Add a version reference to any bills updated

I think that is a great idea. 

Here is one as an example

And i think it would help in this case to see what had happened

Another example 

It will be interesting to get the take of the product owners for this idea. 

Making version control better is a good idea if it’s needed. And I can see your links to topic examples of bills being retrospectively updated. Hopefully we’ll hear about why and if version control can help clear things up. Changing this to ‘Open for votes. 

It would interesting to include here examples of what other suppliers do if anyone knows? 

My memory isn't great these days unfortunately... so i can't remember what Scottish Power did when i was with them. 

It may help when thinking about difficult options. 

I will try to look at my records. I know the update tag used to happen (previous supplier) but not sure when it stopped. The main thing on the current system is that there is no reference to which bill is correct, if a customer has received a pdf at billing only for an update to appear, unannounced online later. 
Realising that online should be the latest but not everyone will notice

Here’s a previous bill from 2021 … note the details regarding an updated bill and a date reference

and a couple from earlier changing from estimated to actual .. 

bill version ID at top left under the logo

Some more Scottish Power screenshots as i see i can still log in

Similar version number at top of bill

Upvoting.

Every document should bear a latest revision date, especially financial ones. I’ve noticed a lot of ‘help’ pages at this site which don’t, and it’s often not clear until having read the whole page that it’s in fact out of date. 

As regards putting the date on bills, I wonder if we shouldn’t differentiate between invoices and statements, although there’s not much apparent difference for ordinary OVO customers.

• An invoice is to my mind a demand for payment; you can’t just revise it and then claim that the debtor hasn’t settled it. If the issuer needs to make a correction, a new invoice (or credit note) should be prepared - with a new date, of course - and presented to the debtor.
• A statement on the other hand is just a snapshot of an account at a particular date; I don’t see any problem with subsequent revisions, if the premises on which it was based turned out to have changed.  

I’m not sure whether this distinction applies to OVO bills; perhaps our resident accountant could put me right if I’ve got it wrong.

So looks like currently Scottish Power let you see all the cancelled bills and flag which one is current

As well as having a version number on each bill

If a document has a date then whatever it is for it is easy to see what supersedes what. In the cases I have seen, there is simply an updated monthly bill dated as the previous one but for a different total. That is the main problem to my mind. Coupled with the total replacement of the previous version without any notification to the customer.

ESB (yes I have often moved supplier!) do things slightly differently giving an individual bill number for each issue but also dating appropriately. 

I’ve just been looking at updates on the OVO billing and realise that there’s another problem. 
If you look at an earlier billing period today, it will give you the bill but dated today - surely that can’t be right?

Agreed. The Date Generated is always the date you click on the link.

It is interesting this is acceptable to any internal or external auditors of OVO.

All the bills are dynamically created. 

Also OVO are only allowed to back bill 12 month in normal circumstances. I wonder what safeguards have been built into the code as all the bills work in the same way.

No? Isn’t​​​​​ that exactly what you were asking for? The document bears the date it was created, dynamically as @Jeffus points out. This means that neither OVO nor anyone else can pass off a changed bill as if it were the original. I think it’s safe to assume that the original was issued, dated and delivered to the customer a few days after the end of the period it refers to. ​​

No I don’t think so. I received a bill by email on 8th Feb. The bill is for January. Without any indication I noticed that the bill available online a day or so later was different. 
As some have said, a bill has been issued to the customer so which is taken as a reference point to determine the next billing period?

If the ‘issued’ bill is taken, then the next bill looks incorrect. All I am suggesting, like the examples shown is that any updated bill is given some validation so that a customer can review themselves

I am going to correct myself a bit.

I didn't look into whether the pdf is dynamically created on the fly, or created in a batch process once a day. It is a small point and doesn't make much difference but i thought i would mention. 

Another example.... Bills changed, gas readings wiped... 

Another one, electricity readings wiped, bills changed

And again 

And another case where version controlled bills would help

Another example