British Gas grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr rrr

I wouldn’t spend money on a solicitor in this situation. In addition to writing to the ombudsman you could also contact Jill Insley of the Sunday Times. She is very successful in resolving problems with the likes of British Gas.

Get a solicitor to write to them, they are not going to take any notice of you, obviously, and I doubt they will be worried about anything you post on Facebook.

As you have made a formal complaint without success, go to the ombudsman and tell them you’re doing so.

It's an imperial meter, so quite old, but said it seemed to working ok

No, don't believe them!

They need to make an assessment based on several years' worth of usage.

Oscar12
Have your meter checked.
We had that problem with a gas supplier but in fact they did note that our bill had more than quadrupled for no reason.

When the gas meter was removed, the dial was still turning and recording even though it was disconnected.

We came to a compromise with the supplier but still think we were diddled out of hundreds of pounds.

Northface the ombudsman dealt with my EON problem immediately as soon as I emailed them it took them a few weeks then I got £250 offer of compensation which I accepted however there was still one small problem which i took back to the ombudsman for which they offered me a further £50 and that resolved the whole problem Nearly a year on and not had a problem since

Hello all. I have just discovered this forum as I am feeling quite desperate about a problem with British Gas that has resulted in them saying they are starting debt collection proceedings against me. They say I owe them over £3,300 and I am absolutely sure I don't, in fact there is something so wrong with how they are calibrating the gas I use that last May I received a credit from them for £6K. I've tried to point out that this clearly shows there is an issue which needs sorting, and every time I phone I end up talking to the South African team who I am sorry to say don't empathise at all, or even understand. I have spent hours of my life trying to communicate with various members of the company, and just draw a blank. I've made a formal complaint to which I just had a bland 'we're sorry you're not happy'. They put a temporary stop on the account to allow an engineer to come round yesterday. It's an imperial meter, so quite old, but said it seemed to working ok but the readings were not being accurately calculated and I was paying about 10 times more than I should be. About 5 hours after he left I had an email from BG saying they were starting debt collections on the account. This I find terrifying - I have no experience of it at all, and feel that it's just 'little person against big corporation' syndrome, there's no accountability, no help, no nothing.
Sorry for the long post but I am desperate (and I have made a note of all the suggestions made to one of the posters above. If anyone has any other ideas, please let me know. Thank you

Leave a review on trustpilot worked wonder when we're trying to sort our mums estate last year.

That's dreadful Nanawind
I also hate British Gas for pretty much the same reason as Patsy 70.
They introduced a new system and migrated my online account to it in December and I can no longer log into it. Individual employees want to help and we have established that the problem is that, for some unknown reason, they used the email address I used when I set up the account years ago (which no longer exists and hasn't been used for at least 5 years)
They seem totally unable to sort this out and I have wasted hours and hours of my life. I am about to resort to paper bills and then vote with my feet.

We have had a 12 month battle with British Gas over our bills, eventually we reported them to Ofgem who then got in touch with BG and some 3 months later they finally got it sorted. It was simply meter trouble, but we must have had 4 engineer visits before the last engineer managed to sort it last month. Ofgem were very good and when BG realised we had involved them they got their backsides in gear.

I also hate British Gas. I won’t bore you with the details, but briefly I lost my online account with them, as my email address had changed and there was absolutely nothing they could do to update my account online. Subsequently, I have now resolved to have postal bills! There was a contact based in Edinburgh who was very helpful, although the IT team let her down in the end! She was part of the BG Executive Office.

We hate them too!
The other week DH spent two hours on a chat line with them. This was one of many calls to them. They keep asking for readings, but we can't provide them, because they plonked a big fat smart meter, which doesn't work in front of our original meter, which we can't see.
They had DH running an and out to take pictures of the offending meters, then a picture of the box, it was held in.
According to their estimates, we owe an absolute fortune, tens of thousands of pounds, despite using less gas than last year.🤬
This has been going on for months.
Today I received an email, saying a new meter was being installed and it was NOT a smart meter! Result at last. (I hope).

