Communal Heat Network billing issues

Madworld2025

Hi all, looking for some advice.  We own a property where the heating and hot water is provided by a communal boiler (a Heat Network).  The system is managed by Evinox Residential who are meant to take the meter readings, produce the bills and collect payments on behalf of the property manager, Trinity Estates.  We moved into the property in August 2024 and have been paying a direct debit of £50 per month ever since. 

However, Evinox has not provided us with any bill and cannot confirm how much gas we have been using.  We therefore do not know if the £50 is too much or too little.

Having spoken to Evinox numerous times and raised complaints, including with our MP the answer provided is always the same, which is that in 2023 the government recognised that customers on heat networks could not access the same discounts provided to domestic customers via the energy cap, and therefore agreed a separate discount scheme for impacted customers. 

The discount scheme expired in 2023 and to date and Evinox and Trinity Estates have been unable to agree new discounts with the supplier and therefore are unable to produce any bills.  Evinox and Trinity have said there is currently no timeline for a resolution to the dispute with the energy provider.

As this dates back to August 2024 we have had the whole winter and now are fast approaching our first anniversary in the property, but we still have no idea how much gas we have used or whether the £50 is sufficient to cover the bill.  We potentially have a huge debt to pay at some stage in the future which is causing us alot of stress and anxiety.

Having spoken to Evinox, they have said this is impacting all customers that live in the block (circa 100 flats) and other customers where the estate is managed by Trinity Estates (Trinity Estates website shows they manage 71,000 properties).  This will inevitably include many very vulnerable people including the elderly, disabled and those where English is not a first language.  Every person will not know how much gas they are using or how much they owe and are potentially getting into massive debt.

Unfortunately our MP is not interested and these Heat Networks are not covered by any Ombudsman or similar.  We are therefore at the mercy of Evinox and Trinity who don't care either.  

I am hoping this forum or MoneySavingExpert can take up the cause and help us and the many hundreds of customers impacted by this to ensure that we are given the same protections as domestic customers

Thank you in advance

Dan

QrizB

Unless there's something very weird about your heat network, you (and the other residents) haven't used any "gas" at all.

You will however have received a number of kilowatt-hours (kWh) a of heat from the network, generally via a Heat Interface Unit (HIU, a heat exchanger), which will be chargeable at the rate set by the network. There will also be some sort of standing charge.

Is your property fitted with a heat meter (possibly as part of the HIU)? Did you read the meter when you took possession and do you know what it reads today? The difference in reading should be the number of kWh you've used. (If the meter says it measures in another heat unit, like Joules, BTUs or Therms, use that unit instead).

If you don't have a heat meter, your heating consumption will be measured, calculated or estimates some other way. The heat network operator should be able to provide details.

Ectophile

That doesn't really make much sense.  I suspect Evinox and Trinity Estates are in full ostrich head-in-the-sand mode, having fouled up mightily.

There's no way they are going to negotiate a retrospective price per unit with any energy supplier, going back for over a year.  Having failed to negotiate a contract, the supplier will be charging their standard tariff, which is not subject to any price cap and can be as high as the supplier likes.

Madworld2025

Thank you for your comments.  The exact wording from Trinity Estates in their response is as follows.  Having said this Trinity has responded to say that they expecting to provide an update shortly. As soon as they do I'll update this forum as I suspected this is impacting many hundreds of home owners. 

The standard EBDS was just £0.00697 kWh net. This was rolled out to all non-domestic gas supplies and appeared on the invoices almost immediately. The government recognised the issues faced by residents with Heat Networks and made available a further discount to these supplies. Our Property Manager made the necessary application to the government and received the certificate, which was promptly sent to the gas supplier, expecting to receive a replacement discount of £0.154583 net. It took many months of chasing the gas supplier to have these discounts applied to the bills. Once agreed, there was a long period of crediting and re-billing by the gas supplier. The full discount was provided up to 31st August 2023. We agreed a heat tariff up to this date and I believe this has been billed by Evinox. The gas contract came to end 25th October 2023 and the additional heat network discount has not been applied for September and October 2023. We have chased and will continue to push to obtain what we believe is due but feel we cannot suspend the billing any longer. Wanting to show transparency Trinity wishes to have a tariff for 1st September 2023 to 25th October 2023, and then another heat tariff for the year following. If we receive the additional discount for September and October 2023, this sum will be reflected in new tariffs.