expensive gas!

pesky_princess

was just after anybodys opinion here please!
I moved into a property in december.. the place has electric and gas on a prepayment meter.. with EDF energy i believe... the thing is, I think something is a miss as I am putting in £30 of gas every few days.. is this normal? I am not used to meters like this and until now have thought that maybe thats how they are.
I rang EDF yesterday to query it as someone said that maybe there was debt from a previous occupant being taken off or something and they assured me this was not the case and that the gas usage was in line with previous occupants usage.. so that was that!
If there is a fault, and it was there when other people lived here then yes of course my usage will be in line with their usage!
£30 is lasting me 3 days, which is over £60 a week, which a month is over £240 a month, and if i were not on a payment meter and got a bill every quarter it would be over £720!!!!! :eek:
can this really be right? i have never paid this much for gas!!
its getting a bit worrying now.. all this money being spent.. i am worried i won't be able to afford to keep it up!

Doozergirl

Can you change it to a regular meter? Prepays are certainly more expensive.

You can have a regular meter after four weeks of moving in if you show good behaviour, I'm sure

pesky_princess

i don't know if i can change it.. its a rented house so i presume the landlord had it put in??
just how much more expensive is a prepayment meter compared to normal? surely its not that different in price to warrant over £60 a week?

JoeA81

I moved into a rented house with a pre-pay electrical meter. These pre-pay meter are definately more expensive than normal tarrifs, and so I phoned up my electricity supplier and got them to change the meter within two weeks of moving in. All they wanted was a £125 deposit, which I got back after 12 months of having the new meter. The landlord shouldnt care how the electricity/gas is paid for, as long as it is paid.

Johnhowell

My friend recently moved into a house that has only electricity via a pre-payment meter. The meter was eating money like no tomorrow. He telephoned the electricity company and it turned out that the tariff was set very high because the previous tenant owed a significant amount to the electricity company.

The company sent out an engineer who reset the tariff to the normal rate and also debited the excess charged since moving in. Now the meter turns over at a leisurely pace.

Try again with the gas company - ask what the tariff rate is and compare with neighbours/friends/family rates?

Good luck,
John

ChasingButterflies

Hi OP,

Did you take a meter reading when you moved in?

Some info here on tarrif for pre-payment with EDF http://www.edfenergy.com/edf-energy/showPage.do?name=homeenergy.prepayment.til&menuName=prepayment

http://www.edfenergy.com/edf-energy/showPage.do?name=homeenergy.prepayment.faq.til <<< see point 1 of this section too - as it sounds like you might be paying for someone elses debt... Our gas bill for the last quarter was £295 (although with a different provider) but it is a big place to heat and I am at home all day with dd2.

Hope you manage to get it sorted.

edit: missed the point that you have already phoned them... I phone again and query it with them, if they still say that this is correct - then I would put a complaint in writing. Or speak to enerywatch I had problems with BG not sending bills and energywatch were really helpful.

pinkshoes

I lived in a house with a pre-payed meter for both gas and electric. With 4 of us living there, we topped the gas up about £45 a month, and electricity £40 a month. We had the heating on quite a lot too!

I'd ring them AGAIN, and ask them to switch it over to a regular supply. Just speak to the landlord first though and check this is ok.

Have you tried switching everything that uses gas off for a period of time to see if it's using credits? Perhaps someone else is sharing your supply?