Oh My!!
We are having EXACTLY the same problem! To cut a very long story short.....
We came back to BG in january 2006. We have an economy 7 meter (day and night readings) told them we wanted a standard meter fitted and they said no! Said they didnt have to change the meter they just converted the readings to standard. Started paying £22.50 per month by direct debit in april, then a few months later they wrote and said this wasn't enough and we're upping the payment to £67 a month. We phoned BG and they said don't worry its a blip and the DD will stay at £22.50, it didn't it went up to £67 but we didn't worry too much as we thought come winter we'll be in credit to cover it.
In march this year we got a bill for almost £800 saying we needed to pay this within 10 days and the DD was going up to £170 a month!
We phoned again, they said oh we're still charging you at economy 7 rates, cancel your dd until we've sorted it as it will automatically go up as its computer generated! THEY cancelled the dd, and we got a revised bill about 3 weeks later.
The revised bill was for even more money... almost £1000 and STILL on economy 7 rates. Also some periods we were charged double!
We've since had 3 more revised bills (4 in total) all wrong... and made numerous phone calls to BG, spoken to managers, debt dept, call centre staff... everyone! explained some periods they've charged double for, they haven't got the right amounts of payments we've made to them on, wrong tarriffs etc... We got hold of price charges for 2006 and 2007 and worked it all out, out bill should have been about £370. We phoned again, and were told theres nothing they can do as they could send another revised bill but it'd be wrong so whats the point. They told us to write to the complaints dept in Southampton.
We wrote to Southampton and enclosed copies of every bill and revised bill and also of our workings out etc. They received the letter on the 20th June 2007 (sent recorded).
We received a red bill a couple days after, phoned BG and they said to ignore it, they know we're in the process of the complaints procedure. Last week we got a "nasty" latter saying pay now or we'll disconnect. Phoned BG again and they said ignore it, the letters are computer generated and they will send us a payment card so we can pay little and often (£10 a month!), "fool the computer" as it will see payments being made and stop sending the red bills.
We still haven't received the payment card even though we keep requesting it!
Yesterday we received a letter to say they are starting legal action against us as the newest "estimated" revised bill is now just under £1200. and they are coming on the 24th july to disconnect the electricity.
We phoned BG AGAIN and after explaining the whole saga AGAIN they've said nothing will happen and they've put a block on our account so we shouldnt get any more letters until this is resolved by the complaints people in Southampton.
We'll see.
They are NOT coming into our house, We have 3 children, 2 who are disabled, they are NOT getting in here! If they bring a police officer we WILL let him/her enter and explain everything and show them the letters etc and if necessary ring BG again whilst the police are here.
And all through this they are still refusing to change the meter to a standard one!
My advise that I've picked up along the way...
a normal 3 bed house should use no more that 20KWH of electric a day.
Check your bills... if the figures don't seem right, then they probably aren't.
Don't trust that because they're a big company that they are right and you are wrong. Challenge the bill if you think its wrong and if you're still not happy, write to their complaints dept.
Also.... BG are absolutely the worst company we've ever dealt with. The call centre staff are either rude, don't know what to do, or just put you on hold and hang up.
When this is resolved we're sending them a bill for our phone calls to them, and also for loss of time and stress on ourselves. We'll also be changing to a different supplier.
Nailstyle, if you're still around, please get in touch with me... I think I might be able to help you!