Dealing with energy suppliers

grannysomerset, as soon as ovo have sorted this, consider a move to octopus. I have nothing but praise for them. They took me under their wing re getting a smart meter sorted and they refund me whenever I ask. Smart gas meter was upgraded last week, exactly on the appointed day and time. They also changed my electric meter to an updated smart meter

You could do with sending an online complaint to ofgem. Details are online

Oh my goodness !! My D/D has doubled. I thought that was bad enough, but yours is just unbelievable. These are estimates I guess. I’m also having a Smartmeter installed on the 21st. I hope you manage to sort it out.

Thank you, karmalady, I have had several people recommend Octopus. Just need to wade through treacle to sort this out and can see it won’t happen in a hurry.

So sorry. I also recommend Octopus.

My aunt on the IOW is 85, one bed flat, she recently had a water bill for £6K. The waterboard had been working outside her house in the early summer, they have finally agreed to come and investigate, it appears there was a leak. She didn't receive any empathy from customer services at all, I have encouraged her to activate her POA so I can deal with these matters.

With Octopus you are treated like a human being and if there is an error, rarely, it is sorted out calmly and competently. I have been with that company almost when they first appeared and I have never regretted it. I have a smart meter so no more reading of meters. I have nothing but praise for them.

karmalady I looked on the Octopus site this morning and was advised not to transfer my account. I think it is something to do with the government subsidies. At the moment, all the electricity companies have crystallised who their customers are, and, I suspect, money has already passed from government to company, so if you change now, you might lose your subsidy.

If anyone knows for definite why Octopus advises me not to transfer, I would really like to know.

GrannySomerset I m also having a huge problem with EONNext it’s been going on 6 months with no result I went from £279 in credit to the very next day £6000 + plus in debit I rang them and they amended it to £675 in debit since then 6 months on I ve been in dispute As I had sent regular meter readings in and they decided my DD I could not see how I was in debt and they couldn’t give a reason
I have recently taken it to the ombudsman and the very next day I had an email fromEON asking me to make a time and date to discuss a resolution I chose today at 10 am …. I m still waiting
No phone call no contact at all so tomorrow I m back to the ombudsman
It’s really getting me down

I have been with Ovo for several years and never had a problem. I think it maybe because your account was transferred to them that you are not getting as good a deal. Nevertheless the amount you have been asked to pay is way ott. They are based in Bristol and I know they prefer online dealings, but they do have a phone contact number which is easily found on Google. Perhaps SSE did not send Ovo the correct paperwork on your account.

25Avalon, I think GrannySomerset's problem may well be SSE.

We are currently with SSE and pay our bills by quarterly direct debit. SSE have decided to ditch quarterly DDs and have monthly payments only. I have no problem with them deciding that is how it will work in the future. What really irritated me was the text attached to it, telling me how much easier it would be for me, and it would help me budget my money better etc. as if, from my point of view quarterly DD was not satisfactory. But I chose quarterly DD because it suited my budgeting and financial planning to pay that way and I really resent the way they imply that somehow, a way of paying I have actively rejected, will be much better for me that the method I have chosen.

I am particularly grumpy because they are suggesting that our monthly payment should be £600 a month, presumably after taking into account all the government discounts that they are applying. OK we have a big 4 bedroomed old house, but we are careful with our heating and previously only paid slightly more than the national average bill.

SSE also made a pigs ear out of our last bill. Demanded £900 and then a month later apologised and paid back £500.

It’s not looking good, is it? I really haven’t the energy for all this but I am not giving them money I don’t owe them. Grrrr!!!

M0nica I just looked this up. SSE are now part of the Ovo family and were gradually transferring their accounts over to Ovo. Maybe this is where it has gone wrong.

Eight years ago I had a similar problem with EDF. I did not have a smart meter then and the guy who read the meter added an extra digit. They sent me a bill for £5.7k which I refused to pay and they insisted their reading was correct. I received two red letters saying they were taking me to court and would cut us off, I demanded someone came to read meter. They appointed an independent meter reader to come out and said I would have to pay his fee if the reading was correct. Obviousy it wasnt and he told me immediately, not a word of apology from EDF for the upset just an amended bill in the post. I changed suppliers after.

GrannySomerset I feel the same I feel they have sucked the fight out of me but I have to make myself keep going because they are in the wrong so dispiriting

EON set me up with a huge DD after estimated readings. They wildly over estimated what I was going to use (single person in small detached house.) I have begun sending in readings every month and am now £700 plus in credit. It will be £1000 by christmas. I am going to wait until spring and demand most of it back.

GrannySomerset have you worked out how many units you've used since paying SSE and compared it to the number of units Ovo say you have used?

