I moved a year ago and provided Npower with final meter readings. I opened a new account at my new home, paying the outstanding balance on the old account and a £50 deposit on the new one.
I switched energy providers nine months later, paid the final bill and realised I had not been refunded the deposit. Npower explained the account was in debit which, given I had paid every final statement, was something of a surprise.
Subsequently, Npower issued a revised final statement of £2,854.43 for the account that had been closed a year before. I then found a bizarre series of credits/debits indicative of an organisation that has lost control of its customer billing.
On one day alone, five months after the account was closed, there were two credits of £15,646.75 and then a series of debits totalling £22,343.16! Npower then issued a third final statement for £2,510.48.
It appears to have adjusted the meter readings between 2012 to 2014 which, having no records that far back, I can’t challenge.
AM, London
It gets worse. After the Observer got in touch, Npower asked you to nip back to your former flat and read the meter, since, a customer service operative told you, its meter readers are unreliable.
And, although suppliers cannot issue demands for unbilled energy used more than 12 months previously, it told you its demands were justified because they were via “reissued” bills. Nonsense, naturally.
The back-billing ban is to prevent suppliers identifying mistakes years afterwards, and springing unexpected charges on customers.
Npower, which in 2015 was fined £26m by the regulator Ofgem for its chaotic billing, only admits to an error when it realises that bad publicity is imminent. If it’s ashamed, it doesn’t show it. “We were sorry to hear of the confusion,” it says, as though alluding to someone else’s carelessness. “We have apologised, amended and closed the account.”
You now owe nothing, have received your £50 back and kindly donated to the Observer and Guardian to help us continue championing consumer rights.
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