Octopus dodgy meter changed and high bills refunded but need help with new charges.

BG1888

Hello,

Background

I am helping a friend try to sort out their energy bill with Octopus. It's the electricity that has been the problem, so I will focus only on electric, even though he is dual fuel.

At one stage in 2024 he had over £1,000 in credit (silly he now realises). It went from there to him being charged £2,171 for electricity for May to June 2024 bringing his balance to -£860.

There are then a series of over charges, some over £3,000 for one month, then credits back on, then more ridiculous charges. At one stage they said he owed £9,487.

During all this time he never missed a DD (£211 per month for many many months but now £150 per month).

This was discovered to be a faulty meter. The meter has now been changed to a smart meter.

They have credited a whole lot back, however still leaving him with a balance of -£800.

They say that having credited all the wonky bills, they will now have to charge him what the bills should have been. They are working these historical bills out using his current usage on the new smart meter, so are basically retrobilling him what they think the bills would have been had he had the smart meter. This is why there is an £800 debit.

Some of these retro charges are for billing dates in 2020. 2021, etc. These were added to his bill in July 2025.

He does not accept that he can still owe this amount and is back and forth with them asking them to clearly spell out to him how this can be the case. They are not sending anything helpful.

Question

Can they retrocharge him for these historical billing dates seeing as he did not receive accurate bills for these billing periods at the time?

Thanks for reading. Any questions fire away. If you need any screenshots I can provide.

MattMattMattUK

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6656410/octopus-dodgy-meter-changed-and-high-bills-refunded-but-need-help-with-new-charges

Back billing is quite complicated, but at least reading between the lines it sounds like they are allowed to do what they are doing. The large credit balance would have mean they would not have experienced any "bill shock". Without usage figures, amounts paid and when it will be difficult to give anything specific, but likely what they have done is correct.

BG1888

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81894239#Comment_81894239

Thanks Matt. Oh there was bill shock alright. At one stage they said he owed over £9,000 which wasn't the case. Hence the inaccurate bills. Now they're trying to re-charge for that faulty bill (among many more) using today's readings.

MattMattMattUK

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81894243#Comment_81894243

Not liking it or it feeling a shock to someone is not what bill shock means. It is in essence that they are not allowed to ask for more money for energy used more than a year ago. The energy supplier can however use credit to cover that bills, then require additional funds to cover usage from the last year.

Qyburn

It's a bit of a loophole in the back billing rules, in my opinion at least.

Say the customer balance is zero then if they find a gap or undercharge from more than a year ago, they wouldn't be allowed to ask for that to be paid.

But instead of billing just for that error, if they reverse all charges from that undercharge onwards, that puts the customer in credit. When they reissue corrected bills they can assign that credit to the oldest bills and ask for money to pay the recent bills.

gpman

A very interesting and illuminative thread on back billing here.

Back billing - but in credit so Energy Ombudsman found in favour of supplier - Page 9 — MoneySavingExpert Forum

Well worth a read for anyone unsure of the rules, or believes there are any loopholes (other than the stated exceptions within the SLC) ;)

gpman

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6656410/octopus-dodgy-meter-changed-and-high-bills-refunded-but-need-help-with-new-charges

Is the £860 debit after paying the £9,487 demanded?

Or is it effectively a £8627 credit that Octopus have applied to the previous amount demanded?

(It would appear to be the latter as you mention Octopus crediting "a whole lot back")

Edit:

If there were some charges for additional consumption from 2020-2021 only first added to your account in 2025, then those charges would appear on the face of it to be in breach of the back billing rules (but it may depend on the exact circumstances)

Edit 2: Hang on! £3k of electricity charges in just one month??? That relates to about 12000 - 15000 kWh.

I've heard of some meters going out of calibration, or otherwise malfunctioning, but not to that extent. Rather than a dodgy meter, it sounds more likely to have been the result of a dodgy meter reading submission (or something else totally unrelated). Your friend was supplying Octopus with regular monthly meter reads weren't they?