Dear Experts,

I was a Powergen (now e-ON) customer from Jan '06 to July '06 (7 months).
In Jan '06 I provided Powergen with Actual Gas Meter Reading. Then I paid my first quarterly gas bill of approx. £120 in April '06. At the end of July '06, I vacated the rented property. Hence, on the final day I called Powergen with Actual Gas Meter Reading and they asked me to pay approx. £100 which I paid on the same day. After this, I returned to my home country.

Recently, at my new address after around 3 years, I have received a letter from a Debt Collecting Agency. They told me to pay some £180 towards old e-ON gas Bill else threatened to take legal action. When I contacted e-ON, they told me that when I provided the final meter reading at the end of July, they asked me to pay £100 which was an estimated bill. According to their actual calculations, I owe them extra £180 for gas usage from Jan '06 to Jul '06.

I was an electricity customer of Powergen during the same time as well. And when I enquired about it, they said that estimated bill that I paid was £1.56 more than the actual reading so that is ok.

What I would appreciate from you experts is below info -
1. For meter bill of 7 months, how can the deviation between estimated and actual gas bill come to a big amount like £180? If so, then can nobody question them about their estimation procedures?
2. Can they contact me after around 3 years and force me to pay this extra £180?
3. They conveniently forgot my electricity account because I had paid them more than actual reading. Can they be such un-professional?
4. e-ON is threatening to put my name in black list and scare me with their debt collecting agency? How fair is it?

Can nobody help me? What should I do?

Regards,
AP

arpat123:

You are entitled to be upset about Eon's treatment but hold back on the rant and focus, focus, focus on the consumption and the billing.

First of all, when you passed the final gas reading in July 06 did Eon request a forwarding address and what was your response? Not to request a forwarding address would be a clear breach of the closedown workflow.

Next, there cannot be actionable billing arrears unless there has been atleast one bill unpaid. You need to take steps to obtain copies of all the bills issued. Ask Eon nicely and if they refuse or propose excessive charges make a Subject Access Request requiring the provison af all the information held, including copy bills. This will cost you £10 but is money well spent.

In parallel, consider setting down all your issues as a formal complaint strictly in accordance with the Eon complaints procedure, in writing, by Signed For delivery. This must be responded to in a specified timeframe and if you remain dissatisfied at the expiry of the timeframe your are entitled to invoke the alternative disputes resolution procedure. This costs you nothing but Eon a hefty case fee regardless of the outcome.

If you were asked, but didn't provide a forwarding address, fighting this is slightly harder but if you weren't asked or you were and provided a forwarding address and Eon cannot substantiate that further bills were sent to that address, in my opinion under the 1 year rule there is nothing to pay.

You need to push very hard and see what gives.

Hi arpat123,

It does sound like E.ON didn't have your forwarding address, or this may have been incorrect as a revised bill using the correct meter readings will have been produced.

I agree with Jalexa, call E.ON and ask why you have received this bill now and as you provided the final meter readings when you moved out of the property, why were the accurate reads not used to produce the final bill.

If the billing is now correct and E.ON have been sending bills and allow up letters, you will need to pay this balance, but ask the questions first.

Helena

First,

A big thanks to all the ladies and gents who responded.

I do not live permanently in UK. I am from an asia. However, E-ON did not ask me a single word about my forwarding address. Had it been asked, I would have given my Permanent Home Address in Home Country without any issues.

My first logical question was same as you people - When I provided accurate meter reading on 28th July and requested to settle off the bill, they should have told me the accurate bill amount. They told me some amount which I paid and then left UK assuming I have settled off everything. E-ON told me that the accurate bill was generated by system on 31st July and then they tried to contact me. If it is really the case then it is their system problem not mine. But I am not aware of the laws of this country and do not want to be proven illegal. Secondly, for a normal salaried person like me, court case, lawyer fees etc is almost unmanageable. I am disappointed that my circumstances are probably used against my defence.

However, I am very grateful to you all for your kind pieces of advice.

I will follow formal complaints procedure with E-ON as advised and let us see what happens...

Thanks to you all once again,

Regards,

AP

arpat123:

If you Google for something called "Code of Practice for Accurate Billing" you will get a documents which describes how Eon must implement the regulations for consumption more than 1 year prior to a bill.

Can't.

Clearly the issue is where was the bill (and reminders sent to). Nowhere if they did not ask for a forwarding address.

IMHO open and shut. Go for it.

Unfortunately for me, E-ON told me that I had subscribed to Internet Service and hence they sent some reminders to my email address and that is why they did not ask for my forwarding address.

arpat123:Unfortunately for me, E-ON told me that I had subscribed to Internet Service and hence they sent some reminders to my email address and that is why they did not ask for my forwarding address.

This will make a difference regarding your complaint.

As you have registered to manage your account online, it says when you register that you will no longer receive paper bills through the post, along with the terms of having an online account.

This means that we will not have needed your forwarding address, as your final bill will have been available to view online, you will have received emails to advise you that he bill was ready along with reminders.

Because of this, I would say the bills does need to be paid as E.ON have tried to contact you by the method that you agreed to.

Helena

Helena - E.ON:

arpat123:Unfortunately for me, E-ON told me that I had subscribed to Internet Service and hence they sent some reminders to my email address and that is why they did not ask for my forwarding address.

I'm not sure that's a satisfactory explanation. The then final bill workflow will be an issue of historical record. Regardless of a customer having registered for online billing I would be astonished if the workflow did not address the forwarding issue.

Anybody moving home would have to terminate their landline. Whether they retain their ISP (and email address) is the customer's perogative, not EON's. While in this particular case (of a relatively short rental) it's not clear that the customer would have favoured an ISP linked email address over a web or personal email address, I make a general argument.

Either the EON final account workflow addresses forwarding or it's an inept and faulty workflow. In any event the reason for the "on-account" final payment not being accurate in spite of an accurate meter reading being provided, assuming it was accurate (and I'm not casting aspertions), has not been explained. If the then billing system could not provide an instant calculation all the more reason for the final account workflow to address forwarding.

I stand to be corrected but I don't believe that an online customer requesting a final account shouldn't expect be asked about forwarding arrangements. I stand by my previous argument about culpability (and the 1 year rule).