Some of the weather headlines from across the world. Any comments,views articles put them here.Is the Climate getting out of control The latest news and comment on natural disasters and extreme weather https://www.theguardian.com/world/natural-disasters https://www.independent.co.uk/topic/extreme-weather Disruption of ocean circulation is thought to be driven by global warming, and could lead to sea level rise and extreme events like storms https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/gulf-stream-current-climate-change-ocean-temperature-ice-age-global-weather-a8300896.html 13 people killed as flash flooding hits Aude, southwest France overnight in Aude, leaving people stranded on rooftops. https://news.sky.com/story/five-people-killed-as-flash-flooding-hits-aude-southwest-france-11526297 -Bad weather in the Aude: in Narbonne-plage. Where is Narbonne-Plage https://www.france-voyage.com/tourism/narbonne-plage-2113.htm Video a little further down in the article. Two wounded and much material damage. On the sidelines of the floods, the Mediterranean coast was hit by a strong wind and a big swell on Monday. https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=https%3A%2F%2Ffrance3-regions.francetvinfo.fr%2Foccitanie%2Faude%2Fintemperies-aude-mini-tornade-narbonne-plage-1559016.html&edit-text= Well is the Climate changing.What do you think and what can be done about it. Someone out there knows or wants to say something,write something. Well write it down now here,release the pressure. Now when i was a kid winters were winters:sad: and summer,mm better go,enough said. Your turn. Bye Tawnyowl

Another small supplier has gone bust - Our Power - who were backed by the Scottish Government to the tune of £6m. 38000 customers are now looking for a new home.

Forgive me if I'm rambling, but can someone point me to some advice about power of attorney. My aunt has vascular dementia and her faculties are not good. She has issues with her short term memory and now long term is starting to be affected. My wife and I have been looking after her for the last 14 years, but the dementia has only been over the last year. Auntie owns a cottage and a small amount of land. We are now having issues with her step family - they're all coming out of the wood work and you can probably guess why. We've finally got her gp to diagnose the dementia and are taking her to the dementia liaison service tomorrow. We're hoping she will understand that she has dementia and we want to take steps to ensure she is being taking cared of properly and not going to be taken advantage of. Boris

I'm with Scottish Power pre-payment meter with key. Put £15 on card as usual. The gas meter read "error call help". So rang up and had the gas machine replaced with a new one. The person on the phone said they'll give me +£10 credit. Got new card in the mail later. Placed £5 to test. No extra +£10 credit, just the £5 I put on, and I still have the receipt of the original £15 and the old card. What are my options if they say they can't do anything about the £15? Not too bothered about the promised credit.

Hi All, Thank you for all your help over the many years - been a long journey but almost there. Now that I have the strength and knowledge (from here) to take on the financial system in this country, I'm now trying to help my elderly Dad fight back. My Dad was always in control of financial affairs in the past but for the last few years now has become less able to deal with the modern world and now he is showing early sign of dementia. It came as quite a shock to find out that he has 6 credit cards which are now leaving him with no pension to live on. It became noticeable last year when he was a victim of identity fraud. His bank account was cleared out twice and so he ended up with loads of penalty payment and a few defaults. I want to "put the brakes" on the charges and interest with all these companies and now feel I'm in a position to do so now that I have LPA (lasting power of attorney). My idea is to send these companies a letter saying that my sister and I are taking over financial affairs for Dad, enclose a copy of the LPA, and also start the ball rolling by asking for the original signed Credit Card Agreement. Some of my Dad's cards go back to the 80's I want to see if he has an agreement and if they don't at least put them on the back foot when I ask them to freeze his account so he can just work out a manageable payment plan. Should I do it this way or does anyone have a better idea? Best regards Fevr

