Please can any one help

This has been going on for over a year I my old supplier British Gas has said I owe a outstanding balance of £538 I have tried to see why they don’t seem to listen my last letter was saying the will contact bailiffs if not paid ASAP I just want to ask what can I do I will be contacting them again tomorrow 

Hey @Sarah1980 ,

I’m Blastoise186, one of the forum volunteers here. :)

I’m still trying to figure out what to suggest, but I can say this much. ECOES, the national electric meter database should be able to help. Ask whoever your current supplier is to give you the entire ECOES Record for your MPAN as it will show you what Meter Serial Number should be active.

If you can post photos of your current meters, I’ll extract the MSNs from them for you.

Hey @Sarah1980,

Sorry for the issues you’re having.

Your current supplier will be able to update your meter serial number if it is incorrect. They will likely need a photo of your meter.

As for British Gas, I'd advise checking the closing meter reading on your final bill to see if it is estimated and out of line. This is likely if they have the wrong meter. If you haven’t yet sent them a photo of your correct meter and read I'd advise doing so. 

Hope this helps. 

I have just checked my online account and it is showing incorrect meter serial numbers on plan and meter readings pages and is showing last meter readings as 2018. We have a smart meter (installed in 2018) that was sending half hourly reads with no issues up until now! Why would this have changed?? Bill for October was correct and I checked usage yesterday, all was ok then!

Hey @NicW,

That’s very odd indeed!

Has it reverted back to normal now? Can you send a screenshot of your Online Account and a either your old bills or meter where it shows the correct serial number. 

Its not uncommon for meter details not to updated after an exchange, for example if we weren’t sent the job report with the new meter details from the engineer or if the meter details haven’t been updated on the national database.

But I've never heard of everything being correct on an account, then suddenly changing.

Let’s get to the bottom of this! 

Hi Guys I hope someone can help. I really do not know where to turn.

A little back storey is I moved into my flat early 2020 (just before the Covid restrictions) and I was with SSE at the time. There was no issue, they had the correct SN from my meter for me and everything was fine, I was switched over to Ovo when they took over and again no issues.

Fast forward to August 2022, new neighbours and lucky I was home, they attempted to get their meter replaced and the EDF gentlemen turned my electric off. I immediately went out and he turned it back on and stopped working (I didn’t see what meter he was replacing)

Now in December, I come home from work (just before Xmas) and the meter cupboard was open, I looked in to get my meter reading and my meter had been replaced to a EDF meter, also once in my flat I could see my electric had been turned off and turned back on, clocks on appliances had been reset.

I have contacted Ovo to make them aware, tried calling EDF and that got me nowhere so I have been communicating with them via email. 
 

I do not believe they are not taking ownership of this utter mess and said they hope to have it all resolved by 25/01/23.

I have provided them pictures before and after of the meter (lucky I had them from the issues in August) showing it was my meter that had been replaced.

I honestly believe due to this, my neighbours they since they moved in mid 2022 have been using my meter SN for there bills (we are not on talking terms and I have told them repeatedly to contact EDF to get my meter back and as of yet they have not)

There is 2 of us in my flat and we both work, I do not believe my neighbours do. They are cooking all hours (I can hear there fire alarm when they are cooking) most nights and also when I come home from work or leave for work, the smell in the hallway is that bad from there food.

I believe because they had given EDF my meter SN instead of theirs, they are committing an electric fraud.

Any advice of what can be done to get this mess resolved. I want my meter back

And I have an open matter with Ovo presently, trying to establish why my bill had been low and then doubled/tripled this year (I know cost of living etc) 

My bills went from £142 to nearly £300 a month, sometimes more.

Hey @Sara1986 ,

We’ve actually seen this a few times over the years. Can you give this advice a try?

Hey @Sara1986,

That sounds very stressful.

I’d advise contacting OVO Support on web messenger with the above information and a photo of your meter, clearly displaying the Meter Serial Number (MSN). Also check your previous OVO bills to make sure the correct MSN was showed on your previous statements.

It may be that your neighbors have switched your supply to EDF, this is called an Erroneous Transfer. If this is the case OVO can apply for your supply to be returned. We have more on this topic here:

We don’t have access to your account on the Forum, but this would be my assumption as EDF couldn’t change a meter unless they supplied it. 

Hope this helps. 

Hi, back in October 2022 our gas supply was off so contacted Wales and West to check it. Turned out it was smart meter stopped working. They fitted replacement meter been trying to tell Ovo this since time, by phone, chat, email and letter. Anyone else had this problem and how did you get Ovo to update your account? I need to pay bill on actual meter readings and not estimates. 

Hi @Newmeter1 and welcome to this customer forum. Not sure why you got the meter swapped from Wales & West but you need to get the registration set up asap. You probably need to send photos etc. 
You can give manual readings in the meantime. 
 

