Moved into new property and I owe previous tenants bill, why?

Hi @Mzero

I have experience of/with LCS (and a few others of the same ilk).

My personal experince of similar was with collectors instructed by a a different company, not OVO, but it's the same thing.

So from experience:

This sounds like a debt that is owed by a previous owner/tenant of the property.

OVO have instructed a collection agency, in this case LCS, to chase it.

So the first thing to get straight in your mind is that it is the debt collection agency that you now need to stop chasing you.

OVO are chasing a debt owed by “someone”, but it's the collection agency who are chasing “you” by mistake so it's the collection agency that you need to stop doing that.

As a first step OVO and the agency will send a letter to “The Occupier” at the address, sometimes the agency will have checked for a name associated with the property and yours may have come up so they will address the letter to your name.

Email or write back to the debt collector (LCS  in this case) saying that the debt is owed by a previous occupier and not owed by yourself. (If you can get something from OVO to say it is not your name on that account number then that is proof - Keep it you may need it again because the same may happen again if another collector gets instructed later).

Then, in the same message,  tell the debt collector that if they continue to “harass” (use that word. it's the magic word with debt collectors*) you for this debt which is clearly not yours then you will report them to the FCA for that harassment.

*A complaint of “Harassnent” if upheld by the FCA can close down a Debt Collection Agency and they really try to avoid any such complaint being made.

You will get a message back saying that they have put any collection action on hold for 30 days while they check, often they won't check and they will try again after 30 days, you don't take their bait and simply repeat exactly what you have already said.

Don't get sidetracked by anything new that they say, they sometimes try to confuse you with irrelevant details, don't elaborate, just repeat exactly what you said before that it is not your debt.

That usually puts an end to it, but if necessary then you do make a complaint to the FCA for harassment. TBH it doesn’t usually get to that though.

Other things to not do:

Don't discuss anything on the phone, politely insist that everyting further is in writing, (email or text is in writing), If they do phone you politely say that again and hang up.

Don't ever sign up to their ‘Customer portal/account’ you are not and never have been their customer.

PS. The online phone number checkers are not very good, they will often say that a genuine number is a scam, and that's often (usually) because of debt collection mistakes such as you are currently experiencing.

Hi @Mzero,

This is a perfect response from @Nukecad. I had a similar experience recently and can say that they have perfectly summed this up! 

Keep us updated on your progress and fingers crossed you get to a resolution quickly 🙂🤞🏻

Hi @Mzero 

Once you get everything sorted I recommend you check your statutory credit report with Experian to make sure nothing has been logged against your name. The statutory report is free and you aren't signed up to any long term commitments.

https://www.experian.co.uk/consumer/statutory-report.html

OVO use Experian.

Did you sign up with So Energy the last supplier at the address before you moved in was So Energy?

Hi @Mzero 

Sorry to hear about the issues you’ve been having with this.

Our volunteers have left some really helpful advice on this already, especially Nukecad’s very detailed reply. I hope that was helpful to you.

We’ve seen others with similar experiences, so it may be worth checking out how they got on with LCS too:

I hope this has all been helpful to you, keep us updated with how you get on.

Hello all,

I moved into my current property on the 15th Nov 23 but signed the lease on 6th Nov 23, during this period (6th-15th) the property was empty of any furniture and I didn't reside there.

I keep getting a bill for the period 11th Oct 23 - 6th Nov 23, with an accompanying letter stating that they're sorry that I'm leaving and they've attached my 'FINAL' bill. This problem has been ongoing for probably 3 months and I've spent literally hours on the phone (the last being 13th June just gone) questioning "how can it be my bill as I didn't move in until 6th Nov 23.

I find it very frustrating that after speaking to probably 7 or 8 different customer advisors and 1 team leader yet the bill still keeps coming through my letterbox, the latest on 11th June.

I'm concerned that if they're incapable of understanding and sorting this problem out they will serve me a default notice.

Has anybody else encountered this and if so how was it resolved? I'm starting to go 😵‍💫 with it.

Thank you in advance for any help with this.

Hey @CF64BLUE,

You’d be liable for the bill from the point at which your tenancy starts & not when you ‘move in’. So it sounds like you are liable from the 6th of November, even if you switched to another supplier you’d be responsible for the period between the start of the tenancy until the point at which the supply moved to a different supplier. 

With the previous bill from October, that might be the responsibility of the landlord or letting agency. You can either return to sender or pass on to either the landlord or letting agency. 

The following topics may be helpful:

I hope this helps.

Thank you Emmanuel,  that's what I thought, trying to get OVO customer assistants to grasp this is quite a challenge though and this bill keeps popping through my letterbox and in my emails.

Quite happy to pay my own bill from 6th Nov but not from Oct till 6th Nov. 

Thank you again.

Hey @CF64BLUE,

I can appreciate it must be frustrating getting letters for a previous tenant. We need to send these letters as part of the collections process, however they will stop when we pass the details over to a debt collection agency to find the liable party through ‘trace & search’. 

This topic may have some more helpful information:

The only thing that worries me is if bad credit is put on my credit report.

The gentleman that occupied this flat before myself passed away so could prove a challenge to get this bill to the correct person.

Hey @CF64BLUE,

That’s sad to hear of his passing, do you have a tenancy agreement or anything proving when you took liability of the property?