Hi Caggers! I have a friend who is at the end of her tether with Scottish Power. She has a Gas Key for prepayment, however, has not used gas for approximately 6-9 years, possibly longer. This was due to the boiler breaking down and this was the only usage of gas, therefore she only uses electric immersion for the water heating. SP sent an invoice for money owing and after she quizzed them due to none usage they told her it was for X amount of standing charges for the gas meter. The agent for SP told her to ignore the bill due to none usage of gas and therefore she accepted that until she received another demand. Once the next agent told her a different story she requested the gas meter to be removed from her house. This request was made approximately 6+ years ago and was never actioned, until April 2018.Now of course they are demanding the standing charges for the last 6+ years at approximately £465. After numerous calls chasing up the removal and she was always told they were going to send somebody to do the removal. After many years of waiting they now sent her a bill for the entire periods of standing charges, which she disputes as she requested the removal, common sense eh? Now due to the hassle factor she has agreed to pay weekly when she tops up with her Electric Key to stop the hassle, but they do not appear to register these payments against her account as they have now issued a DC to chase her for the 'debt'. Now she contacts SP to inform them she has already made 3 payments to the account which they confirmed, but since then they know nothing of these payments and the DC keeps hassling her. Firstly, can she fight SP to actually cancel this debt in the first place as her request for removal was ignored? Secondly, how can we get this monster of a company to realise her payments already made need to be linked to her 'gas account' although she never buys gas? Any help would be greatly appreciated. regards stuscfc

Mum has Power of Attorney for her husband who has Parkinsons and lewy body dementia. Whilst she's managing the day to day stuff, she is really struggling to cope with finances, not least because she's caring full time and doesn't get 5 minutes to herself most days. She's asked me for help with sorting out Dad's bank account as there's lots of payments going out every month that she knows nothing about. Spent a day yesterday going through all the paperwork she has (she saves everything, but Dad went through a phase of throwing everything away without opening it just before he was diagnosed) and I've brought home everything I think is relevant, but dealing with it all is not going to be simple - for lots of things all I have to go on is a name, not even a reference - and though I have a copy of the PoA and signed authority from Mum, I don't think the banks etc are going to want to talk to me. It would be a lot simpler if Mum could add me to the Power of Attorney, but from what's on the OPG site we don't think this is possible. Does anyone know of a way around this?

Hi guys, So in late march/early April I spoke to SP about my outstanding bill and said i'd like to set up a plan to pay arrears (it wasn't particularly high) and get my account in order. Operative told me they couldn't do that unless i set up a monthly payment for my upcoming payments but only offered a monthly payment nearing £200 p/m. Told them that was completely unrealistic, and told them of my financial situation and that i needed to contact a few grant programmes. Operative told me account would be put on hold until mid april. Called back around mid April to inform them that i was awaiting a decision from the grant programme, and the operative told me account would be on hold up until the beginning of may. Got an email at the end of April from SP telling me they have registered a default against me. I called them up next day asking why this was done when my account was on hold and I was in contact with them (had just entered new meter reading two weeks prior as well) and the operative told me they would pass the issue to a manager to get this resolved. I asked how long that would take, they said about a week and they had put my account on hold again for 30 days. I called back at the end of the week and the operative told me that the previous operative was wrong, and they shouldn't have given me that time frame. Said it would take about 10 working days. Called back about toward the end of May as i had heard nothing and was told i would get a call the next day as the team who would deal with the issue closed at 5. No call the next day. I called that evening and said they'd call me on bank holiday. They called yesterday (wasn't a manager) and was told my account was passed on to a debt collection team even though it was supposed to be hold AGAIN. Started complaining to the operative who told me they'll recall my account from the agency, and sort out the default too. Said i would get another call back the next day after this has been done to set up a payment plan. So I get a call back today (not the same person as yesterday), who tells me the account was back with SP, but the can only sort out the default once it was paid in full. Told them this was now ridiculous, and was going to go the the ombudsman as I still hadn't even spoke to a manager a month later. Operative told me they would now open a complaint. I say all of this because I want to know what my options are regarding the default on my credit file and if there are any salient points i can make in my complaint? They've really messed me around for 2 months and this default has put me in a very precarious position. Any advice would be really appreciated. Thanks!

