EDF Cancelled Charges-Anyone else been hit with this?

pgtips123

This is not right...

I've just had a very blunt letter from EDF accompanying a nice big bill with £635 of "cancelled charges" on it (in between my normal billing quarter so its an extra one).

I did not have a clue what a cancelled charge was so i phoned them. Always paid ontime and been with them for years.

It transpires they introduced a new billing structure/system which went wrong. They've been sending me artificial (lower priced) bills since 2006 and now they want full back payment of the higher rate for electricity.

Providing me with an artificial, attractively priced electricity bill meant no one could touch them for price so i didn't switch (don't get me wrong the price I paid wasn't staggeringly cheap, just cheaper). Now they are saying they made a mistake, wrote to me in Feb 2006 (over 2 years ago) and will retrospectively apply the price to date (Mar 08).

Which would then mean their price was very high in comparison but of course I wouldn't know that all I can use when i go online and compare is a bill.

I don't think that is ethical or competitive. I've written to them.

This is a licence to print money and I am not impressed, esp when profits are close to 60bn. At best I think I should only pay the equivalent lowest price on the market at the time.

Anyone else had this. What happens to all the customers who left them prior to Jan this year (emigrated, passed away, switched etc), am I picking up their tab too?

Deep sigh of frustration....

Cardew

Welcome to the forum.

I have never heard of this, what prices were you paying?(and in which area do you live)

It isn't just a case of them sending you wrongly estimated bills??

I can't see them retrospectively charging a higer rate per kWh if that is what they mean.

What did they write to you in Feb 2006?

Sounds like a case for Energywatch.

mute_posting

My folks had a similar problem when they switched to NPower after the ability to choose supplier first came in.

Basically they had a letter from when they switched confirming the unit prices. Then no bills for 3 years. When they finally did send the 1st bill, they had got the initial E7 and STD readings switched (in their favour) AND claimed that my folks had been given the "wrong" prices when they signed and wanted to apply unit prices that were about 30% over the original ones.

Surfice to say they had to go and whistle for it.

MP

MarkyMarkD

pgtips When you went online to compare suppliers, you would have input your usage, not your monthly payments. All the search engines recommend that you do this, as comparing on monthly payments is misleading.

You'd then have noticed that your present supplier wasn't listed at the top, and been able to switch.

I don't see that getting incorrect bills was a reason to stop you switching.

pgtips123

Hi Cardew,
not estimated bills, read quite regularly, they were applying a lower rate for almost 2 years. Instead of 8.19p per unit they were applying an old rate of 6 p per unit due to a system change they introduced (so i am told) that wasn't picked up. Same for standing charge.

Now they want to retrospectively apply the rate to my bill.

MMD<< I don't see that getting incorrect bills was a reason to stop you switching.>>

What you need to remember is that for the last 18 months/2 years I didn't know the bills were incorrect and naturally i was happy with the price I was paying., as far as not seeing the supplier at the top I'm just a normal Joe who is only interested in the price I pay, if a comparison on usage shows I don't save any money by switching then I won't switch regardless of who is at the top, that's a bit irrelevant really as to be fair there are so many tariffs out there it's quite confusing and maybe my tariff wasn't listed, I don't believe all of them are. In fact i know they are not. Social tariffs for example.

My bill doesn't say what tariff I am on so i just select standard but it doesn't alter the fact that no matter who or what i compared to as far as the actual bill in my hand goes no-one could beat the price.

I've written to them, at best i think I should only be asked to pay the difference of the cheapest supplier on the market and what i was charged.

PG

Cardew

pgtips123 wrote: »

I've written to them, at best i think I should only be asked to pay the difference of the cheapest supplier on the market and what i was charged.

PG

Frankly I wouldn't even conceed to that compromise.

You paid what they charged - full stop.

Just go to Energywatch - ring them, they are really helpful.

mute_posting

I totally agree with Cardew...

