Meter readings

[antongould]

Formerly known as SSE - and still using that branding for now but increasingly the curate's egg (or should that be cuckoo's, especially in view of the moves on Bulb) is becoming more prominent. I realise these are minor niggles compared with what far too many folk have to grapple with (and which so far I have been fortunate enough to avoid, partly through having moved house and supplier some years ago before everything started getting silly on the "competition" and choice front and fix 3 good contract terms) but it does nothing to encourage a positive attitude to the company.
As it happens I have the financial resources to pay the bills all in November - but they don't know that do they?

Well trying to make sense of what is on the internet for SSE/OVO is very far from easy. But I would say paying by Monthly Direct Debit should mean you are on cheaper tariff rates than customers paying, or attempting to pay quarterly. They should have also told you what your monthly payment amount will be each month, which should equate to the (projected annual charges for electricity and gas shown on the bill plus your current account balance) divided by 12.

They should take the monthly payment they have calculated on the same day each month and should inform you a reasonable time before they change it.
They should NOT also take the amount of the quarterly bill as your payments should cover all your subsequent bills. ………

Sorry if you are aware of this already ……

[oddoneout]

Well trying to make sense of what is on the internet for SSE/OVO is very far from easy. But I would say paying by Monthly Direct Debit should mean you are on cheaper tariff rates than customers paying, or attempting to pay quarterly. They should have also told you what your monthly payment amount will be each month, which should equate to the (projected annual charges for electricity and gas shown on the bill plus your current account balance) divided by 12.

They should take the monthly payment they have calculated on the same day each month and should inform you a reasonable time before they change it.
They should NOT also take the amount of the quarterly bill as your payments should cover all your subsequent bills. ………

Sorry if you are aware of this already ……

No need to apologise, these sorts of exchanges are very useful for filling in gaps/sorting out what should happen.
However it's very much a waiting game at present as far as I can see. The rates(units and standing charges) given for the monthly DD are the same as those for the quarterly DD, as are the annual usage projections. Where things get a little more uncertain is that the last quarterly period is/was Aug-Oct(I've sent the meter reading as usual) for which DD payment would usually be taken around 22-25th November, and my first monthly DD is due to be taken 7th November according to the "Thanks for choosing..." letter. I was assuming they would want to have the money for the 3 months energy and standing charges I've already had(July to Oct), rather than wait until the monthly DD payments start being significantly above my actual usage charges in about March time, hence my comment about two payments in November. As I say I can manage, but if they do end up taking two payments then others who have been similarly pushed into this change may not be so well placed.

[Petrushka]

Yesterday I had letters from my supplier thanking me for choosing to pay my bills with a new DD plan. They also claim that my payment plan has a discount ("from the date you got in touch to set up your Direct Debit"). The summary on the back says "Not Applicable" in the Discounts box...
All of which completely ignores that I did not choose, they imposed on a take it or leave basis. I'm not sure about the discount issue; in theory I have one anyway as I was dual fuel paid by DD already,although quarterly not monthly. I realise that it easier for them to simply use an existing letter form, even if it's not accurate for the situation, but it does send (or possibly reinforces) a negative message about how they view the customer/company relationship.
The last quarterly reading was sent last week so I don't know at what stage the monthly DD kicks in or the government dosh arrangements appear. The DD will be December I guess as they'll miss the November pay date, and in any case I would hope that they don't take for the existing bill and a new DD in the same month - although these days who knows?* From what an earlier letter said I should get the £66 October rebate in my bank account in November.

* I've just read the letter again and guess what - they'll take the quarterly and the monthly in the same month...

This just reinforces my antipathy to paying for fuel bills by direct debit. The companies would have you believe that it is cheaper and more convenient for customers to pay this way but while the former might have a small grain of truth, the latter is difficult to prove. People are handing out their bank accounts to the companies to take what they want with any errors hard to find and a nightmare to resolve.

