NPower Bill - I'm so angry !
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Hi all,
Apologies for this little rant but I can't scream and shout at anyone physically so its going to have to be via a thread !
Me and Mr Hud have recently changed service providers for our gas and electricity. We were originally with NPower and have been for a few years. We live in a two bed house (small size house) and are both out of the house from 7am to 7pm and asleep from about 11pm till 5am (that gives you an idea of how much we're around).
The heating hasn't been on and the gas is on a timer for 2 hours in the morning and 2 in the evening.
I've just had my final bill in from Npower and its for £238.79 - we pay by direct debit which they advised us would be better and is £60 per month for both gas and electricity.
I'm trying to work out how on earth we would have used that much gas and elec since January ????
We've changed provider now to Southern Electric (have heard nightmare stories about them too since changing).
I'm just fuming at the amount they are expecting us to pay in one whack !
Sorry for the rant - just wondered if anyone had had any dealings with them for the same reasons ?
Sorry Sorry Sorry
Mrs Hud xxx
Apologies for this little rant but I can't scream and shout at anyone physically so its going to have to be via a thread !
Me and Mr Hud have recently changed service providers for our gas and electricity. We were originally with NPower and have been for a few years. We live in a two bed house (small size house) and are both out of the house from 7am to 7pm and asleep from about 11pm till 5am (that gives you an idea of how much we're around).
The heating hasn't been on and the gas is on a timer for 2 hours in the morning and 2 in the evening.
I've just had my final bill in from Npower and its for £238.79 - we pay by direct debit which they advised us would be better and is £60 per month for both gas and electricity.
I'm trying to work out how on earth we would have used that much gas and elec since January ????
We've changed provider now to Southern Electric (have heard nightmare stories about them too since changing).
I'm just fuming at the amount they are expecting us to pay in one whack !
Sorry for the rant - just wondered if anyone had had any dealings with them for the same reasons ?
Sorry Sorry Sorry
Mrs Hud xxx
0
Comments
Since January?
Was your account balance zero in January? Or is that when you moved in and started the account? Is it possible that you had a debit balance in January as well?
Sounds to me like £60 a month has not been enough to cover bills, yet they have not wrote to you to increase your payments. Surely you were still getting bills every three months telling you your account balance?
Is it feasible some of your DD payments bounced?
Its for reasons like this why I insist on reading the meters myself every three months, even if it does involve breaking into the caretakers room and obtaining the key for the electricity room!!
More likely NPower ****ed up (common story this with Npower) and never took some or no payments at all, are you sure OP the £60 has been coming out of your bank each month? Only had a simular thing with NPower, they are complete idiots and were unable to set up a monthly direct debit payment even though I'd handed them the details numerous times.
Eventually left like you, then out of the blue they took a payment for several hundred pounds out of my bank without any prior warning....fair enough I owed them it but it was their incompetence over direct debits that led to the bill building up and I think they should of at least told me they were going to take the full amount owed (funny how they managed to take the full amount when I left, but were too incompetent to set up a monthly debit!)
PS if £238 is your complete bill for gas and elec since Jan that doesn't sound very much that's what less then £40 a month.
Was your account balance zero in January?
If it was, then £238 accounts for an extra £34 per month, so your payments should have been £94.
However, if your account has been behind since, ooh, lets say January 2008, this would be an extra £12.50 per month and your payments should have been £72.50.
A big difference. We need to know more details, such as:
- Did you read your own meters?
- Did anyone else read the meters
- Did you get quarterly statements showing a debit balance?
- Have N Power at any stage asked you to increase payments
- Can you be sure your account balance was zero on the 1st January 2009, i.e. did you clear off the debit balance then, or request a credit balance?
- Have any of your direct debits not been taken?
Also remember if you closed your account in a middle of a month, then the final balance will also include any gas/electric you have used in the final few weeks that you have not made a payment towards.
I.e. my DD date is the 30th, if I was to close my account on the 23rd, then I would have used 3 weeks of gas and electric in that month that I have not contributed towards, and would have expected a debit balance.
That will be their final bill after X months of being with Npower, once X (or X-1) payments of £60 have been taken off it.
Unfortunately, we don't know what X is. The OP she has used that much extra since January, but does not give us a reason why she said January.
I was with them once and when I was leaving to go elsewhere, they took a final reading but I didn't realise that they'd mis-read the first digit on my gas meter as a 5 when it was actually a 3. I ended up with a huge bill and an even bigger battle on my hands. It took months of phone calls and letters and them ducking and diving and blaming my new supplier before I got Energy Watch involved and then it was settled. I'd never use NPower again - useless, ignorant tw*ts.
Surely you submitting a customer-red reading would have resolved the issue?
