Economy 7 Times swapped on meter?

Stanbe

Hi Guys,
Looking to see if anyone else has ever had this problem and what their outcome was:

This week we received our first quarterly bill from Southern Electric for our 2-bed electric only house we moved into just before Xmas.
We were slightly shocked to see our bill was for an additional £380, ontop of the DD of £165 that we'd paid in those 3 months.
Our day usage was over 4000 units, and our night usage was 1300.

After querying this with them, they said it could be our panel heaters that come on for a little time during the evening, and asked us to keep an eye on the reading every day over the weekend.
Yesterday lunchtime we noted the rate 1 (day) and rate 2(night) readings, and when we got home we noticed that the day reading had not changed, however the night reading had moved up by a few units!

It apears they have the night and day readings the wrong way round on our reader. The only thing which tells the difference is a sticker say that
"Rate 2 is 0000/0700"

They are now investigating this, but it looks like it's been like this for over 14 months now!
If we hadnt have said anything it would have just carried on ripping us off!

Has anyone else ever seen this? How did it all turn out in the end?

Thanks,

Mark.

penrhyn

If things are as you state and you are being changed for your daytime units at the night rate then your bill will be lower than it should be. i.e You are getting 17hours of cheap rate electricity , and 7 hours of day rate.
Prepare for a shock!
I'm assuming that you are not using storage heaters that are supposed to charge overnight.

Stanbe

Hi,
yeah, we have 17hrs of cheap rate, however we only used 1300 units of the cheap rate, and over 4000 of expensive rate!
We have storage heaters, and these, along with the water boiler only come on overnight, which for use is now the expensive one!

penrhyn

Ouch!
Hope you get it sorted asap.

Stanbe

Cheers.
Wouldnt be as bad if we could put the storage heaters and boiler on during the day and make use of the 17hrs of cheap, but it will only come on at night

Anyone else had this?

Miss_Poohs

I had a problem similar to this a few years ago when I lived in my flat.

My monthly DD went from £55 to £176.

At first Scottish Power refused to accept there was a problem, even when I pointed out I lived in a 2 bedroomed flat not the Albert Hall!!

They then fitted a checking meter for about 3 weeks - which was removed and down loaded.

Oddly enough they said everything was fine - despite the only reading on the meter that actually changed was the day rate - both the night and the off peak reading remained the same.

I eventually lost the will to live trying to explain to them how this was impossible and I put my account in dispute and handed the problem over to Energy Watch to sort out - which they eventually did.

Good luck.

Stanbe

Cheers for the input.
Have to wait and see what they say then.
They recon it'll be 2 weeks before anyone gets back to me, but i'll get the details ready for the Energy Watchdog just in case!