I do use DD for council tax and magazine subscriptions and the like but never, ever for electricity/gas. It is simple enough to pay by debit card on receipt of a monthly bill which clearly and unambiguously states the charges and government discount. I'm sure most people would find it far easier to budget this way and any errors should be immediately apparent and more quickly resolved.

My daily usage, according to my smart meter, is currently around £5 a day so I can already expect my monthly bill to be around £150 and deducting the £66 government discount should end up at around £84 when I receive it on November 10. A quick check to see if it looks ok and matches with meter readings followed immediately by payment online and it's all done and dusted for another month.

[gradus]

We are now in the clutches of Octopus which has consumed Bulb. Nothing to see here is the gist of the messages from Bulb.

[oddoneout]

This just reinforces my antipathy to paying for fuel bills by direct debit. The companies would have you believe that it is cheaper and more convenient for customers to pay this way but while the former might have a small grain of truth, the latter is difficult to prove. People are handing out their bank accounts to the companies to take what they want with any errors hard to find and a nightmare to resolve.

I do use DD for council tax and magazine subscriptions and the like but never, ever for electricity/gas. It is simple enough to pay by debit card on receipt of a monthly bill which clearly and unambiguously states the charges and government discount. I'm sure most people would find it far easier to budget this way and any errors should be immediately apparent and more quickly resolved.

My daily usage, according to my smart meter, is currently around £5 a day so I can already expect my monthly bill to be around £150 and deducting the £66 government discount should end up at around £84 when I receive it on November 10. A quick check to see if it looks ok and matches with meter readings followed immediately by payment online and it's all done and dusted for another month.

At the moment the amount taken each month should be fixed - they have told me how much it will be per month for gas and electricity, which fits what anton said about projected annual usage divided by 12. I share your dislike of DDs and this is the only one I have, the council tax is standing order and Shell email the phone/broadband bill each month which I then pay at the PO (I suspect they will do the same as SSE and force me to do DD eventually) everything else is paid annually in full. The various insurances used to bump up the points for my JL credit card, but that has finished now thanks to the withdrawal of the card. At least now, with my State Pension meaning a fixed monthly income I can deal with DD payments; before last year the difficulty was an erratic income which didn't lend itself easily to monthly withdrawals.

[oddoneout]

We are now in the clutches of Octopus which has consumed Bulb. Nothing to see here is the gist of the messages from Bulb.

The lights have gone out?

[ardcarp]

I think Octopus is a good company and the CEO, Greg Jackson, is both clever and ethical by this big bad world's standards. ( A member of my family works for Octopus, and GJ cares for his staff and his customers, I'm told.)

[french frank]

The lights have gone out?

[antongould]

This just reinforces my antipathy to paying for fuel bills by direct debit. The companies would have you believe that it is cheaper and more convenient for customers to pay this way but while the former might have a small grain of truth, the latter is difficult to prove. People are handing out their bank accounts to the companies to take what they want with any errors hard to find and a nightmare to resolve.

I do use DD for council tax and magazine subscriptions and the like but never, ever for electricity/gas. It is simple enough to pay by debit card on receipt of a monthly bill which clearly and unambiguously states the charges and government discount. I'm sure most people would find it far easier to budget this way and any errors should be immediately apparent and more quickly resolved.

My daily usage, according to my smart meter, is currently around £5 a day so I can already expect my monthly bill to be around £150 and deducting the £66 government discount should end up at around £84 when I receive it on November 10. A quick check to see if it looks ok and matches with meter readings followed immediately by payment online and it's all done and dusted for another month.

We are never going to agree on this Petrushka but as a little tangent on playing by card ..... last week I paid my credit card bill with my debit card - when I checked my credit card balance this morning there was no payment and indeed there was a £12 late payment charge!
Checked my online bank balance and the payment had been made .... so rang the credit card provider and after 25 minutes a nice young lady informed me a number of payment files had not been processed yet and had caused my pain .......
I find this amazing .... when I was a lad bills were never produced until all the latest cash files had been processed .......