As some of you know Scottish Power (SP) are terrible at everything they do! Story: Friend 1: I helped an SP customer get their account sorted, back-billing issues. Now that's sorted and redress was nice for the customer. Friend 2: I am currently helping sort their back-billing issues, some success so far. Now being smart a SAR was sent to SP for friend 2. In their name only . The data pack duly arrives within the 40 days, some items were missing, a quick email to SP sorted that out. Now its complicated, on listening to the cd's of the phone calls for friend 2, SP have sent friend 2 copies of all friend 1's calls, neither friend know each other, never met nor communicated with each other whatsoever. The only common thing is me. I am not the data subject for either account. So why have SP issued data for friend 1 to friend 2, can friend 2 now complain to the ICO and the Ombudsman in relation to the data breach. It clearly can be heard that the normal security questions being asked and confirmed! Your thoughts please

last year I helped my grandmother switch from EON to Scottish Power to save some money on her energy bills, in October of last year when they requested meter readings we noticed that the previous meter reading showing on their website was in the region of 6000 units lower than the reading we had just taken. We contacted Scottish Power using their online contact form and explained the situation, they requested a photograph of the meter showing the serial number and current reading, then confirmed that the serial number was correct and that the meter read was indeed anomalous. At this point they requested we take photographs of the meter reading every day for a week to check if there was an issue with the meter reading too fast, we provided these at the end of the week the usage seemed normal, Scottish Power determined that the previous supplier had given them an incorrect opening meter read. On 2nd November Scottish Power advised that they would go back to the previous supplier and request that they amend their final meter read to a correct one and that within 28 days the opening meter reading on the Scottish Power account would be corrected. Shortly after my grandmother received an amended final bill from eON for £90 which showed they had amended their final meter read to the one specified by Scottish Power. After this was paid we just assumed that the issue would be resolved. Come late December Scottish Power sent an automated mail requesting meter readings so we took these, upon logging in to the website again we found that the online account still showed a meter read 6000 units too low. I replied to Scottish Power's e-mails on the matter on 25th December and received a response on 2nd January apologising and stating that they would once again get in touch with eON to have them amend their final meter read and that the issue would be resolved within 28 days. I immediately replied to this e-mail on the same day, advising Scottish Power that the previous supplier had already amended their final meter reading and that the issue was with the Scottish Power opening read, and that any changes needed to be carried out by Scottish Power. I never received a response to this mail. I sent another mail reply on 13th January, beyond the automated "We will respond within 48 hours" there was no reply forthcoming, and the online Scottish Power account still shows a meter reading 6000 units short of what it should be. As far as I can tell what's happened is that either Scottish Power have made a mistake when opening the account, as it appears from the amended final bill that eON did provide a correct final read originally, or shortly after opening the account a Scottish Power meter reader came to the property and read the meter, because the meter is at floor level they mistook a 6 for a 0 and then amended the meter read downwards themselves. We just want Scottish Power to amend the meter read on their system so that we can submit accurate meter readings without running the risk of being charged for 6000 units of usage that has already been paid to previous suppliers. Long term this issue also prevents switching providers as the new provider will be given the incorrect meter reads and the problem will start all over again. All communication with Scottish Power so far has been in writing via e-mail and we'd prefer to keep it that way so that everything is recorded/documented. I was planning on following the Scottish Power official complaints process this weekend, before that I was wondering if anyone here had an e-mail address for the Scottish Power CEO that I could try and contact on my grandmothers behalf and see if they can get this issue sorted out faster.

Hi I have found myself with a new problem. My Mother who is 82 years old went into residential care with advanced Dementia 6 weeks ago. I was her registered Carer, I helped with her finances but when she went into care I could no longer afford the minimum payments on her credit card. I notified the Co-operative Bank explaining the situation, sent a copy of the Mental Health form completed by her GP and a copy of the Power of Attorney. The Co-op are now requesting I take an original certified copy of the POA into a Branch, the nearest being in another town, before they can speak to me. I am doing my best to sort everything out and am grief stricken, Mum lived with me, has no assets or savings and the care home is being funded by the Local Authority. As a POA holder am I now responsible for her debt? and any advice what I should do would be very much appreciated. Many Thanks