I’ve emailed photo of new meter, sent paper copy of photo of new meter with all the details via letter. Can’t submit new meter reading as it’s lower than last reading! 

There are some thoughts in this thread including a comment about a few weeks for updates to happen. 

Hey @Newmeter1 

Glad you’ve now submitted photos of the new meter. It sounds like the old meter details are still on the account as being the active meter and these will need to be updated before it’ll accept your new meter readings.

In my experience of meters being changed by third parties rather than ourselves, is that they don’t tend to be great at notifying us or the National Database (this is where the details need to be updated first) to get the new meter details updated. Without this being done first, the system won’t bill the new meter correctly, or allow for reading to be submitted as it can tell they don’t fall in line with the old ones.

As you’ve sent us the photos of the new meter, the team should have a case open and work on getting this updated as soon as possible. 

Thank you, hopefully the case will be sorted soon, it’s been 8 months since the meter was changed and we informed the customer team.

OVO failed to install a gas smart meter last week, with claims it was faulty.Despite that, the app says it is installed (and OVO tell me the job is recorded as complete). So the app shows a smart meter installed when it isn’t, it obviously is showing zero gas usage, and I have no way to make a gas reading . And OVO has nothing to say. What am I supposed to do now?

Hey @dr8v6,

Sorry to hear this,

We should get the job report back from the engineering company advising the install didn’t go ahead. If you’re concerned I’d advise reaching out to our Support Team, they can put a not on your account and remove any billing suspensions that may have been added, 

Hope this helps. 

Thank you for at least replying. I am finding it very, very hard to get any kind of response at all from OVO. According to one of your colleagues, the job (I.e., installing smart meters), is marked as complete, and no more can be done. Except to send in a photo of my gas meter, to prove!!!that I have not got a smart meter. So I did that, but I have heard no more. I am furious.  And so should you be. The fitter has evidently lied to us both, telling me I’d have it sorted within the week, and telling you the job has been completed. It has not.

And now I find that the app says I have a gas smart meter, and that I’m sending daily readings. But I haven’t, and I’m not. As you can see for yourself, because the “readings” are non-existent. 0. So next question. How am I supposed to submit a gas reading to you at the beginning of the month, as I always do? I can’t. Please make something happen here. I wish I’d never started this smart meter nonsense. It  has been an absolute farce from beginning to end. And I cannot believe that a company of your size and significance, in this day and age, is carrying on like some hole-in-the-wall operation, busily being obstructive and dense as a matter of policy. That’s what it looks like. Please get me a functioning gas smart meter.. My account number is *edited by moderator*.

Please try to avoid posting personal info here. This is a public forum and you just exposed your personal data to the world.

Please try to edit your post to remove it. You can do so with the three dots button below your post.

Hey @dr8v6,

Sorry to hear this,

I’ll ask Forum_Support to reach out. Please keep an eye on your private messages. 

I would like to ask if anyone has any ideas on how to get some action from Ovo, when i was moved from SSE ( who i never had a problem with ) i was £313 in credit on my gas account, since then i have also paid another £118 in monthly direct debits but according to Ovo i am over £60 in debt

apparently they have the wrong meter number so i am paying for someone else’s gas, i understand mistakes can happen but i an fed up with being ignored, i was told on the 11/09/23 that a specialist would be touch and be my point of contact within five days but despite emailing and texting to ask why  the promised contact has never arrived

they are claiming SSE gave them the wrong meter number which SSE absolutely refute and say i am one of many with this problem, Ovo have taken over £400 of my money and do not care, i have called, emailed, text many times but just get ignored, the last response just said it with the complaint dept and then at great length wanted me to rate them as five star and leave a five star review on trust pilot, i am a pensioner and both myself and my wife are registered with the county council as disabled but despite this Ovo are just ignoring me and taking my money for someone else’s account, any help or suggestions would be bery much appreciated, thank you  

All I will say is good luck and keep pestering them.  I am still fighting a dispute on migration too.  It’s like talking to a brick wall at times. Sadly I am finding Ovo’s customer service to be very poor.

It is actually worth noting that repeatedly getting in touch may slow down response times as someone has to read literally all of it before they can reply at all, and this pushes you down the queue.

Please only get in touch once and then wait for a response.

One other thing to add, @scopexx7, other than an apology for the experience you’ve been having with OVO Support. 

It sounds like your complaint has been escalated to the Complaints team. The ‘5 days’ for a response time frame is being missed currently but your complaint should be assigned someone who will reach out to you. If you’ve been waiting more than 45 days since this was first raised to them, let us know here and we can get our Forum_Support team to chase up your complaint handler. 

In the meantime you can disregard the account balance showing on your OVO account. 

Trying to change suppliers but new supplier says I have a Pay As You Go meter which I haven’t had for over a year. OVO tells me the database is correct. Where do I go from here please?