EON Help- DD went from £70 to £400 per month!

[Archie1963]

I hope someone has some advice because I am at my wits end with Eon

 

 

In 2012 I moved into a property contacted EON who set up a DD payment

 

After 13 months we received a letter stating that our consumption had been underestimated and our DD would increase from £78.00 per month to £392.00 per month

 

As you would do I contacted EON there are two adults in the property and there is no way we could afford this, the amount was to cover usage and ongoing consumption

 

EON refused any offer of any payment less which went on for another few months and issued a deadlock letter

 

Eventually we agreed to pay £250.00 per month which has gone along fine, the debt has never really gone down despite us consistently saying there must be a problem, a 18 month payment plan has been in place we are averaging 32.00 gas per month and 24.00 electric

 

 

Fast forward to August 2016 EON took a DD payment of 578.00 from my account and claimed this was our new DD following an account review despite the payment plan being in place

 

If we contact EON advisors are rude arrogant aggressive the list goes on

 

Now each time we contact EON they refuse to raise a complaint despite ongoing mismanagement of the account, the reason for this is because we have a deadlock letter.

 

The energy ombudsman say because the deadlock letter was issued over nine month ago they wont investigate

 

Where do we go now

[dx100uk]

if they did not inform you by letter they were going to take that money under the DD

go get it back under the DD guarantee from your bank.

 

 

now can give us a bit more background of this 2012 onwards issue

somethings not right here

 

 

how can a duel fuel bill go from £70 to£400PCM overnight

that usage would be incredible!

 

 

I believe we still have an EON rep here

i'll go alert them

 

 

dx

[Archie1963]

I know but what they are saying is that the period where we were paying 70.00 a month for 13 months was underestimated so they reviewed the account after a year and said our consumption was way higher than thought its been a constant battle about this

[dx100uk]

still doesn't seem right

 

 

did they write telling they'd take the £ 578.00

if not go do a DD guarantee refund now.

 

 

malc the EON rep should pop in tomorrow

[Archie1963]

From 2013 when the underestimation came about they refused any payment less than £390.00 per month which we couldn't afford

 

 

its been awful

 

 

i asked for a reduction in DD payment

 

 

we go along for a short time then they want to increase this

 

 

but the way we are treated every time we contact EON is shocking seriously

 

They provided the deadlock letter and now EON refuse to talk to us following them taking 578.00 which they say is our new DD payment

[dx100uk]

did they write to you before they took the £578

detailing exactly when that would be taken

and atleast 7days before they did do it?

[Archie1963]

No they never wrote to say that

 

when i was made aware I rung them and they said they sent an email

but they never sent it to my email address

 

I am still waiting for them to tell me where the email was sent

 

now they are saying that they will not discuss this with me because we have had a deadlock letter but that was in 2014 it has nothing to do with how they have manged things since

 

I only realised when i checked my on line banking

[Bazooka Boo]

I would cancel the DD , and set up a SO.

Lodge a formal complaint with them BUT inform them that as it has been longer than 8 weeks since your first complaint, which they failed to rectify satisfactorily, you are now going to the energy ombudsman, to have the matter resolved as they are clearly not able to justify, nor explain the extremely extortionate amounts they are demanding, nor are they willing to investigate the matter.

 

£400 a month?? You're being royally shafted and mugged off!

[dx100uk]

I never let any of these have a DD setup

they just help themselves.

 

 

always cancel it

then use bacs or SO.

[Bazooka Boo]

I never let any of these have a DD setup

they just help themselves.

 

 

always cancel it

then use bacs or SO.

 

Yep, totally agree DX, all DD does is allow them access to your bank account to take what they want when they want.

[Archie1963]

Thank you

 

I cancelled the DD when they took the 578.00 and am paying what I can towards the outstanding amount but they will not lodge any further complaint due to the deadlock letter despite making error after error

 

The ombudsman are saying also as we received our deadlock letter over 9 months ago it is unlikely they will take it on

 

We cannot change supplier as we have the outstanding debt caused by the year underestimated bill

 

Yesterday I had six automated phone call messages from EON

 

They are the most pig ignorant advisors that I have ever dealt with

[dx100uk]

wait for malc to pop in.

 

 

I suspect you owe 'something' obviously

so that 578 might cover it or some

let malc sort it out

 

 

dx

[ericsbrother]

have you got your last couple of sets of meter readings?

£70pm may be a little low but £400pm to recover the shortfall of around £500 ( average fuel bill for terrace house) for the year and a bit is extreme.

 

You need to check your meters by switching everything off and taking readings and then an hour later.

the mater should not have moved.

 

 

Then try turning things back on one at a time such as fridge etc and take readings after an hour the consumption should match the wattage of the item.

 

 

as for your gas meter,

is the display in Cu Ft or M3?

 

 

Check this against your bills as with older meters you may be using cuft and being charged for cubic metres, which is 28 times too much!

[Archie1963]

Thanks I will do that

 

There is a debt on the account as I explained which has come about after 15 months where we were paying 78.00 per month this was a fixed DD set by EON

 

 

after 15 months they wanted us to increase our DD to 392.00 DD per month based on our actual consumption for that year

 

 

of course we are now paying the outstanding debt and out ongoing consumption

 

 

our actual usage for the last few months (although I appreciate its summer averages at about £36.00 gas and £52.00 electric

[E.ON Company Rep: Malc]

Sorry Archie1963 but not been around CAG today and am now away for a couple of weeks. I've asked my colleague Helena to take a look on Monday.