Update
I've joined Twitter posted a tweet and had a reply from British Gas help.
Hopefully they are looking into my complaint.
Also sent emails to different money experts.

Nanawind

@Maggiemaybe yes that is the email I used for the CEO.
I've posted on Facebook. My son is doing twitter.

Just sent an email to Adam Rowlands. Threatening to send in the bailiffs and report to the ombudsman.

I have had results using twi tter before. Not about British Gas though.
Did he say it direct on their website, a DM I think it is called, privately, or start a tweet himself and @ them in?

I think each time I started with the tweet on their website. More visiual that way.
At least one of the times, with a company, they tweeted back[cant remember which method they used] and asked me to send a DM which I did. There were them a handful of tweets back and forth asking questions.

indicate whether or not their business is happy to waive the relevant time limits.

Apologies - paraphrasing from the Ombudsman website.

There is a procedure to go through before you can go to the Ombudsman. They have a very long waiting list to look at cases although they may prioritise those involving people who are 80 and over.

It may go without saying but make sure your case has been escalated to a formal complaint and isn’t just being batted around by a succession of call and email handlers.

This is the procedure:

If a business can’t resolve a complaint within 3 business days, they must send a full written response:

summarising the complaint

acknowledging any mistakes made, giving details of whether they accept the complaint and want to offer redress to settle, with a clear explanation of how they decided on that offer, or say why they do not accept the complaint, with reasons

tell the customer they have the right to complain to the Ombudsman service within six months of the final response
indicate whether or not your business is happy to waive the relevant time limits

include contact details for the Ombudsman.

For most complaints about payment services, companies have 15 days to resolve the complaint. In exceptional circumstances, they have up to 35 days, but they still need to respond within 15 days to tell the customer when they will reply fully.

They have up to 8 weeks to resolve all other complaints. The time they have to resolve a complaint starts from the date it is received anywhere in the business hence my comments in paragraph two.

If this is a simple case of having quantified what the bills should be and there is now a net refund of £2,500 due then there wouldn't appear to be any reason why is couldn't be handled in three days.

If you’re still struggling, try asking advice from this Facebook group - Energy Support And Advice UK (Community). They have people in the group who work in the sector and are very experienced

@Maggiemaybe yes that is the email I used for the CEO.
I've posted on Facebook. My son is doing twitter.

Just sent an email to Adam Rowlands. Threatening to send in the bailiffs and report to the ombudsman.

The email address on the ceoemail website is this, Nanawind.
[email protected]

Is this the one you used? I only ask because I’ve used the ceoemail information twice in the past for British Gas and each time got a very swift email response from someone in the executive office, and a quick resolution.

Good luck. It’s a dreadful situation and I would echo the advice about going to the press if it’s not sorted very soon.

I got £600 excess back from Eon but I had to pester them and send them pictures of the meter readings and the actual serial numbers of the meters.

Ive also had some success with an online site called "Resolver"

www.resolver.co.uk/

There is no reason why you cant take them to the small claims court online. Send them a "letter before action" containing the court papers made out but not signed. That usually promotes a quisk response.

There was a feature on Radio 4 You and Yours last week about excess credit building up on the accounts of vulnerable people.

There was criticism that the energy companies are not reading meters, not monitoring and questioning excess credits but continuing to take hundreds of pounds from that customer each month my direct debit. In the case they discussed, I think the company agreed to pay some interest on the money they had been holding so if this is the case with your mum also consider taking that up with them.

I have all names of people I've spoken to.

Will try that email.

Call them and tell them you will be sending the problem to the ombudsman, unless they sort it out within 30 days. Keep a note of who you spoke to. Check out referring the case to the ombudsman as well. My DH took a year and a half to sort out his gas bill. He only had a result once he made this threat.

DH had been calling BG and being told they were sorting it on a regular basis until he took this action.

Try [email protected].

He's Head of Customer Resolutions.

I would get either Martin Lewis ( money saving expert ) or Steve Web from the Daily Mail involved both of them are marvellous for getting results for this type of thing . I think the bad publicity is usually enough to get them moving.