[french frank]

For an unaccountable reason, one of my builders went into the bathroom and switched my heating on. I can only think it was to test the programmer which they'd had to remove from the hall wall. Hurrah for the smart meter which, on checking, I saw had mounted to over my £2 daily limit. It could only be the gas boiler, so I investigated and found the temperature had been turned up from 0 to 2. I may not even switch it on tomorrow (the clocks having changed, usually the signal) as it's still quite mild. At £2 a day? I should think not! I didn't live in a centrally heated home until I was almost 40. Human beings can stand it.

[oddoneout]

For an unaccountable reason, one of my builders went into the bathroom and switched my heating on. I can only think it was to test the programmer which they'd had to remove from the hall wall. Hurrah for the smart meter which, on checking, I saw had mounted to over my £2 daily limit. It could only be the gas boiler, so I investigated and found the temperature had been turned up from 0 to 2. I may not even switch it on tomorrow (the clocks having changed, usually the signal) as it's still quite mild. At £2 a day? I should think not! I didn't live in a centrally heated home until I was almost 40. Human beings can stand it.

I am slightly puzzled ff. If the heating was on would you not have noticed without the smart meter - or were you out?
On my boiler the CH dial is set to 5 which according to the instructions is about 74 degrees C (and what the engineers set it at and is shown in the instructions), but as the boiler is controlled by the thermostat in the coldest room in the house I suppose the only significance of that control is whether the radiators get too hot to the touch, and the speed at which the set room temperature is reached.. The hot water dial is similarly numerical but no indication of what the numbers mean in terms of water temperature from the tap - which in any case varies according to flow rate, and as far as I am aware is factory set not to exceed I think 60C to prevent serious scalding.

[french frank]

I am slightly puzzled ff. If the heating was on would you not have noticed without the smart meter - or were you out?

No, I was in, but perched up in a crow's nest because the downstairs is uninhabitable. In the summer, I find the easiest way to turn off the heating is to set the dial back to 0. I discovered the heating had been on when I checked and found the radiators were hot. I didn't notice any difference because I wasn't cold before and wasn't hot afterwards. Currently no heating and the wireless progammer suggests the house temperature (in the hall) is 18º which seems quite reasonable

IHD currently showing Gas consumption at £1.11 and electricity 26p.

[oddoneout]

I think Octopus is a good company and the CEO, Greg Jackson, is both clever and ethical by this big bad world's standards. ( A member of my family works for Octopus, and GJ cares for his staff and his customers, I'm told.)

They do seem to be one of the better ones for customer service but the chaos in the energy business has had a big impact on levels of service as more and more customers were allocated to the companies that were still functioning. The assimilation of one company into another always bring glitches so it is to be hoped that Octopus is well prepared, and that it doesn't find too many unexpected circumstances lurking in its new acquisition.

[antongould]

Sorry to use this place as a means of recording the detailed complaint I will eventually make against the bungling EDF …..

Latest events - when I checked my gas meter a couple of mornings ago there was a reading and all has been OK since.
The same day I got a WhatsApp message to say EDF were aware of my various problems and would “ …. be in touch ….”
So yesterday a young lady rang up and said they were coming to check the gas meter …. I said “ … and the electricity meter as your engineer said that’s where the problem is … ???? “ - she said no just the gas meter as “ … that is what my sheet says …. “ I told her the highlights of the saga and she said “ let me check “…. 10 minutes later she was back and said “I see what you mean but I can only work from my sheet” and then with an echo of remembered times past “ …. Someone will be in touch …”

Reader ( if one remains ) ……. I have officially complained

[oddoneout]

Reader ( if one remains ) ……. I have officially complained

Well, at least one remains! What is the likelihood of a functional(ie fixing it) response before next year do you reckon? After all, December and the first fortnight of January don't exist in customer service land, and achieving something in the mere 4 weeks left before then seems a stretch...