Hi Everyone, I really need some help and advise with an issue that I currently have with N Power please. My partner and I used to rent a small one bedroomed flat, which we moved out of in August of this year and everything was electric, we had no gas at the property. Whilst we lived there all bills made to N Power were made on time and yes they were always high but we just assumed this was normal. On the 14th February 2017 we received a bill from them telling us that our monthly payment has decreased from £94 per month to £21 per month and they also refunded us £559.57 because we were in credit and had been overpaying. We continued to pay £21 per month with no problems until we notified them that we were leaving the property on the 19th August 2017. When our final bill was posted, they said we owe them £1093.40! After getting in touch with their customer service department, my partner and I must have spoken to around 4 different people and none of them could figure out why our final bill was so high, I contacted the complaints department who then looked into this issue for us. This issue has been going on since August now in December they have finally come to a conclusion regarding our bill. They have admitted that it was a fault made by them and that we should never have been given a refund and we should never have had our bills reduced to £21 per month but they still want us to pay back the full amount! I completely disagree with this. I obviously don't mind paying them for the energy we used but why should we pay them back to fix a mistake that was made by them? Please can someone help me as this is the first time I've had to deal with an issue like this and I don't know what to do. Can we fight this or do we have to give in and pay them back the full amount? Any advice on this will be greatly appreciated! Thanks, Michelle

My Mum In Law is in a local care home and today I received a letter from the home asking for a copy of the Power Of Attorney for her, which we do not have. The same letter also stated that if we do not have Power Of Attorney for her, the home would look into appointing an Advocate or Welfare Deputy through the Court of Protection. Can anyone please advise what this is at all? I do not want to visit the home to talk about the letter without first being at least aware of what it all means. Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

Hi all! Want to get my details in line ready for tomorrow when I am going to take my 20 month old HP Pavilion notebook back to PC World to see if I can get this power jack fixed. The port (on the laptop itself) has been loose, and now come apart, and the internal plastic spacer keeping all the pins straight has fallen out. This has been a problem since May 2017 but I was awaiting a response from HP which never came. It does still charge however the pins are highly likely to get bent now the spacer is not present. It's normally used on a table with no stress on the jack itself, and there is no damage present to the surrounding plastics or the charger/cable. I have spoken to KnowHow however they say that they will charge an up front fee of £60 to only assess the port before deciding if a manufacturing defect is present and therefore replace FOC. Can PC World charge this upfront? I am able and willing to replace the jack myself if they were to get the part. Most of them on eBay appear to be £20+ and HP's own spares site state that they do not stock it.

Hi All I have received a letter today from Past Due Credit Solutions requesting payment of just over £1.5k for an account with n power at a property I lived in for 18 months this between 2010 and 2012. Firstly the dates of the account are incorrect and are for a further 2 months after I moved out, secondly this is the first I heard that I owed them money! I'm not sure where to start with this one to be honest. Do I send them a SAR request? If so, is there a template specificity for energy companies? I was paying previously via a bank account I closed sometime ago it's going to take me a while to price payment I would like to push the ball into their court for now. Looking online and at other forums i think n power have sold on a shed load of accounts recently to DCA's as there seems to be an awful lot of people complaining about debt collectors film letters for old accounts. Any help you can give would be appreciated. Thanks