Or failing that, when the new occupants moved in and gave the correct reading, the discrepancy would have been noted.
How come you never read the meters yourself when you moved?
Hope this helps.
I wasn't a new tenant, I was just changing suppliers. I didn't need to supply a reading as they came and took one anyway (albeit a wrong one). I've learnt by my mistake though Ginger Daddy and now, every time someone comes to read a meter, I read it with them and keep a note of it.
As for me giving them a reading at the time, I did this during the dispute but they wouldn't believe me and refused to send anyone out to check. As I said, useless, ignorant tw*ts.
Forgot to add - it took me a while to realise that they'd mis-read the meter; it only came to light during the dispute. They just expected me to fork out hundreds of pounds more than my bills usually came to, without questioning the amount.
What utter nonsense!
So are you telling me because she has not stuck with a provider for one year, she has to pay £240??
You only pay for the electric you use up to the point you leave!
For example, if I was with NPower for only three months, was paying them £100 a month but used £350 worth of electric, I would owe them £50 at the end of three months when I moved on.
From your explanation, and in my scenerio, I would actually owe them £950!!!
:rolleyes:
Just for Bond, James Bond, here is a worked example to show how the system works:
Move in Jan 1st
Jan - Pay £50, use £80. Account is £30 in [highlight]arrears[/highlight]
Feb - Pay £50, use £65. Account is £45 in [highlight]arrears[/highlight]
Mar - Pay £50, use £60. Account is £55 in [highlight]arrears[/highlight]
April - Asked to increase payments to £60, use £60. Account is £55 in [highlight]arrears[/highlight]
May - Pay £60, use £40. Account is £35 in [highlight]arrears[/highlight]
June - Pay £60, use £40. Account is £15 in [highlight]arrears[/highlight]
July - Pay £60, use £30. Account is £10 in credit
And so on and so forth...
There could be a number of reasons the OP has a final bill for £240. The fact she has not stuck with the same company for 12 months is not one of them!!!!
You don't pay in arrears.
I did owe them the £150 , however NP actually sent me a letter saying as a goodwill gesture i wouldnt have to pay monies owed to them. So imo they aint all that bad !
The reason it was started in January is because I always start the year owing nothing when it comes to gas and elec... some of you may seem this strange I don't its my choice to do !
I just found the amount rather high considering the amount of time gone (Jan - August) and the fact that we pay ample enough for our gas and elec each month due to the fact that we're never in the house !
I've never missed a payment and they have always come out via DD.
And for the bright spark that said ring them - that was the first thing I did before I came here looking for advice not smart comments !
Mrs Hud
Have you checked the meter readings on the bill in front of you match your own readings of the meter?
Just out of interest, what was the credit/debit on the account at the start of the year, i.e. the amount you paid off/got back to start the year with a 0 balance?
I did not say OP was billed said amount because they were not with npower for 12 month.
Npower send a statement to direct debit customers every six month. At this point the payment amounts are adjusted to match consumption. If there is more than £60 credit it is refunded.
We do not know how far the OP was into their billing cycle. We do not know what OP was paying per month or what the actual consumption was.
But here is a likely senario:
Moves in Jan1. Billed to 1 April for £300. Payments : Jan 20 £50,
Feb 20 £50, March 20 £50.
£150 OUTSTANDING
Next bill. 1 April to 1 July for £250.
Payments April 20 £50, May
£50, June £50
£100 OUTSTANDING from this bill.
£250 Total Owed.
This is where they tell you that they are increasing your payments.
Customer not happy and decides to leave. Say change over takes 1 month. Only 1 payment in this month made say, £80 July.
So the FINAL bill is for usage between July 1st and August 1st. This costs £90, PLUS you are paying the PREVIOUS outstanding!.
Who is good at math?.
LOL, was it not a statement?.
I agree that most DD payments are geared towards a full year of payments with most people going into debt during the winter months. During the summer when less gas/electricity is used the DD payments catch up with usage.
However, there are penalties with many gas/electric contacts if you cancel, or change, during the contract period. For instance with my contract there is a £30 fee if I change before 31st Dec 2009. Sometimes the better deals tie you in for a longer minimum time and with a higher fee if you change.
no it was def a bill - took about 6 months for them to stop sending me reminders, I wouldn't go back to npower if they paid me
British Gas on the other hand have been trying to contact me for over a year now to get me to go back! When I rang to cancel in the first place, the sales person tried very hard to persuade me to stay and when I said I was adamant I wanted to leave, the guy said "okay, well good luck with that" (in a sarcastic tone) and hung up on me! They then took months to actually release the gas to Southern Electric, which meant we were in limbo.
Why are these companies so rubbish? You would've thought they'd treat us with some respect since we pay their wages!