British Gas have "recalculated" my gas bill for 1.5 years adding £239.75 to my bill

[confusedwife]

My recent post on this site brought much joy to our house.

 

We had a gas bill of over £4000 for one year - I discovered through this site that we had been incorrectly charged as British Gas had decided that we had an imperial meter as opposed to a metric one (and therefore multipied our meter readings by 2.83 - the metric conversion factor).

 

Having a maths A level under my belt I decided to recalculate our bill starting from when we first bought the property (Jan 08). Fairly simple maths - just removing the 2.83 multiple in the gas units to kilowatt hours calculation and then readjusting the VAT. We owe them exactly £668.52. A lot - but better than the £3413.73 they claimed we were in debit (we had already paid £701 during this period).

 

Despite many protestations they eventually conceded that we did indeed have a metric meter. Hurrah we thought.

 

Not so.

 

"Computer says no"

Apparently they are unable to make retrospective changes to their systems for anything over a year old. Our metric meter was fitted in July '07. Therefore they had to falsely "install" a new meter in June '08. Apparently this means that they now needed to change all of our estimates which now means that our highest usage happens to fall within their highest billing structure.

• 182 days at 1.9 units/day (6.151p + 2.58p)
  
• 204 days at 12 units/day (7.203p + 3.632p)
  
• 90 days at 10.6 units/day (6.863p + 3.292p)
  
• 3 days at 3.67 units/day (6.863p + 3.292p)
  

The british gas advisor I spoke to had initially said we would receive a "good will" payment to recognise how much they had messed up. hmmmmm..... no sign of good will here.

 

I have printed out the original bills - can they really get away with this???

[mattlamb]

Surely they can manually calculate the correct amount and then send you the bill, by using Microsoft Excel if they have to, in order to show you how they have calculated the amount? If not, I would be fighting hard for the amount you receive as a "goodwill payment" should be at least equal to the amount extra you have been billed thanks to gas units being charged at the higher 2008 prices, instead of the lower 2007 ones. Plus something extra for the huge inconvenience they have caused to you.

 

I would suggest you go the industry watchdog if they are not prepared to do this. Someone else may be able to offer you their thoughts on this.

[indebtstudent]

Look I work in the industry and, to be honest, there are some limitations to the system. However I am in complete agreement with the above post the calculation MUST be done manually why should you be disadvantaged by thier mistake?

 

From your message I would say it is a little early to be going to the watchdog. I say this because the first thing they would ask is have you raised a COMPLAINT with the company.

 

Again from my own perspective it seems to me you have spoken to an advisor who has requested an adjustment based on thier knowledge of the system.

 

If you are not satisfied with this, and are unsure if this is being treated as a complaint, contact them again ask to speak to a supervisor. If your remain unhappy escalate it.

 

You can go to the Ombudsmen if you remain unsatisfied but the timescale (which I'm not sure of) starts ticking from when the complaint is made.

 

I believe at the least BG should manually calculate the difference and credit it to your bill, it is a judgment call for yourself if you want to press for more given theer under-whelming efforts to sort this out.

 

If its any consolation if you have changed supplier the same mistake may have occured as they would have simply lifted the info from the national database which is clearly incorrect.

 

Good luck.