How can I cancel my Direct Debit? - I'd like to pay on receipt of my bill instead.

That’s fine, I think I’ve got what I need.

At first glance, it appears that everything is working and I’m not seeing any obvious faults here. However, there is one trick I know of that the Support Team can try if you’d like them to.

Try asking them to reconfigure the read schedule for your electric meter to match that of your gas meter. I’ve known cases where these pesky E470 meters somehow lose it at random, but that fix might do the trick. See if you can ask them to grab an instantaneous on demand meter reading via SMETS Commands as well. If that comes through, it confirms comms are good and adds more weight to what I think the fault might be. Oh, and you can also ask the agent to log that meter reading to your account as todays reading as well, since it can be accepted as an authorised meter reading.

Just an update on this. We've tried to call and webchat but both were stating 90 odd in the queue. The lines are extremely busy and with working and looking after a feral 6 year old we've given up and cancelled the DD. We'll analyse the situation for a bit and pay the bill as it comes in. As it stands we're still £200 in credit and using about £120 a month for both gas and electricity. We'll pay something rather than nothing until the credit run out and just cover the bills for what we use. 

Hopefully these prices will reduce soon. Even both of us working are struggling to pay these prices let alone those whom are single or not working/pensioners etc. Its a very worrying situation to be living in. 

I usually help out on the Eon next forum but i was browsing here and thought I could offer a new point.  Monthly DD is a budgeting mechanism designed to spread your costs over a long period typically 6 or 12 months.  It does not change, in any way, what you account will be billed.  you will always be charged your consumption times the applicable prices.  Your DD is a forecast and inevitably will always be wrong , but if you pay in too much you get that back and if you pay in too little you will have to pay that as an extra charge in the future.

But switching away from monthly direct debit will CERTAINLY cost you over £200 per annum (OFGEM typical Customer) extra, so think carefully about taking this step.

I think @meldrewreborn might be able to figure those out. I’ve seen him do a pretty good job of it on another forum. It’s out of my skills however, sorry about this!

As an example these are the data for the North West region (it is shown top of the OFGEM tables). VAT inclusive.  You can see that both the standing charge and the unit prices are higher on Standard Credit than for Direct Debit.  The extent of the additional cost is determined by each individual household’s level of consumption.  The data assumes that the supplier charges the maximum for the standing charge that OFGEM permits - most suppliers have done this in the past.

From October1 2022, Standing Charges for Standard Credit are between 12% and 17% greater than DD standing charges.

Unit prices are circa 5.3% greater.

Conclusion.  Paying by Standard Credit is substantially more expensive than paying by Direct Debit in every case.

The caps as published by OFGEM apply to a certain level of consumption, 3,100 kWh of electricity and 12,000 kWh of gas.  At those levels (3,100 and 12,000) of consumption the prices charged by the suppliers cannot exceed the annualised figures published by OFGEM.  These then very effectively cap the unit rates which will apply to all levels of consumption. 

To put it another way, OFGEM publish maximum charges for set levels of consumption.  From these you can work back to standing charges and unit prices.  Then you can apply those unit prices to each customer.  Its gets very complicated because there are different rates for DD, prepayment, standard credit, Electricity and Gas and 13 different regions - in effect there is not one price cap, there are multiple price caps, plus there is an addition set for economy 7/10.  Its too difficult for the main stream media to articulate so they concentrate on the mythical average user, in the mythical average area, but using the exact amounts of OFGEMs average user, rather than delve around in the messy detail.

The clue is in the term price cap - its not a maximum household charge.  The more you use the more you pay, and standard credit is always more expensive than DD

This is what I want to do but can't find d out how

If I cancelled DD will that not cancell my energy supply? I can afford to pay for whatninuse each month but not what they want in DD. £355 A MONTH FROM MY PENSION OF £740 IS UNACCEPTABLE. 

You bills will be based on your consumption whichever way you pay.  The prices on paying on receipt of bill are £215 higher for the average user (per annum, Oct 22 prices) so this switch could be very costly.

Your DD is intended to smooth your payment over an extended period, it does not increase your consumption which is the real influencer of your charges.

Can I cancel my Direct Debit and pay each bill monthly as I get them

@martinsimpson seems odd to want to pay a higher rate than you could, especially going into winter when the average DD payment could well be less than your actual usage. But you can. Other suppliers also allow variable DD payments where the DD taken is your bill amount each month. That way you still get a DD discounted rate but pay for what you use.

@martinsimpson 

The charges for paying after receipt of the bill are circa £150 higher per annum for the average user than DD.  Most people don’t think that a price worth paying.  The choice though is yours.