This situation now is so ridiculous it is beyond frustration. I initiated the switch process to leave Scottish Power back in February. This was objected to. Contacted them to find out why and was advised that incorrect MPAN had been applied for. Supplied with MPAN. Contacted new supplier with MPAN. Was the same one they had applied for. Switch re-initiated. Objected to again. Phoned Scottish Power to discover reason for this second objection. Again informed it was because of incorrect MPAN. Was now advised that supply had a dual MPAN and that first number advised was in fact the secondary number and that a different primary number had to be applied for. Back to new supplier with this info. After some discussion, questioning and investigation, new supplier advised they were unable to take over the supply unless the second MPAN was de-energised and unregistered and / or the meter changed. Back to SP with this information and a request for them to perform said actions. After some long discussion which centered mostly around trying to convince them that I do not have electric heating an appointment was made to have the meter changed. Told a letter would be sent out to confirm. No letter was received so called SP the day before scheduled appointment to confirm. Rep was unable to access this information nor able to confirm or deny appointment. Next day no one arrive to perform meter change. Called SP again to complain and ask why. Rep was unable to answer this question or access the relevant information. Was put on hold several time while he made enquires with other people and departments. The last time I was put on hold I was left there for approx 1 1/2 hours before being disconnected. Both emailed and called to voice my complaint and displeasure at the situation. Receive irrelevant email replies addressed to someone else. The account is registered in my name only and no one is registered on it, had made contact on my behalf or should be affiliated in anyway with it. Also received and email addressed to both myself and this other person asking that we ignore the previous message and requesting we provide a letter of authority to allow details to be disclosed to this other name person. Each of these messages bearing this name were questioned and explanation sought as to who this person was and why they were being linked to my account. No answer received, only replies that bore no resemblance to the questions asked or the points raised. Various other emails sent and calls made trying to find a resolve, each time in vain and usually with Scottish Power referring to the electric heating in the property. The electric heating I do not have. There seems to be some sort of inability or unwillingness for them to accept the fact I do have electric powered heating as most of their correspondence includes some sort of reference to it and the cycle begins again when I explain that this is not the case. Having received yet another email stating that there is a dual MPAN because of the fact the property had electric heating I sent an email reply and telephoned them. After spending a good few minutes explaining the situation and making it abundantly clear that I do have electric heating the rep put me on hold. On picking up the call again the rep began to explain that the meter could be changed but that I would be making a mistake as the cost of my electricity would increase, especially that of my heating. Not believing I was hearing I stopped him and asked him to explain his statement given that I had not ten minutes previously finished telling him that my heating was not electric powered. "Oh, I missed that" came the response. At this point I was put on hold again as he went to seek advice. Returned to the call and advised that someone else would look into this and call me later. After agreeing a suitable time the call back was confirmed by the agent. No call received. Sent yet another email complaining of the situation. Surprised to receive a call from a complain resolution rep. Short lived was this surprise as, Deja vu, she started to comment on the supply and the electric heating. Again I had to state and explain this was not the case. This was met with great resistment and I was even asked whether I was sure as I had to have electric heating. She at this point advised that more investigation would have to be done but the she was finished at three o'clock and would not be returning until the following week. Told me she would send me an email from her direct address and asked that I send photographs of my electric meter to aid resolve the situation. Never received her mail. Have sent yet another email of complaint You can see why it is now beyond frustrating. Have passed some of this onto OFGEM. All I want them to do is change the meter to allow me switch supplier. Any suggestion how I can get them to do this ?

I moved into new rented house, I called & gave the start meter readings, my name & emai & phone number to SP, I requested a contract & standing order mandate to be sent in the post for me to sign & return & asked for the cheapest online tariffs. 3 years & 5 months later I still have not received anything in my name from SP, what I have received are many letters (possibly bills?) addressed to someone else, all of which I returned to SP "not known at this address. I have called them 4 times speaking to different operators all promising to help & put me through to the right department but nothing happened & I was left on hold or cut off. I complained in writing to SP only to receive a computer generated standard letter from their fictitious Lynda Clayton giving me a complaint number & promising they would investigate. Nothing was done. I broke the law & opened one of the mystery letters & managed to pay one of the accounts in full. I came home one day to find that SP has visited the house, they had tried but failed to break in, & changed both gas & electricity credit meters for pre payment versions. I complained in writing again to SP. Same computer letter & empty promises. For the last 17 months I have been paying for my energy upfront using a card & key. Each week when I load £10 onto the gas meter it deducts £6 average for an unproven alleged & estimated debt. SP then tried to transfer the alleged gas debt over to the electricity account & tried to deduct monies from that meter as well. I have received a letter & an email from SP only after the intervention of the Observer newspaper (Funny that !) again promising to investigate - but still nothing. I have complained to the energy ombudsman but thus far not much action from them either. Does anyone have any ideas as to how I should proceed ? Informally I have been advised to hire a solicitor & sue them. I am told that they are likely to be guilty of, breach of contract, mis selling, false accounting, maladministration, fraud, deception, criminal damage, trespass, theft, abuse of power, slander, I am sure there will be more . . Regards.

