Scottish Power claiming I owe £4500 on prepayment meters!
Bit of a long one, sorry.
So I moved in to my house in April 2013. Problems with Scottish Power started a year later. I accidentally put a wrong meter reading in online which resulted in my bill being £1000 more than it should have been. I phoned SP and explained, they sent me a revised bill with correct readings but still claimed I owed the £1000. Several phone calls and revised bills over several months and I finally gave up and agreed to prepayment meters with the debt on. This was April 2015.
I’m now receiving bills claiming I owe £4500! Also had a debt collected at my door saying they are taking me to court and that my only option is to pay or have prepayment meters put in. He was very confused when I explained I already have prepayment meters.
Anyway I phoned SP and it turns out they have been continuing to bill the old meter, have no record of the prepayment meter or any top ups made to it. I have since sent them pictures and readings of my meter and they have updated my account with a new bill. The new bill, however, still says zero top ups received and a carried forward debit of £4200!
It is the same crap they pulled with the original “debt” and I feel like I am banging my head against a wall trying to deal with them. Any advice?
So I moved in to my house in April 2013. Problems with Scottish Power started a year later. I accidentally put a wrong meter reading in online which resulted in my bill being £1000 more than it should have been. I phoned SP and explained, they sent me a revised bill with correct readings but still claimed I owed the £1000. Several phone calls and revised bills over several months and I finally gave up and agreed to prepayment meters with the debt on. This was April 2015.
I’m now receiving bills claiming I owe £4500! Also had a debt collected at my door saying they are taking me to court and that my only option is to pay or have prepayment meters put in. He was very confused when I explained I already have prepayment meters.
Anyway I phoned SP and it turns out they have been continuing to bill the old meter, have no record of the prepayment meter or any top ups made to it. I have since sent them pictures and readings of my meter and they have updated my account with a new bill. The new bill, however, still says zero top ups received and a carried forward debit of £4200!
It is the same crap they pulled with the original “debt” and I feel like I am banging my head against a wall trying to deal with them. Any advice?
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Comments
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Follow the supplier's complaint procedure, and also pass all the details to [EMAIL="consumeraffairs@ofgem.gov.uk"]consumeraffairs@ofgem.gov.uk[/EMAIL]
Scottish Power are not a stranger to to breaking their various licence conditions, and it would, therefore, be worthwhile keeping Ofgem in the loop of any continuing breaches they are involved in.0 -
This site has seen this same problem with SP on several occasions, and because they are in ignorance of the both the reading on the old meter as it was removed and the that of new the meter as it was installed, plus the fact that the card payments are being credited to a different account, the chaos never ends
Your one hope is that the meter change crew should have left you a card that states the Old and New meter reads and the change date.
Often they don't hand it over to the householder, but leave it tucked behind the meter or into a corner of the meter housing - LOOK FOR IT NOW
Hopefully you will find it - Send a copy to SP and hang onto the original for dear life0 -
Thanks. I do have the card with the date the meter was installed plus readings. I!!!8217;ve emailed this to Scottish Power and logged a complaint with them.0
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Bit of a long one, sorry.
So I moved in to my house in April 2013. Problems with Scottish Power started a year later. I accidentally put a wrong meter reading in online which resulted in my bill being £1000 more than it should have been. I phoned SP and explained, they sent me a revised bill with correct readings but still claimed I owed the £1000. Several phone calls and revised bills over several months and I finally gave up and agreed to prepayment meters with the debt on. This was April 2015.
I’m now receiving bills claiming I owe £4500! Also had a debt collected at my door saying they are taking me to court and that my only option is to pay or have prepayment meters put in. He was very confused when I explained I already have prepayment meters.
Anyway I phoned SP and it turns out they have been continuing to bill the old meter, have no record of the prepayment meter or any top ups made to it. I have since sent them pictures and readings of my meter and they have updated my account with a new bill. The new bill, however, still says zero top ups received and a carried forward debit of £4200!
It is the same crap they pulled with the original “debt” and I feel like I am banging my head against a wall trying to deal with them. Any advice?
Hi TraceyJ29
I am sorry to hear of the poor service you have received trying to get the correct bill issued for your property. I would really like to get this resolved for you.
If you could possibly email me at Social@scottishpower.com with the following information,
your MSE handle in the subject heading
your full address
your name and telephone number
and some details of the issues you have encountered
I can look to get this escalated for you
Kind Regards
Danielle“Official Company Representative
I am the official company representative of Scottish Power. MSE has given permission for me to post in response to queries about the company, so that I can help solve issues. You can see my name on the companies with permission to post list. I am not allowed to tout for business at all. If you believe I am please report it to forumteam@moneysavingexpert.com This does NOT imply any form of approval of my company or its products by MSE"0 -
Great that TracyJ29 has found the meter change card and sent a copy to SP, but the problem doesn't end there.
There is still the mystery of the Top-up payments not being recorded - The money has been paid but not credited to the correct account.
Personally I'm not a user of the PAYGO system, but it seems logical the number of the receiving account would be printed on the payment receipt, so giving SP a copy of a receipt could help.
Something to think about
I would not recommend muddying the water any further at this point, but when the meter readings and payment questions are resolved, I think the original circumstances of the prepayment meter installation with it'[s debt should be revisited.
SP had serious problems with an up grade to it's computer systems a while ago, and although fixes were made, as TracyJ29 has found there are still big holes customers fall into.
A phantom £1000 debt due to an incorrect meter read, that's resolved by a fresh bill with correct readings, but then the insistence that the phantom £1000 must still be paid, has all the hallmarks of rogue computer software0
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