a domestic supply contract.

la531983

Personally I would be running a mile, god knows what other issues there could be.

QrizB

Was the flat previously a holiday let or AirBnB? Properties used for those purposes can be treated as non-residential and pay business rates instead of council tax.

And it used to be that business electricity was cheaper than residential so some enterprising people would get their residences onto a business tariff.

Whichever case applies, it's easiest to switch from business to residential (or vice versa) if you're with a supplier that has both types of customer, since a business-only supplier won't be able to change you onto a domestic supply (or vice versa). Do you know who the current supplier is?