I moved house over 18months ago and moved to a new supplier. All bills were paid. I am now getting harassed by debt collectors as ovo have linked the period since leaving the house to my phone number due to a trace and search but not my name, so they won’t give me any information regarding the account. I have spoke to ovo who won’t stop the collectors ringing me as they need to find who is liable. What should I do?
Best answer by Jess_OVO
View originalGood day,
I do hope the swift response with solution from OVO company however this is not happening at all regardless status of update or complaint.
Indeed, the support got in contact however provided the initial answer what we had received and we had followed. The case is not moving forward but ask our family to pay the “cost” because OVO’s failure.
Hey
Sorry to hear you were told this issue was resolved but have received another letter.
When was this issue dealt with? If it was recently, could it be the letter was already sent out. Is it dated?
Hi, the letter was sent out on the 20th December, I have had previous contact with the closed account but that was over a year ago, I was told it was dealt with!
I have recently spoken to ovo who wrote off £30, but insisted I paid the rest ?
I was told the account was still active as of November 2022? It obviously wasn’t dealt with at the time of a new contract, or by the agent I spoke to over a year ago.
I have sent ovo an email to request it written off, as yet there is. I reply.
best
No reply from ovo !
Hey
Sorry to hear this,
I’ll get Forum_Support to reach out to you, please keep an eye on your private messages.
Hope this helps.
I am getting letters and billing information to my property (currently empty) for a named person who has never lived there. I contacted customer services to say it is an empty house and the account isn’t valid but as I can provide none of the security details on the account they will not entertain speaking to me, the person on the phone asked me to email proof that the house belongs to me, but the email is simply replied to, that as the email address I am sending it from isn’t linked to any account they cannot look into my issue. Next step? Who do I try next ?
+1
Use Live Chat via https://help.ovoenergy.com . Tell the bot the keyword “agent” and when asked, tell it you don’t have an account. It’ll then let you through security and skip the security questions to put you through. You can also upload files this way to send them in for support cases.
Email is the slowest option, not recommended for something like this.
Great, thanks, I’ll give a try tomorrow
+2
Hi
I couldn't tell from your post.
As the house is yours but empty, are you paying the energy standing charges via another account either with OVO or another supplier?
Hey
Following on from what Jeffus has responded, if you are liable for the property and it’s supplied by OVO you’ll need to set up an account in your name. Even if the house is unoccupied you’ll still need to pay standing charges.
If you don’t believe OVO is the supplier, please get your meter point administration number and meter serial numbers from your recent bill from your supplier. If you contact our Support Team we can look into why we’re sending you letters when the property isn’t supplied by OVO, it may be that a previous owner or tenant was with OVO.
Hope this helps.
I get that I need to be paying the supplier standing charges etc, I’ve been a landlord for 15 years, im not daft. It’s the fact that I’m getting bills addressed to someone there who doesn’t and has never lived at that property with usage charges. I tried the chat method today, got passed around 4 different departments, each time having to restart the whole process and still got nowhere. Giving up for now because my stress levels aren’t going to let me pursue it further for now
+2
I get that I need to be paying the supplier standing charges etc, I’ve been a landlord for 15 years, im not daft. It’s the fact that I’m getting bills addressed to someone there who doesn’t and has never lived at that property with usage charges. I tried the chat method today, got passed around 4 different departments, each time having to restart the whole process and still got nowhere. Giving up for now because my stress levels aren’t going to let me pursue it further for now
That is frustrating.
Did you manage to give ovo any documents they previously asked for while on the chat feature today?
Have they set you up an account in your name for your property?
I have provided proof that the property is mine (three times), but no, as I got passed to the fourth department today to register the account correctly to myself the chat was ‘hung-up’ and I didn’t have the strength to start again. I’m frustrated that an account can be registered without any proof of tenancy or address etc but I can’t close that account without jumping through multiple firey hoops :(
Hey
If your property is supplied by OVO, you can call our Support Team on 0330 303 5063, we’re open Monday- Friday 9am to 5pm. Or, if you’d prefer to do it all online you can sign up here. I’m not sure why they are requiring proof as I don’t have access to the account. Have you not been able to set up your account on the phone or online?
You can set up the account from the date you became liable again for the property and pay on demand for the standing charge, just remember to submit meter readings if you don't have a smart meter so we can see there is no usage in the property and bill accordingly.
