Atlantic Gas and Electric price rise

gillh

This may interest Atlantic customers. I recently received my electricity bill for the March to May period and discovered the price had risen by 15.5% from April 1st. As I wasn't aware of this, I hadn't increased my monthly direct debits and subsequently was £195 in debt to them.

Being really unhappy about this (plus the patronising, self-congratulatory tone of the price-rise letter) I complained. Apparently they are allowed to put prices up without telling customers directly and it had been publicised on the BBC website etc etc.

Interestingly, they looked at my account and discovered I had been billed in February on an estimate (why I don't know as I have a new-build with exterior meters) which had been underestimated. I had been billed for the underestimated electicity at the new rate and they had overcharged me by £45!!

Might be worth other customers checking to see if this has happened to them.

ArmchairTycoon

Atlantic only take one meter reading per year, it is part of how they keep their costs down, customers have the option of calling in their meter reading each month via a freephone number on their bill.

It might be an idea to give them a call and establish a date for you to call in your monthly reading, I have to say that I keep promising myself to do this but keep forgetting, your post has prompted me to give them a call and organise this today by marking the dates on my calndar to call them each month.

I agree it is underhanded telling customers their costs are rising but failing to say by how much, I thought the same thing as you regarding the tone of the price increase letter.

If it is any consolation they are probably still the cheapest energy supplier, well at least for me.

Premier_2

gillh wrote: »

This may interest Atlantic customers. I recently received my electricity bill for the March to May period and discovered the price had risen by 15.5% from April 1st. As I wasn't aware of this, I hadn't increased my monthly direct debits and subsequently was £195 in debt to them.

Being really unhappy about this (plus the patronising, self-congratulatory tone of the price-rise letter) I complained. Apparently they are allowed to put prices up without telling customers directly and it had been publicised on the BBC website etc etc.

Interestingly, they looked at my account and discovered I had been billed in February on an estimate (why I don't know as I have a new-build with exterior meters) which had been underestimated. I had been billed for the underestimated electicity at the new rate and they had overcharged me by £45!!

Might be worth other customers checking to see if this has happened to them.

First you say you weren't told of the increase then refer to a price rise letter

Section 4.2 of the their terms and conditions

4.2 We will be allowed under the terms of this contract to change
the price we charge you. If we decide to reduce our price,
we shall publicise this change (for example, in a newspaper).
If we decide to increase our price, we will tell you in writing.
If you do not wish to accept this increase, you must write and
tell us within 14 days of us telling you of the change. If you do
that, then this contract will end 28 days after you have told us
and the increase will not be applied to your final bill.

http://www.atlanticeg.co.uk/SSEInternet/uploadedFiles/CoreMarketingSites/Assets/Documents/AT%20terms%20and%20conditions%2007.pdf

ArmchairTycoon

The price rise letter that Atlantic sent to it's customers waffles on about the fact that they are increasing their prices but are still cheaper than certain companies on comparible tarrifs, but they fail to say how much the increase is, I don't think it is an unreasonable expectation for them to say by how much.

They issue a printed statement every three months so it was long after the 28 day notification period before you actually know what the price increase was.

The customer has a right to know how much they are paying for goods and services, Atlantic have failed to do this, I have used their gas and electricity and now I have to pay for it, I can hardly say no thanks you can have it back as I don't like the price you want for it.

I suspect if anyone was unhappy with the new price they would have a good case for trading standards to intervene, whilst I am not happy about the price increase I can't complain as I am still paying less than other suppliers but they are taking advantage of the goodwill of their customers.

SwanJon

They have 65 days to advise you of a price rise, that's when the 14 days start, and if you take them up and cancel that's when the 28 days starts.

If you choose to leave within those 14 days then you continue to pay the old price until you leave, so you can choose to reject the price rise and move elsewhere.

Cardew

gillh wrote: »

This may interest Atlantic customers. I recently received my electricity bill for the March to May period and discovered the price had risen by 15.5% from April 1st. As I wasn't aware of this, I hadn't increased my monthly direct debits and subsequently was £195 in debt to them.

Being really unhappy about this (plus the patronising, self-congratulatory tone of the price-rise letter) I complained. Apparently they are allowed to put prices up without telling customers directly and it had been publicised on the BBC website etc etc.

Interestingly, they looked at my account and discovered I had been billed in February on an estimate (why I don't know as I have a new-build with exterior meters) which had been underestimated. I had been billed for the underestimated electicity at the new rate and they had overcharged me by £45!!

Might be worth other customers checking to see if this has happened to them.

This subject of underestimated meter readings at the time of a price rise comes up time and again and very rarely has any foundation.

They can hardly be expected to read every meter in the country on 01 April(exterior meters or not) so estimating on the price rise date is standard practice in the industry. They also have a very sophisticated computer algorith that takes into account weather etc and is normally pretty accurate.

How do you know that the reading was underestimated?

To underestimate such that you are overcharged £45 when the rise was 15% means that to April 1st in that quarterly bill an additional £300 worth of electricity(around 3,000kWh) was charged at the higher rate.
e.g. They had underestimated by some 3,000kWh your pre April 1st consumption and overestimated your post April 1st consumption by 3,000kWh

It would be most interesting to see the figures for that bill!!!

ArmchairTycoon

loaner wrote: »

The second paragraph of the letter says "please find enclosed your new gas and electricity rates".

Perhaps you have thrown page 2 and 3 of the letter (containing the detailed rates) in the bin?

They read the meter twice a year, and produce bills twice a year.

I only received a one page letter with no mention of any additional pages.

highet

same problem - price rise april 1 and their estimate of consumption pre and post rise was way out (i took reading on april 1st and phoned it in but as usual they ignored it) - surprisingly enough i had used lots of gas after the rise and not much before - phone call to atlantic to ask for proper pro-rata bill and they immediately agreed to charge all units up to bill date at old rate resulting in credit to me of £30 - from manner of CS agent on phone i got the impression this agreement to charge at old rate had been pre-arrangend by atlantic to be offered to anyone who complained so worth phoning

DeeCee

highet wrote: »

same problem - price rise april 1 and their estimate of consumption pre and post rise was way out (i took reading on april 1st and phoned it in but as usual they ignored it) - surprisingly enough i had used lots of gas after the rise and not much before - phone call to atlantic to ask for proper pro-rata bill and they immediately agreed to charge all units up to bill date at old rate resulting in credit to me of £30 - from manner of CS agent on phone i got the impression this agreement to charge at old rate had been pre-arrangend by atlantic to be offered to anyone who complained so worth phoning

Same for me, see post #7....
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=911145

Finally Atlantic sent me corrected bills based on actual meter readings. Done the same when they reduced their prices, again biased in their favour.
Very sharp practise, my overcharge was about £15.

Cardew

DeeCee wrote: »

Same for me, see post #7....
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=911145

Finally Atlantic sent me corrected bills based on actual meter readings. Done the same when they reduced their prices, again biased in their favour.
Very sharp practise, my overcharge was about £15.

If it were true it would not be sharp practice, but conspiracy to defraud.

This is worked out by computer(mainly) or manually.

For someone to deliberately program a computer to defraud millions of people would mean a jail sentence.

Do you not feel that some disgruntled employee would 'blow the whistle' on this deception?

Could you give us figures on how you calculated your £15 overcharge please.

Also 'highet' for the £30

Desperate_Housewife_2-2

I am sick of Altlantic and have just swapped over to a capped tariff with another company (and got £75 from quidco)

I ring up every month with a meter reading and they have given me so much false info they have ended up giving me 2 lots of £10 as an apology.

I've voted with my feet...