Scottish Power

[rascal]

Scottish Power have just put my monthly payments up from £63.50 a month to £260.00 a month!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! . I physically cannot afford this what do I do?

 

There was some discrepancy on our meter readings a while back and whether or not we had a faulty meter or what I dont know but Ive checked the readings appearing on my bill now and they match up to the ones on my meters. Im scared ****less - I am not working at the moment on full pay as Ive just had a baby so on maternity leave for the next year.

 

What do I do? My husband is going mental at me Ive explained I cant do anything til Monday when their lines are open.

 

If I suggested a payment plan to them to cover my suggested bill of £2500 for the YEAR (we only live in a 2-bed house) do you think they would accept it? Can they cut me off?

 

Im really scared.

[Guest NATTIE]

Switch to a cheaper provider maybe. worth a look at some of the witching sites as you may be able to get some money back as well

[barracad]

You need to discuss payment arrangements with them immediately.

 

They cannot cut you off - absolute worse case scenario is they will fit a pre-payment meter but you should be able to set up a payment arrangement to avoid this.

 

Also do as NWSM suggests - dig out a recent bill and go to one of the comparison sites like uswitch.com and find a cheaper provider!

[gizmo111]

Thing is SP will stop yu from switching if you owe them money.

[Gruffle Gaw]

I'm just recovering from the same situation (well, I didn't owe quite as much) with NPower, whose customer service is the worst I've ever encountered. I suggest you go and see the Citizens Advice Bureau about this - they will work out a payment plan based on your income and the electricity company are more or less obliged to accept it if the CAB have drawn it up based on your budget.

 

Given that it has risen so steeply, I would also suggest you take a meter reading and find out what your actual bill is. It is not acceptable for them to pluck numbers out of thin air and demand you make extortionate payments based on their "estimates".

 

Finally, when you speak to the CAB ask them to demand that someone comes round to check your meter is working properly. It could be that the meter is faulty.

 

However, I wouldn't hold out much hope for the above. Fuel costs have skyrocketed lately - I am currently paying around £100 a month for my usage in a one-bedroom flat. I live alone, am out at work all day, have my hot water turned off all the time (aside from the shower, which runs seperately) and only have the heater on in one room. In my case, NPower are refusing to send someone round to check the meter unless I take seven days worth of readings, and even then say I will be liable to pay the call-out cost if it transpires my meter is working fine. Since you can't switch suppliers while you owe them money, it basically amounts to extortion. I have contacted the industry watchdog energywatch about this and suggest you do the same.

 

This is the problem with privatising essential commodities - I blame Margaret Thatcher.

[Gruffle Gaw]

Oh, and barracad is more or less right - while they can (I am told by the CAB) theoretically cut you off this is highly unlikely. They will be more likely to exert pressure on you to have a pre-payment meter fitted. You want to avoid this at all costs because a) they will take around 1/3 of the money you put into it off the arrears before you have even begun to pay for the electricity and you can probably negotiate much less with a payment plan and b) they will charge you MORE per unit. It's appalling that they extort more money for an essential commodity from the poorest and most vulnerable in our society, but hey, that's capitalism for you.

[demon_x_slash]

Guh - we were shocked at how much our leccy bill was this quarter, we thought we'd been wasteful for the past three months! Now we know it's the companies themselves... I thought it was a fair bit higher than usual, what with our energy-saving lightbulbs and eco7...

[buzby]

The trouble with these averaged payments to account, is that the company itself calculates your future consumption based on the ptrvious year, adds for inflation then tell you how much it wants. Just like DD, it's a double whammy. It's supposed benefits of averaging the cost across the year are laudible, but the fact consumers are giving way their right to manage their own affairs makes me wonder if it's worth the effort.

[Irishson]

Hello i know that this may not be the place to put this, but my computer wont let me create a new thread, so if someone could maybe put it in a new thread. I am currently Moving house and wanting to take scottish power with me so i dont have a large bill to pay upfront, but when i applied to do it online it said i need to reapply for my services but it calculated my monthly payment at 124 pm whereas im paying 72 pm at the minute and i cant afford a 50 pound increase. Does anyone have advice on what i can say to them to get the price down? A friend said i should just tell them because it will even out over the summer they should keep it as it is?

[dx100uk]

7yrs old thread!!

 

 

see the link below upon how to start a new thread

 

dx