Anyone else being forced to change their direct debit due to 'impending debt'?
Apparently OVO don't think my current direct debit level will cover the final amount owing for the year, so they've already sent me two letters from their Collections Department, talking about 'how much debt' they think I will have if I don't rectify my payment. Bear in mind I haven't missed a payment and have been pretty good at giving monthly readings, so I'm not in 'debt', as they so succinctly put it, they just think I will be, despite the 'shortfall' being quite manageable.
OK, so I acquiesce to this veiled threat from Collections and attempt to increase my direct debit payment. But it turns out I can't choose what that level is, they decide based on what they think I'm going to owe.
This would be great, however their projections for what they think my overall useage will be have been found to be wildly inaccurate.
OVO, I'm a grown-ass man, I think I should be allowed to decide whether I think I need to change my direct debit payment and to which level - or, conversely, receive a bill at the end of the year to cover any shortfall - it should be my choice.
Undoubtedly you will come back and regale us with the usual corporate flannel - 'well we do this to protect the customer form big bills', 'we've only got your best interests at heart', 'some people don't like being surprised by a big bill at the end of the year'.
I've got to say, I switched from British Gas for a similar reason (and received a massive payment at the end for their continued incompetence regarding estimated bills), but my experience thus far has not been much better, which is a damning endictment given the corporate ineptitude that British Gas display daily.
As an aside, the app is still rubbish. You've been trying to fix the thing for months now, to no avail. Maybe funnel some resources in to interface management as opposed to haranguing customers for mythical debt.
Why am I being forced to change my Direct Debit?
Best answer by Lucy_OVO
Updated on 10/06/25 by Abby_OVO
How do Direct Debits work?
A Direct Debit is an automatic monthly payment set up with your bank or building society. You can choose which day you want the payment to go out each month, and your bank will sort the rest.
Once your Direct Debit is set up, you don’t need to do anything else to make your payments.
Why paying by Direct Debit is the best way to pay
Direct Debit is usually the simplest and cheapest way to pay for your energy. This is because:
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You don’t have to remember to make payments each month – it’s all done automatically
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You’ll get a cheaper rate if you’re on our variable Simpler Energy tariff
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You’ll pay the same every month for your energy, which can help with budgeting
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A Direct Debit spreads your energy costs evenly over the year, which means you’re less likely to have to pay more in winter
How does OVO work out my monthly Direct Debit?
The aim is to make sure you have credit for 1 month’s payment in your OVO account by the end of March. This is to help cover any change in your home energy use over the course of the year.
For new customers, this only comes into effect once you’ve reached March. When you first join, the aim is to make sure you have no balance left to pay after 1 year.
How do we check you’re paying the right amount?
Your Direct Debit payment amount will be regularly reviewed to make sure it still covers your home’s energy use.
We’ll let you know if your Direct Debit amount needs to change to keep your energy account balance up to date.
Why is my Direct Debit increasing when my balance is in credit?
It’s normal for a credit balance to build up in your energy account over summer, when energy use is usually lower. This credit can help pay for your energy in winter, when most homes use more. It helps you spread your energy costs over time.
Even if your energy account is in credit, sometimes your Direct Debit payments still need to increase.
This could be the case if we’ve worked out that your OVO account is likely to have a debt balance long term – based on how much energy your home is predicted to use.
You can always choose to get a credit refund if you prefer. Request one at any time in your online account, in our app, or over the phone. You just need to leave credit in there for 1 month’s payment. This is in line with our refund policy.
It’s important you have all the info, then you can decide what’s best for you.
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If you request a refund online, sometimes we’ll need to confirm this over the phone. This is to make sure you have the details of how it’ll affect your energy account.
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Getting a refund might mean your Direct Debit payments will need to increase, once your account has less credit in it.
Check out our Direct Debit “check in” process here.
We’ve got lots of handy topics all about Direct Debits so check those out too:
Is there any support available if I’m struggling to pay for my energy?
If you’re worried about your payments changing or you can’t afford them, please speak to our team. We can make sure you get financial support that’s tailored to you and your situation. There are many options available for anyone who needs help. To get in touch with our team:
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Sign up to our online tool at ovoenergy.com/payment-support and we can find the best plan for you.
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Call us on 0800 408 6615. We’re here Monday to Friday, 9am and 5pm, and 9am to 2pm on Saturday.
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Talk to us online at ovoenergy.com/help Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm, and 9am to 2pm on Saturday.
+50800 0699 831
They can freeze your direct debit for 3 months
+9- Super User
Hey
That shouldn’t happen! You should always get advance notice 10 days in advance. Did you maybe miss the email/letter or lose it in your junk folder perhaps?
+9- Super User
Hmm… That’s unusual. I’ll keep an eye out on the forum in case anyone else reports the same issue. If they do, I’ll ask for it to be investigated.
In the meantime, if you wish to discuss your payments, the Support Team via https://help.ovoenergy.com for Live Chat or on 0330 303 5063, or the Collections Team on 0800 069 9831 might be able to help.
I have tried to contact OVO without success, both by phone and chat, told I am number in the queue but after 30 minutes still no response, how about OVO contacts me to discuss?
+4Hey
Sorry for the issues you’re having,
Every customer should receive two direct debit review communications. Do you get other emails from OVO? I’m wondering if we have the correct email address on your account.
I’ll get someone from Forum_Support to reach out to you, they can take a look into it. Please keep an eye on your private messages.
Hope this helps.
JohnM (OVO) has apparently fixed the issue my account was set not to receive them, I am surprised that this capability is available to turn off all notifications, especially something as important as account changes.
+2OVO shouldn't be able to switch off direct debit notifications as the direct debit guarantee states that a company must notify you of changes to your direct debit.
