Npower caught out by Sunday Times reporter

steveharvey2001

Not really a surprise if you have ever had one of these muppets on your doorstep !!

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/utilities/article3690034.ece

JohnG

Crikey, they are even worse than I thought. You don't expect a company of that size to behave in such a a way, I normally associate that kind of selling with smaller double glazing firms etc that you often see featured on WatchDog.
I have added further comments to the Times website - hopefully the more that do will help to get the message across to Ofgem that this kind of thing must not be tolerated.

trisontana

And, of course, there is the usual statement from senior management saying they are "shocked by the findings" , the sales-staff have been suspended and will undergo re-training. Can't these managers see that the reason this is happening is that they are paying their staff a very low basic wage and then expect them to make up their money on "earning" commission on each sale. Just pay them a decent wage, with perhaps a small reward for each successful sale, then you wouldn't get all this nonsense.

I would't be surprised if these managers know about these tactics, but turn a blind eye to it because it makes their figures look good.

moonrakerz

trisontana wrote: »

I would't be surprised if these managers know about these tactics, but turn a blind eye to it because it makes their figures look good.

Do you really think that management don't know about this ? If NPower were to take people on at £70,000 per annum (which one salesman claims to earn for 6 hrs "work" a week ) do you think these people would bother trailing from door to door, in the rain/snow, trying to persuade disinterested members of the public to change supplier ?

caveat_emptor

Coincidentally I had a doorstep by an npower rep. this week trying to get me to sign up to the 3 year fix. I checked the cost against my current supplier and found no advantage so didn't change. Today, I checked the tariffs he quoted and found that they were under the price quoted on the website. Thing that made me suspicious was that he said that I could exit the fix at any time.

Joyful

This is disgraceful but unfortunately Npower are not the only company doing this. Last year I had a salesman pressurising myself and neighbours. When I advised him he was breaking the law he swore at me. I reported this to Energy watch. My daughter also had the same problem but had enough sense to refuse but I did laugh when a salesperson went to my sons. She advised she would return with another. When I heard this I told him as both his gas and electric were fixed till 2010 no company could beat this at that time so I went to his house before they returned. They quoted absolute garbage and I kept correcting them. The look of surprise on their faces was great when my son advised at that time I was a Complaints Manager for an Energy company and knew what I was talking about. I sent them away with a flea in their ears.

Plushchris

You should hear some of the lies peddled by the Npower guys at the Ideal Home Show!

The 2010 Fixed price is a "show only offer" apparently according to them, strange how its been available on all the comparison sites etc since Christmas (or before)

"Cheapest fixed rate tariff on the market" is another belter that had my sides splitting!

Felt like popping around to the new energy ombudsman stand but decided that would probably be a waste of time.

Terrylw1

Yeah, remember that these tricks have been going on for a long time. I've been seeing complaints like this since 2000! Sadly, not much ever seems to change.

Ofgem don't do anything even when they are reported. So, whe the regulator lets them off, what do you think people on commission will do? Pretty obvious to me.

The News Of The World caught them out earlier this year as they planted a reported in their sales team.

The reporter stated the tricks employed and even that the sales team targeted ethnic communities and they quoted 1 employee stating a certain ethnic group would sign anything. They also quoted the employee using racist names for that group.

Did Ofgem do anything...nope...so this paper has obviously gone after them as well.

Ofgem are rubbish and they need kicked from a government level to make them finally do something about this. Energywatch and fully aware of the sales tricks which have been going on for years with no attempt by Ofgem to do anything to protect consumers.

Poppycat

They should be a ban on doorstep selling and huge fines for customers who get moved from one company to another without there permission

Terrylw1

The telephone ones do dodgy things as well but they aren't anywhere near as bad. Why? Someone is recording and monitoring.

Door knockers are on their own and it's all down to who you believe. It's not all one sided, some customers try to wriggle out of contracts where they spot a cheaper rate shortly afterwards.

I've always sided with the customer unless they say anything which doesn't sound right e.g. they keep changing their story.

Personally, Ofgem should take a large slice of the blame for doing nothing over the last 8 years to sort this out.

magyar

Terrylw1 wrote: »

Personally, Ofgem should take a large slice of the blame for doing nothing over the last 8 years to sort this out.

I actually think Ofgem should take nearly 100% of the blame. It frustrates me whenever I see one of the supply companies highlighted like this because they all have rogue salesmen. And whilst it's ridiculous for npower to say they're 'shocked' like this (since they know it's going on), I do believe they genuinely don't want to have this sort of salesman working for them.

The real problem is the system, which is ridiculously unclear about the charging structure (and thus allows people to say 'we can reduce your bills by £x a year' when they can promise no such thing), the ludicrously complex switching system (it's simple from the customer's point of view, ludicrously complex from the companies' point of view, which means big problems when people switch) and the general lack of transparency on the whole process.