In regards to the letters you’re getting, it could be a number of things. It may be that a previous tenant didn’t set up an account and we’ve found someone's details through trace and search (a debt collection agency). You can either return to sender, or send us a tenancy agreement for that period and we can get it corrected. If they’re requiring evidence you are currently liable for the property, this may be to correct the information provided by the debt collection agency.
Hope this helps.
We do not use ovo energy for electricity or gas, and we have never used it before, but two days ago we received a litter from your company. that we still have £3900 to pay on my account and Basically, we don't have an account because never used your company , what can we do ? is possibile some one else used our details ? can you know in which location used by your meter? Or should we tell the police?
+5
You can check what’s on record as your supply company (so can OVO) .. it’s worth checking what it says
ovo energy opened an account in my name without my knowledge for a property ive never lived at and are requesting that i pay £96 ?
Hi
I’m sorry to hear about this.
We don’t have access to accounts here at the Forum so you’ll need to contact the Support Team to get this sorted. They’ll be able to help fix this for you and remove that account as needed.🙂
I had an account with SSE which then became OVO. We moved out and closed the account, I even got a refund. No documents were ever requested from me.
Following this my wife (who moved with me) is now being hounded for proof she moved out too after being identified as the new account holder. No contract was ever signed or accepted but she has been phoned and emailed dozens of times asking for proof of a new address which she does not have, There is no tenancy agreement or mortgage and no bills in her name but they will not accept this is the case. The old property is vacant and the bills that are being sent there are wildly inaccurate estimates but even so, she is not liable.
She requested that her details be removed under GDPR rights but that has been ignored despite her never having been a customer.
How do we get this to stop?
+1
Hi,
I will ask the Forum Moderators to stop by. That flag will be raised shortly after I write this reply.
Strictly speaking, GDPR RTBF does not apply to a situation like this one - otherwise people could use GDPR RTBF to evade legitimate debt collection. It will work once the debt is resolved, however that may be, but not before. It’s also not the correct process to get debt collectors off your back either.
It’s possible that you didn’t fully disassociate yourselves from your previous address - even one thing like not updating the Electoral Roll can be enough to prevent that link being severed. It’s important that you do this when you move out, so that you can completely sever any links to previous addresses correctly and that everyone/everywhere knows the exact date you moved out.
You do need to satisfy OVO that you’re not liable, as soon as you do those letters will cease. But OVO has to do this in the event that they can’t figure out who’s liable.
Please try to call 0800 069 9831 to see if this can be resolved.
Thanks,
Strictly speaking there should be no account - we were hoping that the GDPR request would push proving that my wife is a customer and she isn’t really
+2
Hi
That is annoying but unfortunately allowed.
Obviously you may have tried all this.
Have you tried providing a selection of anything that might be in your wife's name?
1. Any financial products like bank statement, insurance where she is named etc.
2. Anything from the government, e.g. HMRC, DVLA, Council Tax, Electoral Roll, land registry documents if you own your new property jointly etc
3. I would also recommend you check out your credit reports. Just to be certain there is nothing left registered at your old address that you were not aware off
https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/loans/check-free-credit-report/
If you haven’t already you could raise a complaint
https://www.ovoenergy.com/feedback
There are also some email addresses on the complaint page where you can email the ovo CEO for help.
+1
Likewise, there will be an active account in your/her name until the debt is resolved. Once resolved, the account will be closed if appropriate - such as if you prove you’re not liable. There’ll also be an update to OVO’s records to reflect that (usually to prevent it looping back through the system again).
GDPR RTBF requests are blocked while an account is still active - and definitely blocked for accounts in an active debt state. You can only make one after the account has been closed.
In case anyone’s interested, the reason the block is allowed would be under the stance that the Supplier/Data Controller still has an active contractual relationship with the Customer/Data Subject and the Supplier has a genuine Legitimate Interest in not processing the data deletion.
The agents making contact have a list of documents and none are available. They have refused to accept what was offered outside of that very limited list (tenancy agreement, CT bill, exchange docs from solicitors)
My wife asked to open a complaint and guess what? We can’t because YOU ARE NOT A CUSTOMER.
I really didn’t believe that an organisation could be worse than SSE but OVO are stepping up to the challenge
And as for a contract, there is no contract. It should be up to OVO to prove that there is
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