Within weeks of joining OVO, they were sending me emails saying they needed to increase my DDebit because “at the end of your contract you will be in debit by X amount so you need to pay that money now”. I was then over three hundred pounds in credit so I told them to take a hike or I would move my account. I am now over seven hundred pounds in credit. I have their app on my phone which is supposed to tell me what my usage is, but all the daily amounts are the same for each day of the month, which means they are averaging them out, and they can’t explain why. I am still waiting for them to replace my in house monitor which packed up at the end of July! I wish I had stayed with Scottish Power.

Hi Greyduster I too am well in credit with Ovo but they are paying me 5% interest on it so I don’t mind. Plus in the winter I will soon eat into it. Do they not pay you interest? Also you don’t have to increase your DD and if you are in credit you can ask for it back if you don’t want the interest. I can’t speak about the app as I don’t have it and I don’t have a smart meter - with solar panels it would be skewed.

I have recently taken over the responsibility for the bills at another house. The supply of water and the council tax have been taken care of, but the situation with the gas and electricity is an absolute nightmare! The previous resident had switched to a PAYGO meter, so I made a call to Scottish Power to see if I could get back to a traditional meter. After 22 minutes on hold, I was informed I was through to the wrong department and given another telephone number which resulted in 44 minutes on hold and having spoken to a lady with an almost unintelligible accent I was no further forward. I couldn’t change the meter back until I had been registered with ScottishPower for a month. Having gained access to the property, I then discovered that there was no credit left on either meter, so it was another phone call to ScottishPower. I took a picture of my phone, because I ended up on hold or having a brief conversation with what sounded like the same lady for two hours and 10 minutes. I suppose I should be grateful that she registered both gas and electricity and I have account numbers for them. She then told me to hold while she transferred me to the meter department and after 40 minutes I swear I was transferred to a man in a van who muttered something then hung up on me !!!
Thankfully, I have got some practical information from the Internet and with a friend’s help we got the electricity supply up and running, which for the moment is the most important of the two.
I am with Octopus myself, have had no problem whatsoever with them and find their App extremely helpful.
I wouldn’t recommend Scottish Power to my worst enemy!

Georgesgran Interesting what you say about Scottish Power. I have never heard anything good about Scottish Power in all the years they have been in existence. 20 years ago my father fought battles with Scottish Power to get regular and accurate bills. Looking after a relation's house after they went into care, I found no bills had been sent for over 2 years, followed by a ludicrously over estimated bill and others have told me horror stories since.

Actually I would be inclined to recommend them to my worst enemy.

To continue the thread-
I have spent nearly all day trying to get hold of someone to speak to at Scottish Power. I was on hold for 20 minutes then the line cut off. When I tried the number again, the message said they already had a large number of people waiting and they weren’t taking any more calls!!

We are moving into a new build apartment and unfortunately the electricity energy supplier is Scottish Power! I have had first hand experience with their appalling incompetence in the past and vowed never to touch them again!

Trying to set up an account with them online and to give them a meter reading is proving impossible. I too have taken a photo of the meter reading, but their website is only set up to deal with people who are already their customers!
What on earth is going on with these energy suppliers? Maybe they don’t want/ need new customers as they have already made a lot of money?
Sorry for the rant, but it is so frustrating and worrying.

Oh dear, I hope I didn’t hold you up today.
I got through to Scottish Power in about 10 minutes and it was a joy to speak to a real person who not only arranged for SP to refund the £500+ by which I seem to be in credit, arranged for paper bills in future and advised me on how to time cancelling my direct debit and read my meters monthly , paying for what I use NOT what they think I am going to use.
My so-called “smart “ meter seems to be less use than a chocolate teapot as for some reason it is not communicating gas usage and, according to the girl on the phone, the amount of money it tells me I am “spending” bears no relation to my actual spend as it doesn’t include VAT, standing charge, the number you first thought of and your lucky number.
So my lucky day but sorry you had so much stress.

Well done, Maw! I am girding myself to do telephone battle again. I sent photographs of the meters and of the bank statement proving I had paid SSE up to the beginning of June when Ovo took over my accounts but have heard nothing since. I will send readings again on 2 Nov and they are due to fit a smart meter on 11 Nov, original booking of 8 Sept cancelled by them on the day. It just goes on and on.

I had to spend another 80 minutes trying to speak to ScottishPower again! The first chap was good, listened but then I was on hold while being transferred to the original sort of person I spoke to last time.
Absolutely no help at all - I begged for someone to come out, explained it was an empty property in another area miles away, I faked tears, I tried the little old lady routine - but no! The meter is read every 3 months, but she couldn’t say ‘when’ so I could be there. I’m just leaving it and I’m sure they’ll be in touch if they don’t get their money.

Is anyone else with British Gas?

I spoke to my aunt on the phone about her charges, and she said she pays 3.9p per kwH for gas.