 

Thanks.

 

Malc

[Archie1963]

Thanks Malc

[ThedaBara]

Pffttt!! EON charge me £1,500 a year... I live alone and I have oil central heating/hot water and I don't have an oven, just a hob... I know that something's wrong with the meter but I'm worried they will check it and say it's ok and then charge me for checking it. On a very low income. (£500 a month after rent). TB

[E.ON Company Rep: Helena]

Good morning Archie1963,

 

I'm sorry for the delay on getting a reply on here for you.

 

It sounds a bit of a muddle here to be honest, I understand you were under paying for a while so we increased the Direct Debit to cover usage and the balance.

 

However, this appears to have been going on for some time.

 

Quite rightly you raised a complaint, this should then have been fully investigated and you should have had a complaints manager looking after this for you, this would then have been followed through to either a resolution or by getting a deadlock letter and then going to the ombudsman.

 

You say you did get the deadlock letter 9 months ago, did you go to the ombudsman when you received the letter? What did they say then?

 

I understand the account is still estimated, if so, you can just pop some reads on your online account and bring this fully up to date, you'll then know the position of the account.

 

I think at this point, this isn't a complaint I can actually take over, it's gone above me, but I can certainly get you in contact with the correct people. No one should be rude to you on the phone when you contact us that's not acceptable at all.

 

If you need me, please email all of your details and I'll get this passed on for you.

 

Thank you

 

Helena

[Archie1963]

Hi Helena

 

 

Thanks for your reply it is a real muddle

 

The deadlock letter was sent in 2015 but we then agreed with EON a £200 18 month payment plan because that is all they would agree going forward which is why it did not go to the ombudsman at that point,

 

 

however after arranging the 18 month payment plan they decided to increase that payment to £280.00 which I refused

their attitude and constant calling threatening letters ect ect,

 

 

they then reset the payment up but in August went into my account and took £578.00 which they say is my new DD figure!!!

 

 

I cancelled the DD got the £578.00 back and contacted EON

they said they emailed me regarding the DD increase but they didnt and they cannot tell me who that email went too

 

I complained they said I cannot complain as we have a deadlock letter (received in 2015)

i said this has nothing to do with that this is about the mismanagement of my account from that day forward

 

EON refuse to acknowledge complaints as the say it is connected to the deadlock letter

 

I have never in my life come across such a load of rubbish and as I said rude ignorant people with zero customer service skills

 

Last week i was receiving 6 automated messages a day asking me to call them

 

If this was a case that i was refusing to pay I could understand,

the debt was initially bought about by the underestimation,

however I provide meter reads on line to expect any customer unless you are a commercial property to pay £578.00 is utterly madness

 

I have cancelled my DD and have paid my last two payments to EON on line account they are still calling driving me insane

 

I am waiting for appointment with CAB as I believe the next step is legal action

[E.ON Company Rep: Helena]

Thank you very much for the reply.

 

I understand.

 

It sounds like it's linked as the balance and therefore, the payment amount is a result of the initial problem. But this is a guess as I haven't been involved and the reason I think it needs looking at.

 

If you wanted to have a word with the CAB first, then come back to me I'll still be more than happy to pass you on to the correct people.

 

You can just pop back on here, or drop me an email.

 

Thank you

 

Helena

[Archie1963]

Thanks Helena I will do however the initial underestimation does not give EON the right to continue mismanaging the account and treat customers in this disgusting way.

 

I work for an energy company myself thankfully they are not one of the big 6 and their customer service is amazing sadly i cannot switch to them or any other company because I am tied to EON because of this debt absolutely shocking

[E.ON Company Rep: Helena]

No worries,

 

I agree, we should have had this resolved and in no way should anyone be rude you and the account should be running properly now.

 

I'm here when you need me.

 

Helena

[dx100uk]

archie if you want to PM me or any siteteam member your details

we will fwd to Helena so you've not enough posts to do it directly

[E.ON Company Rep: Helena]

archie if you want to PM me or any siteteam member your details

we will fwd to Helena so you've not enough posts to do it directly

 

Thank you

[Good Sister]

Hello Archie1963,

 

Forgive me if I am mistaken, but I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere what type of contract you are in.

Are you in a fixed term contract that is due to expire in the next few months or do you have an upcoming 'review' date for an ongoing contract?

 

The reason I ask is that I know from being an E-On customer myself that they like to have the balance on the account as close to 0 as possible at the end of the contract or on the review date.

Therefore they will periodically check and review your direct debit payments to make sure you are on target.

Which might explain a huge rise in the direct debit and why your previous payments haven't covered enough.

 

That said, that's a shocking increase.

Have you been getting regular bills in that time so you could see how the debt was supposedly building up?

Do you send them regular meter readings?

If you haven't seen a statement from them regarding your payments and what you owe, ask them for this.

You don't have to say it's to do with your complaint

- you have a right to see this. I would also be inclined to do the meter test that ericsbrother set out so you can rule out any meter issues.