n power charges

[dransy]

I moved house in December and I was paying my gas and electric via the meter and had to go to the shop to put credit on a card .

Had a few letters over the past few weeks from N Power . The first letter said I owe 8 pound on gas and 13 pound electric , I spat my dummie out and was like how the fuck can I owe money on a meter when I use what I pay for .

Week after I got a letter saying that they owe me 22 pound for electric and 8 pound for the gas .

Now this week I've got another letter saying I owe the a total of 84 quid .

Now I'm already minus 550 quid in my bank going from weekly to monthly pay so like fuck I can afford to pay it when I can't even afford my rent for the next 3 week .

Have I got any grounds not to pay this ? If they put there prices up and then don't come change the meter to match the prices its there fault so can go fuck .

Thoughts ? [/b][/i]
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Being shot out of a cannon will always be better than being squeezed out of a tube. That is why God made fast motorcycles

[wr6133]

[Rogerborg]

We aim to provide you with the best possible service but sometimes things can go wrong. We take complaints very seriously so if you aren't happy with our service we'll do our best to put things right.

Escalate, escalate, escalate.
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GONE: HN125-8, LF-250B, GPz 305, GPZ 500S, Burgman 400 // RIDING: F650GS (800 twin), Royal Enfield Bullet Electra 500 AVL, Ninja 250R because racebike

[Flatbadger]

Have you passed on your details to NP and told them you're new in the house? Could be there's a debt still on the meter from the previous occupants. Who are the letters addressed to?
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If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
You're in ISIS

[Kickstart]

[daffy]

[Kickstart]

Hi

Quite probably the previous owners had landed up in credit, or the meter had not been changed since npower increased their prices a couple of months ago.

Reading a meter is not the same as changing the meter rate. And I wouldn't be surprised if the company doing the meter reading is a different one to the owners of the meter. So unlikely the reader could change the meter rate.

This is standard for all the electricity / gas suppliers.

All the best

Keith
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Traxpics, track day and racing photographs - Bimota Forum - Bike performance / thrust graphs for choosing gearing

[dransy]

There was credit on the meters when I left and I took meter readings on the day I handed the keys in
____________________
Being shot out of a cannon will always be better than being squeezed out of a tube. That is why God made fast motorcycles

[Kickstart]

Hi

The credit on the meter would assume that the rate on the meter was set correctly.

It would be entirely possible for the meter to be accounting based on 8p a units while the electricity is billed to the customer at (say) 10p a unit. So if you paid for £800 worth of tokens you would get £1000 worth of electric and be £200 in debt.

Putting a token in the meter does nothing to pay for the electric instead it merely trigger the meter to release the electric. It is buying the tokens that pays for the electric. This is why using tokens someone else has bought (or stolen) is pointless.

All the best

Keith
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Traxpics, track day and racing photographs - Bimota Forum - Bike performance / thrust graphs for choosing gearing

[dransy]

It wasn't a token it was a gas card and an electric stick thingy I don't know if that's what you mean , but I thought the purpose of them was so you can't get in debt as you only get what you put on the card
____________________
Being shot out of a cannon will always be better than being squeezed out of a tube. That is why God made fast motorcycles

[Kickstart]

Hi

Depends on the setup. There were Smartcard electric meters which took readings between the meter and the electricity supplier, allowing easy adjustment of the meter rates, credit, etc, when recharged. However these were regarded as non standard (think only 2~3 of the regional electric companies used them) and so dumped as people moved between suppliers, replaced with just basic token type setups (initially most would have just been switched to basic token or credit mode). I don't think the industry data systems support this kind of processing. Supply and distribution are split, hence the company generating the electric, the company selling it to you, the company whose lines the power goes through to reach you, the company reading the meter and the company that own the meter are likely all different, hence for anything to be used the central systems must support it.

I am not sure how the gas smart cards work but suspect they are the same.

The point of tokens and the like was to keep usage pretty close to payments. But when the cost of gas or electric changes the meters rate needs to be updated to reflect this. As such people can easily get into debt. When this happens the rate is (eventually) adjusted above the cost of the units until they are back in credit, or more likely until they are some way in credit .

When you buy credit you get (say) £10 worth of credit. This goes to the meter as being £10 at whatever rate the meter is set up to supply, while being fed back to your supplier as £10 to pay your bill at whatever the real current rate is. Hence ultimately for billing the rate the meter supplies units at is irrelevant. The rate could change for billing on a particular day (with the bill calculated based on how many days of use were before and after that date), but it could easily be months or even years later that the rate on the meter is updated.

All the best

Keith
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Traxpics, track day and racing photographs - Bimota Forum - Bike performance / thrust graphs for choosing gearing

[_mjs_]

Good luck sorting it out. I used to get my gas and electric from Npower and despite trying several times I found it literally impossibru to get through to an actual person on the phone.

If you're still living in West Leeds I found switching to EDF save me a few pennies
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Previous Bikes: 2006 Honda XR125L > 2003 Yamaha DT125R > 1996 Honda CB500
Current bikes: 1997 Kawasaki ZZR 600 E5 > 2006 Honda Varadero XL125V

[Cunnington]

The second largest of the big 6 (who supply me) has almost 10 million customer accounts. Assume a single figure percentage for PAYG type meters. If they change their prices, are they going to manage to visit up to a million meters within a timescale that you deem "acceptable"?

They currently aim to read their meters every 6 months, assuming they can get access, which is an indication of the level of resource they have for reading meters so what do they do? Employ more meter readers? That will increase their costs, which will increase their bills as they seek to cover them.

Smart meters are being rolled out which gives real time information to your supplier over the gsm network, which takes away from the need to read the meter, so hopefully these issues will resolve themselves.

When you go to a paypoint or whatever to get your key credited, it will credit the value to your account as well as allowing you to transfer the value to the meter, to allow the meter to release that value to you.

Contact NP and tell them that you will struggle to pay immediately and explain your situation - no supplier will disconnect in the winter, and they will take measures that will allow you to work your way out of being in deficit over a number of months, much like Kickstart described.
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'82 C50, '81 CB100, '84 GS125, '95 NTV650, '00 Bandit 600, '06 SV650, '56 Z1000, '89 NTV600
The Shaggy D.A. wrote: "You are invisible. Those who can see you are trying to kill you."

[Kickstart]

[chickenstrip]

I had problems with British Gas telling me I owed money that I didn't. I sent them a letter showing exactly why they were wrong. Then they went quiet. When I moved, they found my new address although I wasn't with them anymore, and started to hound me again, threatening legal action if I didn't pay what I (didn't) owe. I referred them to my last letter, and they went quiet again. Then, when I moved again, it started again. So referred them to my previous referral and invited them to take action. They went quiet again. Wonder if they ever update their records properly.