NPOWER

[cat 1]

OMG.I've got both gas and lecky with npower.I've just send in meter readings.Recieved a revised lecky bill today.It's gone up by £95 per month.How on earth can I find this?Dreading the gas...CAT4[V]

[Viki.W]

Oh Cat, that's a HUGE increase. I'm sorry, don't know what to suggest. [:(] X

[chris.g]

OMG, sorry to hear that Cat. They were a nightmare with us, left us underpaying for nearly 2 year then sent us a whopping £1500 catch up bill.....NumptyPower is what we've been calling them on the forum....
You need to get on a capped tarrif rate, before it goes up anymore to be on the safe side.

[kallis3]

Cat, that's really terrible! I can't remember if you are in an IVA yet or not(the memory is not what it used to be!) but if you are, I think you need to speak to your IP and tell him/her of your increase.

I'm with Atlantic for both of mine, have two bills a year and the meters are read by them on both occasions, so no nasty estimated bills.

[Skippy]

I would get away from Numpty Power as soon as you can Cat. They were a nightmare with us - they told Dave we needed to pay a total of £30 a month for gas and electricity but luckily he said no, he wanted to pay £30 each. We still got a bill for over £200 for gas as they never took both DDs - they took gas one month, and when Dave queried the electricity DD they hadn't set an account up. They set up an electricty account and cancelled the gas account and sent a final demand for a bill that wasn't even due!

We've switched now, so hopefully we're rid of them, but I'm not counting on it - you might see me on Watchdog yet!

[CJ08]

They were on watchdog at end of last series with the most complaints taken over from british gas!!

[cat 1]

[:(]I can't change suppliers as I now owe £800!

[kallis3]

Bummer!!!!![:(][:(]

[chris.g]

Cat, how long did it take for the debt to accrue? They have to give you the same period of time to repay it,

[jpj]

All the power companies are as bad as each other...I battled with Eon for two and a half years cause my meter was faulty and i got no cheap rate leccy....

Time to move to a warmer Island me thinks!!![8D]

[Soulgrowth]

Apparently that's a bit of a ploy ... they undercharge you so that you owe them money and can't change suppliers!

I do mine the old fashioned way ... put so much away in my ebanking savings account each month, and get the interest on it, and have a quarterly bill which means they HAVE to come and read my meter at least twice a year.

Debbie

[CJ08]

British Gas have a ploy of not collecting the dd on one of my accounts when i approach a "zero" balance and then argue for 3 months to sort it and then im back to owing like £100 again!! The worse one was i complained to sort something out they read my meter aparently used £200 worth in the summer but as i had 32 letters in 2 weeks i never opened it and didnt realise what they until i go the next bill i was gutted!!! nevermind hey numptypower changed my gf's house (uni house) to them with her and her friends consent switched back and now recieved 2 bills one from them and another provider and apparently to cancel they have to pay £600 they are students they dont have that money - complaint gone to energy watch so watch this space!

[chris.g]

They get away with day light robbery and nothing seems to be done about it. Like BG with their last increase, yippe, they're not going to have another increase this year, only 4 months of the year left anyhow!! I'd put my last £ on them increasing within the first 2 weeks of January and claim 'neccessary increases due to rising oil prices which must be passed to customer' with the added insult of them telling us they cannot absorb the increases themselves!!! Something smells of manure and it aint the farmer's field!!!

[cat 1]

I'm getting very panicky now.Spoke to some k***jockey in customer service.He said I had to pay the money.Reckons my lecky is really £100 month even before the money owed!! I can't afford the increase without making everything impossibly tight.And, still waiting for gas bill increase!New company not getting back to me and don't really know who my IP is now.This is the first real IVA hurdle.And there was me thinking things were going ok.Not sure what to do?

[chris.g]

Refuse Cat and put in a formal complaint. This is what I did and I/complaint was passed to customer service team. They were great, they asked how much I could afford and we came to a compromise. The unfortunate thing is though that you will be tied to them until you pay the debt back.
On the usage, they said I was using £100 per month on Gas alone, there was only a combi boiler which was only used for one bath a day monday to Friday, (hubby's) and normal washing, teeth brushing etc, the rest of us had showers. Even the washer only had a cold fill....when I asked how it was that high they just referred me to the energy helpline. Then there was £120 per month on electric, very expensive...my usage is only £50 per month now and the house isn't that much smaller.
Fortunately for us we were allowed to put it into the br so we started from scratch with EDF.