Ok I pay my water bills ever 3 months last week i paid £100 on my water and was going to pay the rest this week The outstanding balance was £115 this morning i received a letter stating i owe them £500 and that is not right at all. The oustanding balance is £115 they send me a letter demanding i pay them £500 in 14 days or it will effect my credit blah blah Far as im concerned i have no correspondance off united utilties regarding outstanding bills and now i get this letter

hi, i,m new to the consumer forums i need some advice i owe united utilties about £180.00 from 2007 over the last 2 months a DCA as been sending me letters saying i owe over £1,000 which is not true ive never contacted them in any way now letter comes asking me to settle to £700. same day letter from GPB solicitors pay or we take you to court any advice welcome please.

When we moved into our current address several months ago we was fully aware that the property would be under occupied due to it being a 3 bedroom property and there is only the 2 of us and a child. When trying to sort out the water, gas electric etc we asked for the water to be put onto a meter for the reason of being in an under occupied place knowing the rate they will charge is based on what they feel the average is based on full occupency as they state they can charge under government regulation etc and are highly concious of water useage anyway and figure by the use of a meter we would probably be using more like half what they state they can charge us for based on the current system without a water meter. This would also help us more due to being in receipt of benefits and a few pounds a weeks saved by paying for what we use than what we dont certainly helps these days. Only we heard nothing about the water meter. 2 months ago we get a knck on the door by some chap from United Utilities checking unregestered addresses or something. We again pointed out we are waiting to hear about having a water meter fited for the reasons above. He took details and said someone would get back to us over the water meter. We hear nothing but a few weeks ago get a bill for £212 odd saying it's due. Dont have the money on benefits and that had been stoped for a few weeks so in a little debt now. We sent a letter in again asking about the water meter and what the delay was as we dont feel we should be paying the rate for a fully occupied house when there is just the 2 of us and a child here and are highly concious of water useage and asked them if they could re-access the bill as we have been asking for several months for the water meter to be fitted for the reasons stated, knowing they probably would not. We dont get a reply but a second bill thats been passed to the recovery department or something (not debt recovery agency yet) asking for the money to be paid in the next 7 days etc. We call them explain the situation over the the under occupied property and that we have been asking for months for a water meter to be fitted only to be told there there is no record of us ever having asked for a water meter to be fitted even though we asked over the phone twice, to the chap who came calling in person assuring they would sort it and by letter about 2 months ago. They then say we will have to wait about 3 months for a water meter to be fitted but in the meantime will be billed by what they are entitled to bill us. They said they want us to pay the current rate for the water in the meantime while waiting another 3 months for a water meter to be fitted, despite us having asked a number of times in the last several months yet been ignored for the meter request. They want the bank details to pay for current ongoing charges for water useage over a payment card it seems, but also want the same bank details to take £10 per week\£40 per month off the debt. We cant afford this at the moment yet they calim thats the minimum they can accept (£10 per week) off the debt reguardless of any finance situation we are in and being on benefits. They said if we dont pay the current ongoing charges plus an additional £10 per week off the debt they will pass it over to a debt recovery firm who will add there own charges onto the debt etc. Now we dont dispute the debt or whats owed or the current ongoing costs etc. We have asked 5 times now for a water meter to be fitted that each time asking about it the issue seems to have been ignored due to there being no record of a request for a water meter to be fitted and now told to wait 3 months where we could be told the same excuse again. They will only take payments via the bank it seems yet we simply cant agree to a minimum of £10 per week off the debt or give them the bank details as they could simply take what they want with no written aggrement in place on the amount and thats the minimum they state they will accept and dont care about other debts we may have due there there being a pause in income. Any advice as we want to get this sorted yet United Utilities seem to keep ignoring the request to have a water meter fitted and have threatened us with debt collectors unless we pay per week twice what we can afford?.