Energy Misselling successes

katherine31 · 17 August 2011 at 10:10PM

I should have added that when I phoned EDF they suggested that I phone Eon which I said was not up to me to do, then they suggested I might have signed up with Eon and was trying to get out of a contract. Then said that they believed me because I was not umming and aahing. What a wayto carry on!! Will try to post back when and if I get a reply.

Robisere · 18 August 2011 at 6:37PM

Hi
We are a disabled Senior couple, living in an area of Lincolnshire that is surrounded by wind farms and which will receive many more in the near future.
Ours is not exactly a misselling story, but:
We live in a very small Sheltered Housing bungalow and have Economy 7 to provide power for our huge, obsolescent, energy-hungry Night Storage heaters, which store the heat until around 3 to 4 in the afternoon. This leaves no heat for the evening and we are then forced to use an electric fire, behind closed doors. We were with Scottish Power until MSE (Bless you, Martin!) gave us the bad news about their price increases, whereupon we voted with our feet and chose an EDF plan which reduced our monthly bill from £90 to £72. When I tell you that Scottish Power were going to apply an increase of 19% to that £90, you will understand that move.
For several weeks we heard nothing from Scottish Power after giving our final Meter Reading online, until just before EDF were to begin supply. Then a very bright young Scottish Power lady called us to try to keep our custom. Despite admitting that Scottish Power could not match the EDF price, she badgered us. Eventually, she said words to the effect that EDF could give no guarantee of the price. I replied that it was fixed until September 2012 and that we had the added facility of paying the EXACT price each month, of the actual energy used. I added that after the end of that contract, we could once again vote with our feet if we were not happy. This brought on a temporary silence, after which she said that she would call me the next day with an improved offer. This never happened.
Three days later, we received a cheque from Scottish Power for more than £200. This was a real insult, as I had been asking them for months why our account had so much credit upon it.
I have to say that, initially, Scottish Power gave us a good contract and less expensive payments than our previous supplier, NPower (originally we were with PowerGen, taken over by N Power.) This all proves the wisdom of watching your statements and Bills (online or not) very carefully, and leaving the supplier who charges more, for one who gives a better deal. Providing you study the "better deal" with care.

missbungle · 20 August 2011 at 9:01PM

I don't really know if I can do anything about this since we've almost paid back our 'debt' but here is the story.

We moved into an apartment block and were automatically with npower, I did some research online and found my switching to Scottish Power would save us money or so I thought. When I joined SP we started paying £55 a month just for electricity which didn't seem too bad. Then later on in the year it actually went up to £56 which wasn't a problem. The next year it actually went down to £10 a month then to £11 a month that summer. We thought it was quite low but didn't really think to check it out as we just thought we must be using loads less. That year we actually received a letter saying we were in credit by £500 and they sent us a cheque soon after for £250. All this time when they had requested meter readings I had provided them. It's not as straightforward as we don't have access to our meters in the building and we have to ring the company that own the building for someone to come and read them. I rang up to give my meter reading once and the lady on the phone said 'by the way do you know you're in debit by a thousand pounds?' Obviously you can imagine my horror at that. I obviously questioned her and she said that that was how much we owed. After numerous phonecalls we were sent a letter saying we were allowed to pay it back in installments so we worked out we'd pay £104 a month. I ran this by my Dad and he asked for a breakdown of how they came to that amount and he worked out that they had charged us at the higher electricity tariff which was very sneaky. We sent an e-mail with all the workings out at the fairer tariff and they agreed to reduce it to £84. I'm really annoyed because at the bottom of their letters they say that they will let you know of any payment changes. I think they were wrong for charging us £10 or £11 in the first place and it's not our place to question it as they're the service providers. It must have been a mistake that was theirs and we're now paying for it!!! Is there anything we can do or is too late?

missbungle · 20 August 2011 at 9:14PM

Also, forgot to mention that the bills went back up to £104 in April this year. We are now £89.95 in debit.

ojay123 · 22 August 2011 at 11:32PM

I discovered today that my supplier: spark energy had overbilled me to the tune of £767 in just 14 months! When I asked why they had ignored my monthly meter readings they just said 'we take our own figures!' also
It's going to take 'up to 6 weeks' to get my money back! How can this be allowed? In any other walk of life this would be called theft. I've already lodged a complaint with them and trading standards. Any advice from people on here would be much appreciated.
Oli

umboko · 7 September 2011 at 10:40AM

MSE_Wendy wrote: »

Please let us know if you have a success from using the new Energy Misselling guide by reporting it below.

