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What's the problem with my new account and the OVO welcome letter?


Hello everyone,  I hope you’re all having a nice day,

 

Having recently been moved over automatically from SSE PAYG to Ovo Energy PAYG I received my welcome letter dated 2 August 2023, it stated my move was complete so I thought I’d give them a call to confirm a few details, like making sure I’m still registered with priority service, that I can I top up my electric key at paypoint without any issues etc, generally get some more information I needed in regards to my specific concerns.

 

Yesterday in my 1st call using 0330 303 5063 I got from google search, I got told that my “account is still pending”, 5 days after welcome letter saying everything complete & ready, today I tried webchat for an update & to get more information, they told me they couldn’t access my account & to phone 0330 175 9669 as web chat is not available/set up at the moment for prepayment meter customers like myself (not very good is it?), so I called them on that number, 18 minutes on hold then the calls rings & goes dead 😡, classic, call again, 11 minutes on hold but put through to a nice lady who told me account was now active & I could top up as normal with no issues, she gave me a £10 credit code to present at any paypoint as an apology for wasted time & getting the run around to get the correct information I needed 👍🏻, I asked her to confirm the correct contact number for when I make future calls about my account/prepayment queries, she proceeds to give me “0330 0175 9669”, I read that back to her, she confirmed it correct, I thanked her for her help & ended the call, I called the new number with the extra 0 on it, 0175 instead of 175 thinking I had wrong department number to begin with, it rings & I get an automated message saying I’m being transfered to sales department, a very polite lady asks how she can help, I tell her I’m calling in regards to confirming correct contact number for Ovo Energy prepayment, she laughs & tells me they are a car sales firm in Bristol & they’ve been having a lot of calls of late where people are calling thinking it’s Ovo Energy, so unless I’m looking to buy a car she cannot help me, I laugh & tell her her company needs to contact Ovo & complain as call centre advisors are giving out their company number to customers.🤣🤡

 

So in short,

 

1: Why are OVO welcome letters giving a broken website URL at the top of the letter which doesn’t work? :- help.ovoenergy.com/payasyougo which returns an Oops! page doesn’t exist

2: Why is there no correct contact phone number provided under the traditional meter section of the welcome letter for customers with prepayment meter queries?

3: Why are OVO Energy customer service giving out a Bristol car sales number with an extra 0 in the number, 0330 0175 9669 which is wrong, but confirmed by lady I spoke to in customer services? (Should be given 0330 175 9699 which is correct for PAYG prepayment).

4: Why isn’t webchat setup or ready so agents can help with prepayment PAYG customer queries etc?

 

Anyone else get a migraine 😖 to get the correct information they needed after being switched?

14 replies

Userlevel 7
Badge +2

Hi 

I don't work for ovo so will leave to the ovo moderators to respond to the inconsistencies you experienced. 

Just for information 

The ovo website actually encourages ovo payg customers to use chat and has the correct phone number. 

https://www.ovoenergy.com/help/article/how-do-i-get-in-contact

 

 

I wonder if the broken link on the letter should have been

https://www.ovoenergy.com/help/category/pay-as-you-go

Thank you for your reply Jeffus,

 

I’ve bookmarked the link you provided for future reference.

 

Much appreciated,

 

Have a nice day.

Userlevel 7

Yep not a good experience, @Shauneeb. Thanks for sharing it. 

 

I can provide some context on why this happened and an assurance that it is not an experience you’re expected to get used to. 

 

1: Why are OVO welcome letters giving a broken website URL at the top of the letter which doesn’t work? :- help.ovoenergy.com/payasyougo which returns an Oops! page doesn’t exist

 

 

Since we sent out that letter, we’ve moved our ‘OVO Help’ knowledge base site from that link you quote above to this one: https://www.ovoenergy.com/help

 

The link you used should be redirecting to the new one and I actually noticed the same thing yesterday, flagging it to the software engineers involved in this work. 

 

The new OVO Help is much better than the old one. Ignore that broken link in your letter. Hopefully a redirect will be set up soon to avoid others experiencing the same. 

 

2: Why is there no correct contact phone number provided under the traditional meter section of the welcome letter for customers with prepayment meter queries?

 

3: Why are OVO Energy customer service giving out a Bristol car sales number with an extra 0 in the number, 0330 0175 9669 which is wrong, but confirmed by lady I spoke to in customer services? (Should be given 0330 175 9699 which is correct for PAYG prepayment).

 

 

The OVO Pay As You Go contact number is 0330 175 9669. I’m sorry that the advisor you spoke to incorrectly added a ‘0’ to the number. Also when you call OVO’s ‘Pay monthly’ contact number (0330 303 5063) from a number linked to your OVO account, it should route the call to the OVO Pay As You Go team. When you next speak to OVO just make sure you’re mobile number is correctly registered on the account so you can call either number moving forwards and get through to the right team. 

 

4: Why isn’t webchat setup or ready so agents can help with prepayment PAYG customer queries etc?

 

My understanding is that we have OVO Pay As You Go advisors available via web chat, and you should be prompted for an account number, which would get you routed to them...

Thank you for the reply Tim,

 

My understanding is that we have OVO Pay As You Go advisors available via web chat, and you should be prompted for an account number, which would get you routed to them...

 

I put in allmy details etc at the start of the web chat with the automated bot before it put me through to the advisor. So the web chat advisor lied to me by telling me web chat wasn’t available for customers like me with prepayment meters, as by your understanding there is, or should be. He just told me I needed to call, moving forward, if I do need to get in touch I’ll phone up in future & avoid Web chat.

 

Thanks for your help, appreciated.

Userlevel 7

It was agent error, @Shauneeb due to how the clever behind the scenes routing works. Effectively you got routed to a group of teams that can’t handle Pay As You Go contact, but that shouldn’t happen if you have a live account and your account number is correctly picked up. Hopefully once the transfer from SSE Energy Services to OVO Pay As You Go is all complete, any time you use web chat you won’t have any issues like this. 

I’ve recently joined OVO over the phone but never received a confirmation email, nor have I received any letters to confirm account activation. I called the support team to confirm the email address they have is the correct one and it is. Is it normal for a confirmation to arrive a few days after account set up? Or should I keep calling for support? Any help welcome, this situation is causing great stress!!

Userlevel 7
Badge +5

Hi @Naoise , this guide seems to suggest that you should get a rapid email confirmation 

Might there be anything to confuse things? A previous supply account, strange set up or similar? If not, it might be worth getting back in touch with them

Thanks for your reply, 

Nope, no previous account. I do have an unusual name which may not have translated well over the phone. I will get back in touch with support team.

thanks for your help!

Joined OVO on website, but still received no contact about account creation or a welcome email let alone an account number or login? What’s happening?

Userlevel 7
Badge +1

Hi @Peterfettes ,

Please use Live Chat via https://ovoenergy.com/help to chase this up. I’m afraid it can’t be done via the Forum.

Thanks for understanding

Don’t have an account ! Can’t get past the OVO Chat BOT 🤖 does anybody work in this company. I even used the WeChat app someone read my messages but no one responded.

Userlevel 7
Badge +1

Just tell the bot you don’t have one at the start. Otherwise, you can try 0330 303 5063.

Userlevel 7
Badge +1

Just tested it by saying NO to the question about being a customer, NO to being PAYG and then entering a name/email - got through in seconds. Seems to be working fine right now.

Thanks 🙏 

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