"You paid what they charged - full stop."

Look at it another way, say you arrived at your local petrol station to fill up and were told,

"sorry, gov, but for the past 2 years we've been charging 1p/litre less than we should have been - can you pay the difference?" you'd rightly tell them to take a long walk...

MP

pgtips123

Hi, and thank you for your supporting words.
I have just spoken to Energy Watch who in turn put me through to EDF dedicated customer support team.
seemed quite pleasant so have to wait for a call back, at least the ball is rolling now. I'll keep you updated, I must admit I do agree with the petrol analogy.
Thanks
PG

MarkyMarkD

I don't agree with Cardew or mute_posting.

You are not liable to pay just what they ask for.

You are liable to pay for your actual usage, at the contractually agreed rate.

If they made a mistake on your bills on either of these two items, then they are still entitled to the difference.

The fact that you didn't switch suppliers is really a red herring and there is absolutely no way you are entitled to refuse to pay anything, or indeed to pay at a rate based on the cheapest possible supplier.

Whilst social tariffs may not be listed on the comparison sites, all the "normal" tariffs are listed. If your bill didn't show the correct name of your tariff, you could have asked your supplier what it was.

As I've said before, comparing on the basis of monthly payments is misleading and bad practice and nobody should rely on that as a guide to whether to switch or not.

I think that the most likely outcome is that EDF will agree to collect the under-payment over a period of time. 2 years would be reasonable as that's how long they made the error for. They may also throw in a bit of a goodwill reduction but I wouldn't expect it to be huge.

At the end of the day, you've had an interest-free loan from EDF for two years, against which you may have paid a bit more than the cheapest supplier. In fact, given that most of the cheapest suppliers give annual retrospective discounts to achieve their "best value" prices, it's impossible to constantly be with the best value supplier as moving within a year negates the retrospective discount.

mute_posting

MarkyMarkD wrote: »

I don't agree with Cardew or mute_posting.

You are not liable to pay just what they ask for.

You are liable to pay for your actual usage, at the contractually agreed rate.

If they made a mistake on your bills on either of these two items, then they are still entitled to the difference.

But if the agreed rate was the one OP signed up for (6p) and the supplier hasn't written to notify of a new rate they can't simply turn around and demand money for their mistake

Cardew

MarkyMarkD wrote: »

I don't agree with Cardew or mute_posting.

You are not liable to pay just what they ask for.

You are liable to pay for your actual usage, at the contractually agreed rate.

If they made a mistake on your bills on either of these two items, then they are still entitled to the difference.

MMD,
I think we are at cross-purposes here.

If they made a mistake on the bills I would agree with you.

Ditto if the contractually agreed rate for the tariff was 8p/kWh and they charged 6p/kWh - then again you are liable.

However if you were placed on a tariff where the price was 6p/kWh, you are entitled to pay 6p until you are notified of an increase.

To a certain extent we had a similar situation with EDF, much discussed on these boards about 3 years ago. Some people were on early versions of the EDF on-line tariff(mainly accounts 'inherited' from firms like London Energy?)

For some reason EDF didn't raise the prices on those editions of their on-line account(they weren't fixed/capped) and they were paying way below anything else available on the Market, including the other versions of EDF on-line accounts.

When EDF finally 'caught on' they fell in line with the other EDF tariffs, which was a big jump in price.

However EDF did not try to impose that rise retrospectively; which is what I understand they are doing with the OP.

I also interpreted the OPs point about comparing prices and moving companies in a different way to you.

He was paying, say, 6p, and said he was on "an artificial, attractively priced electricity bill meant no one could touch them for price so i didn't switch"

Well I suggest If I(or you?) were paying 6p I guess we wouldn't switch.

So it wasn't a case of 'couldn't' switch - but didn't want to switch!

However had he known that they intended to raise his price to, say, 10p/kWh and backdate it 2 years, he would have switched - but they didn't tell him.