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EDF collecting a debt (arising from their own error) from 2010/11

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  • EDF collecting a debt (arising from their own error) from 2010/11

    I'll try to keep this as succinct as possible!
    .
    Lured by the incentive of a £100 ‘windfall’, I applied to switch to EDF for both gas & electricity in November 2010.
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    Naturally I provided EDF with accurate readings from both the gas & electric meters. However, I received repeated emails from EDF asking me to provide my “initial gas meter reading”. I responded to each email with the appropriate readings.
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    By January 2011 I was finding the constant requests for "initial gas meter readings" to be rather peculiar, so I contacted EDF’s ‘customer service’ dept to find out why I was repeatedly being asked for this info. I received the following email reply on the 15th January 2011 [quote]: “I confirm your reads have been loaded for 9 January 2011, please ignore the recent request you have received, I will amend our records”.
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    And sure enough I received no more requests for my “initial gas meter reading".
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    Sadly my Mother passed away on the 22nd January 2011, and from then on I had rather complex issues involving her estate (plus my own grief) to deal with. The EDF service/tariff that I’d signed up for (identified by some bizarre and immediately forgettable name) involved online billing, and payment by direct debit. To be honest, I was rather relieved that the utilities were ‘taken care of’ during this difficult time ... and I have to admit that I didn’t bother to check either my (online) bank statement or my (online) EDF account for quite a long time.
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    When I did check I found that I hadn’t been charged for any gas usage. I ‘phoned ‘customer services’ and was informed that the £100 ‘windfall’ had been used to cover my gas bill. So that seemed reasonable.
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    But two months ago (May 2013) my bill showed that in addition to the usual gas & elec charges I had also been charged £14 for a “gas debt”. Initially I assumed the “gas debt” was merely to cover an underpayment, so I ignored it ... but the current bill also shows that a further £14 has been removed from my bank account (via DD) for my “gas debt”.
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    I contacted EDF and received several nonsensical replies. However just last week their ‘complaints dept’ admitted that for several months in 2010 and 2011 after I’d signed-up with EDF, they had failed to bill me for any gas consumption at all ... and hence I had inadvertently accrued a “debt” of £154. In their infinite wisdom (and without informing me or asking my permission), EDF have decided that I can pay this amount off at a rate of £14/month over the next 12 months ... and the fact that my bills are paid by DD has enabled them to scoop this extra amount of money from my bank account, whether I object or not.
    .
    I’m a pensioner and my income is very limited. So firstly, please could anyone advise whether EDF can simply decide for themselves at what rate I’m going to repay the ‘alleged’ £154 debt? (Particularly bearing in mind the fact that the debt was accrued due to their own error/incompetence ... and NOT due to my unwillingness or inability to pay the gas bill). And secondly, isn’t there something called a “Back Billing Code of Practice” which limits the amount of money that energy companies can recoup when they have failed to bill a customer correctly?
    Tags: None

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