+4Hey
I’m really glad to hear this has been rectified for you,
Now I have had some time to think about this the words from your agent were
“Firstly I wanted to apologise sincerely If you have not received communications advising of the direct debit review. I can see that email communications have been attempted several time but on each occasion they have failed. After investigation I can see that you were not set up on the account to receive emails so I have implemented this feature so that future attempts will now be successful. Please allow 24/48 hours to take effect.”
From the above there is a communication success or failure status recorded. If sending these notifications is a regulatory requirement that has to be met this status should be checked and appropriate action taken to rectify the situation if the message fails. Should OVO be reporting itself to the regulator to say they have failed in this respect?
Bob
+9- Super User
They do have to be sent, but delivery is beyond OVO’s reasonable control. If your email provider chokes on them or spits them out and refuses to deliver such emails, there’s nothing OVO can do about that.
Whilst I agree with your synopsis, this was not the case, mine was not enabled, hence in the above statement “After investigation I can see that you were not set up on the account to receive emails” I did not get a postal notification either, this is why I made the above statement.
As an aside I get email from all sorts of other providers with no issues, especially as I use a professional paid for email service.
If emails fail for regulatory either OVO should consider moving to a mailbox system where I get an email telling me there is something awaiting my review or as previously suggested they should be investigated or re-sent, or a postal letter sent..
+9- Super User
It already is set up that way. As far as I can tell, the emails with your bills etc are sent via AWS SNS aka Amazon Web Services Simple Notification Service. That’s already a professional system, albeit probably not exactly a cheap option.
OVO also pays for a pretty expensive internal email system. I know what they use, but I don’t reveal that information. You cannot use stuff like Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 to send out several million emails a day from a single account though - you’d get banned if you did that for breaching Terms of Service.
As for having an In-App Mailbox feature, while that would be really nice to have on the forum, I can’t see that happening for MyOVO. You’d be welcome to suggest it though. However, given that not everyone wants to log into MyOVO just to check a bill and given that it’d duplicate functionality that already exists… I’m not too sure I’d be keen to support such an idea myself.
I had my DD set at £158 per calender month, back in September. I got a notification from the app saying we're paying too much and so they recommend a new monthly payment of £152. So I changed it to the recommended amount.
Less than 10 days later I open up the app and well I'm blowed it tells me that unless I don't increase my DD to £163 a month I'll end up owing £114 at the end of my 12 month period.
I'm sorry but this time I'm ignoring the stupid recommended figure. It's obvious that at the moment with the current cold snap that were consuming some of our built up credit at a faster rate than two weeks ago. However rest assured once the weather warms up our energy usage will decline again.
It is unacceptable to keep messing about with DD figures on a monthly basis just to keep OVO happy with the credit on the account. We never had this issue when we were with SSE.
+4Hey
Sorry to hear this,
Direct Debit reviews are triggered once every 3 months, this is where we’ll contact you to advise if we think you need to increase your direct debit. If the direct debit isn’t increased manually by the customer, we do so automatically.
The Online Account and direct debit calculator will constantly monitor your direct debit and give suggestions based on your usage.
Unless you’re receiving emails from us advising you need to increase your direct debit, it won’t be automictically increased. It is just a suggestion online and can be ignored.
If the Online Account has been showing varying figures recently it may be as you said, because of the cold weather recently, or, if you’re on the Variable Tariff your rates might be increasing in January.
Hope this helps.
It’s a mess ! I spend £20.00 a month
I’m in credit £55.00
my bill will double as going off contract
OVO demanding £125.00 a month : I’m unable to contact anyone to correct this. The lowest figure the computer accepts is £110.00
all on a smart meter. What to do ?
+9- Super User
For that one… Best thing to do is wait until the New Year and then call 0800 069 9831. The Collections Team can modify your payments down to more closely match your actual costs.
At 8:18 this morning (Boxing Day) OVO emailed to say they are increasing our direct debit (despite us being in credit) to £431! Not only can we not afford this but we got no warning and it is way more than the electricity we are using (we’ve recently got solar panels and a battery). They’ve obviously done this when their communications lines are closed for the next few days so is there anything I can do about this?
+9- Super User
This was an automated action that you’d always get 10 working days notice for. It wasn’t deliberately targeted to trigger today i.e. wasn’t deliberately made to happen on Boxing Day. It is more likely that you got the 10 day advance warning today instead.
Call 0800 069 9831 from Wednesday onwards. The Collections Team can revert this for you if you have a valid reason.
On the 16th we got an email telling us the direct debit was increasing. I immediately phoned OVO and was eventually passed through to the collections team. After explaining the solar panel install to the lady she agreed to leave the direct debit as it was but this would be re-assessed in three months.
I don’t think this was deliberately targeted for Boxing Day, that’s just a stupid lack of planning. How many people will have had this sort of thing happen when there is nothing they can do other than stew in their own stress for the next couple of days.
If I’d done nothing about this then fair enough but I did and the OVO collection agent I spoke to clearly did not do what they said they would.
Exactly the same problem.
Email received at 08:10 on 13th December, rang in and call answered at 09:30 and spoke to customer services who stated that DD would be left as is.
Email received on 23rd December stating they were putting it up!
To be fair, despite the issues I have had with OVO this year they have always added my account to the exceptions list to prevent to requested DD increase from going through.
Very disappointed this time as not only have they breached the agreement to leave as is, the customer service agent clearly did not do what they were supposed to, they were also totally closed on 23rd so no way of stopping the increase!
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OVO Energy Ltd, registered office 1 Rivergate Temple Quay Bristol, BS1 6ED, company no. 06890795 registered in England and Wales.
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