Hi all Looking for a bit of advice as I need to extract some tables from web pages (nothing illegal) I have been looking for a free easy to use Excel web scrapper but they all seem to be pointing to specific web data (eg Yellow Pages) and have been advised to use Microsoft Power Query which I have downloaded and installed. I have had a quick look and it looks quite a powerful tool but has anyone ever used this tool. The MS instructions are not meant for the simple brained operator who has not got 10 A levels and a degree in IT Any help would be very much appreciated. Note .. I am not a novice Excel user. I can advanced functions and program with both Macro and VB language British Expat TIA

Hello Friends, Scottish Power, my previous energy provider, had some misleading text on the bills about my current and the best tariff possible and this caused me to not switch to the best tariff. I raised this with energy ombudsman, who agreed with me and asked Scottish Power to pay me Goodwill gesture of £30.00 for shortfall in service. However the ombudsman said they cannot ask Scottish Power to pay for consequential losses due to misleading literature, which would be to apply correct rate retrospectively. Ombudsman said that compensations like consequential losses, stress etc are not in their scope and that's why they can only recommend a Goodwill gesture compensation for shortfall in service. Can you please advise where can I go for consequential losses, other than court. I tried Financial Ombudsman but they said such cases are in their scope. Financial Ombudsman suggested going to ICO. Are they right? Can ICO look into this case of consequential losses due to confusing literature.

My brother in law obtained POA over my son without consulting me, My son tells me he never asked for his uncle to become his POA, I cannot get access to my sons accounts (at his request) indeed my son cannot view the state of his account himself, My son wishes to cancel the POA. where do I stand in this matter

i have just been given power of attorney over my father , his grandson is 45 and been living with my father rent free bill free all his life, my father has been in a home for over a year and the grandson has been using my fathers bank card, there is a police investigation due to over 10 thousand pound being stolen from my fathers account the outcome of this investigation is near , but my question is , i have asked the grandson for the spare set of keys for the house as i need access to the house paper work ect but he has refused to hand the keys over to me , i want to do this the correct way , what can i do ?

Received an email from a friend of mine, as follows:- “Well....what do you think about this...in the post was a letter from Scottish Power. They inform me I have an outstanding credit with them (£13.83) which they have now paid into my bank.....I closed my Scottish Power account in October 2013 !! ....”

I have just moved house and let Scottish Power know as we have been customers for 13 years paying a direct debit monthly and never defaulting. Yesterday I had a text from the bank and looking at my accounts they have taken £1,452 out without any prior communication. When I rang them they said it was arrears which I did not have any idea about. I can't understand why I have not been contacted about this as it was so much as I would have paid more each month. I went to the bank and they have refunded me but obviously I have to sort it out. Surely more communication should have been given, they e-mailed me when they needed meter readings. Can anyone please comment on this. Thanks for any input.

hi everyone, my brothers wife passed away 5 years ago and in her will she said my brother could continue to live in her house for the rest of his days or until he remarried then the house would be returned to her 3 grown ups. 3 weeks ago my brother was taken into a nursing home and will never return to his wifes formal home as he is so ill and not expected to live much longer. 2 weeks ago the 3 grown ups who now own the house broke into the house awith a locksmith and took control of house changing locks etc without any court order I may add. The 3 grown ups solicitor wrote to my brothers solicitor asking my brother for £25 thousand pounds to repair damage done to the house which my brother does not have. my brother gave me power of attorney in 2012 so if the 3 grown ups decided to sue my brother for 25 thousand which he dosnt have would I then become responsible to pay it myself?. I have no conection to house financially or anything else. ive never taken out any loans debts nothing at all either in my name or my brothers. any help and advise id be most gratefull for many thanks.

Hi, I tried to leave Scottish Power for one of the smaller/greener alternatives, this was stopped before transfer could be completed as the majority of suppliers seemingly cannot deal with a Green Deal loan on the property. So far, all seems normal - however, at the same point of where the transfer was to take place 12 months of bills were regenerated and access to the old bills was removed from their website (some were weeks or days long, rather than monthly or quarterly). Luckily I had a copy of one of the 'settled' invoices (maybe it's a statement..? - I pay monthly DD) which was very different to the one now on their website. So I downloaded everything available and emailed their support (keep it in writing where possible, I thought) They replied that they needed my account number but did not open me a case. I replied with my account number. They ignored me. I emailed again and then escalated to their Director of Customer Relations (only posted normally, so no proof of receipt). After months of no reply, I sent them a SAR request - copies of all of the statements (I haven't had chance to check which version and if there are duplicates) and no mention whatsoever of my emails or letter. So, should I send this up to the ombudsman, or battle more with their customer (dis)service? Scottish Power Letter 17 Oct 2016 red.pdf