Tell us brief details of what happened to you eg,
* Who is your supplier?
* What did you complain about?
* How long did it take?
* Did you get a refund and/or compensation and how much?

* Anything else you'd like to tell others to inspire them.

I Brought this subject up, in MSE forums, two years ago. I told them the energy companys are just quoting us any figure they like, to get our business, then charging us later for the rest of what we had used.The so-called experts that were on site then, said "I should check my bills and this was only right, the companys have got to charge for what you use.":mad:

I've never listened to the forums since.

I just wonder what there saying know?

umboko · 7 September 2011 at 11:34AM

MSE_Wendy wrote: »

Please let us know if you have a success from using the new Energy Misselling guide by reporting it below.

Tell us brief details of what happened to you eg,
* Who is your supplier?
* What did you complain about?
* How long did it take?
* Did you get a refund and/or compensation and how much?

* Anything else you'd like to tell others to inspire them.

I am with Atlanic Electric. (but not for long)

I went with Atlantic for two main reasons.
One - the fixed price electricity.
Two - The recomendation from Uswitch: (voted best overall energy suplier in the uswitch satisfaction reports.)

Basicly my meter readings were wrong in June this year. I rang Atlantic to give readings. My new bill was posted on-line and was even more wrong than the last one.

I had to put up with: - *Being cut off three times * Everyone at atlantic blaming someone else fr the wrong bills. *Two people saying they would ring me back, but never did. *Transfered to wrong department three times. *Not one person I spoke too at Atlantic could understand their so-called "easy to understand billing system"

But, I got my £400 bill reduced to £70.:beer:

All I can say is:

Atlantic's Customer Support is the worst I have ever come across.

Uswitch are wrong.:mad: I will never listen too or use Uswitch, ever.

RIP Atlantic and Uswitch

uSwitch_company_representative · 8 September 2011 at 9:25AM

Hi Umboko,

I just thought I'd explain how we come to our customer satifsaction ratings for the energy suppliers.

They aren't based on our opinions as a company (because let's face it, that wouldn't be worth all that much!) - they're based on the opinions of real customers.

Every year we get YouGov to do a survey and we base the scores on the results. So Atlantic's rating is based on reviews from over 800 of its customers - http://www.uswitch.com/gas-electricity/directory/atlantic/.

Hope this clears things up.

Lauren

iad · 9 October 2011 at 12:55PM

One to watch for customers who are switching. I recently switched gas and electricity from Scottish power to EDF. I supplied a final gas reading to EDF on the 23/8/11. There has been quite a delay in things changing but last week I received a couple of interesting letters.

From EDF energy I received a letter to say that there was a mistake with the reading I supplied (no there wasn't, I checked) but not to worry as they had received a final reading from Scottish power.

From Scottish power I received a renewed final bill (they had previously sent one showing that they owed me £122). This second one had a mysteriously high final estimated reading and a consequently much lower amount of money to pay me back. EDF still have my original final reading on their website. Good scam if they can get away with it. I don't intend to let them but the advice is write everything down with dates. Scottish power also disabled access to my online account with them so I couldn't check details during the transfer (nice).

stellafella49 · 17 October 2011 at 5:38PM

I switched to nPower May 2010 from Atlantic, no problems with the previous company. nPower seemed to be a good deal with the cash back so went with them for a year with the intention of switching back.

6 months later I get a bill for approx 400 quid debt so called to increase direct debit. They wouldn't allow me to saying it would even out.

12 months later get a bill for over 1000 quid debt - heart sank and wife cried.

Spoke to them and raise direct debit to a crippling amount to clear before Christmas and ask for the matter to be resolved by the complaints team.

Dont hear anything so call back 2 months later and find out that did not happen so raised an official complaint - heard nothing.

Eventually I get emailed a letter a month after it was written with an explanation, a deal (that had expired) and an apology.

They had put feet cubed not meters cubed in at the account at set up effectively tripling my bill.

They now owe me nearly 400 quid..l:T
The lack of customer service is however shocking through out the whole process.

Check the same has not happened to you.

Energy Misselling successes

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