Hi

Thanks for your reply. I finally got through to someone sensible last night. She went through all the meter readings I had given them plus our usage (ie I told her what we'd had on etc) and it turns out that 1) we have a very high powered boiler (30kW) which the plumber put in because we want to do an extension in a few years, so that's increasing our usage and 2) the direct debits are high to cover off debt for gas we used in the old property. Apparently our direct debits when we lived in the old house were not enough to cover what we were using. She has dropped our direct debit back down to what it should be and also refunded us part of that huge amount that went out in the first place. So no need to get the meter checked hopefully....

I'm still a bit cross though as why couldn't they have rung us while we LIVED in the old place to tell us the amounts weren't high enough and we'd have upped them ages ago.

Anyway, I'm hoping that its all sorted now. I'm going to keep reading the meter and she said I can keep emailing her readings every few days and she will make sure we're not using too much. I've also signed up for online bills so I can track how much we're spending compared to how much we should be spending.

Clair :)

The first job is to check that the meter readings on the bills are correct, or anything estimated is acceptable, and that you are only being billed for your property. Hopefully you have a record of the meter readings when you moved in. It is more likely that the supplier is using incorrect readings than the meter being wrong but you can check both possibilities.

The next job is to check how much your meter will record when you have the central heating on for an hour (preferable starting sometime when the house is cold so that any thermostat does't turn the heat off). You should be able to work out how much you should use in an hour. A typical boiler might have a power output of 24kW (the figure for your boiler will be in the manual, specification sheet or written somewhere on the boiler itself) so, in one hour, it would use 24kWh (about £1's worth) of energy.

Your calculation will be complicated because even though you are billed for the number of kWh (KiloWatt Hours), the meter will probably record cubic meters (m³) but older meters record cubic feet (it'll say ft³ or similar on the meter). The calculation to convert from m³ to kWh will be shown on your bills. It depends on air temperature and pressure but a rough and ready means to convert from m³ to kWh is to multiply by ten or eleven. So, your meter might record two point something cubic meters of gas if the boiler is on full for an hour.

Hi all,

Over the weekend I was checking our online banking and I noticed that our energy supplier had taken out a direct debit of nearly twice the usual amount. I was very cross as we'd not had any phone calls or letters to say that they were going to do this - they just TOOK it.

So Monday night I rang them up and asked them why they had taken it. The girl told me it was based on a meter reading. So I told her that they'd not had any meter readings from us and she told me it was an estimated meter reading. So I asked her what these meter readings were and she told me address A 10122 and address B 9820 - I was furious!! It turned out they have been taking direct debits based on our current property plus our old house that we moved out of on 23rd Feb!!! This girl then told me that all post had been going to the old address as well!

She transferred me to a different department and I had to explain it all to a new guy - Kevin. He understood why I was so cross and said he'd go away and calcualte how much we were owed. I was put on hold and he came back to say that we were owed £70. No way was that enough. So he said he'd ring me back at 10am the next morning with a recalculation.

He didn't ring til gone 11am, but then he proceeded to tell me that we were owed £200. Still didn't sound like enough when we'd spent over £1000 in the past 9 months. So he told me to go home and find the meter readings for when we moved into the new property. I spoke to him last night and he said that in the new house we've been using a great deal of gas over 9 months. About £150 worth a month!!! It just can't be right as over the summer we weren't even in the house for about 8 weeks as my husband was in hopsital and I only went home to sleep. And we've only had the heating on for the past couple of weeks.

I've asked if he can send someone out to check the meter as I think it must be broken, he said he will after I've given him another new meter reading tongight so he can compare to the reading on monday night.

Has anyone else ever had a faulty gas meter?? What if they say it isn't faulty?? They won't give us one of those smart meter things that can tell you how much you're using and when so we can't even work out when this usage is meant to be happening.

I'm half tempted to swap to another supplier as these seem very disorganised, plus I've checked and their rates are a lot higher than an alternative company.

The house is a small 2 bed detached. we have plenty of loft insulation and double glazed windows and doors and we only get the heating up to 20.5 degrees in the morning and evening. The boiler was put in in January and is supposedly very efficient!

Any advice anyone???

Thanks

Clair