No progress in meter reading dispute, poor customer support

Hi @daisy12 

Sorry to hear about this.

We don’t have access to accounts here at the Forum so you’ll need to get back in touch with the Support Team. They may look to rebill this now or may need to open a case for the billing to be looked into so they can make sure you’re not paying twice, or for an incorrect amount. 

They may raise what’s called a meter reading dispute, in order to have the readings corrected properly. I’ve linked below to a helpful topic on Meter Reading Disputes that might be useful to you:

I have the same problem, although the amount is much smaller for me. I’ve had web chats, and spoken to support on the phone both assured me that they would pass it on to billing. Having heard nothing for two weeks I raised a complaint. Again I heard nothing after two weeks but then one reading was corrected last week and the other a couple of days later. So problem solved. Well it was for a few days as one reading was changed back on Tiuesday this week, so I had another web chat and was told it had been passed to billing as high priority. Then today the other was changed back and. so I am back were I was at the beginning of Sept. If I haven’t received a response from my complaint by the eight week deadline I will be getting in touch with the ombudsman. 

Thanks Abby and awills61 for the information.  Looks like I will have to keep contacting the Support team and escalate to the ombudsman when the 8 weeks is up.

Hey @daisy12 and @awills61,

Really sorry for the issues you’re having,

It’s worth noting, the read dispute process can take 12-18 weeks, this is the industry standard timeframe. 

The following topic shared by Abby gives more detail about the process:

The ‘Meter Reading Dispute’ Process

- We ask you to take two meter readings at least two weeks apart
- We use these to calculate what the meter reading should’ve been on the date you switched
- If there’s a big enough difference between the reading used and the reading calculated, we can officially raise this as a ‘Meter Reading Dispute’
- We contact your previous supplier with our calculated read
- Once they’ve agreed to this new reading, we can amend opening meter reading and reissue your opening statement. Be aware that your previous supplier may also re-issue their final statement with you.
- This whole process can take up to 12 weeks as we have to wait for the calculated reading to be received and agreed to by the other supplier.

During this process your regular monthly billing will be paused whilst we look to correct the opening statement. If you pay via Direct Debit these payments will continue, building up a credit balance in your account to cover the opening statement once it’s issued.

If you don’t yet have a Direct Debit in place, we’d recommend setting one up with our Support Team, to avoid a large balance to pay when your initial statement is re-issued.

It may sound complicated but we’ll handle all the details and make sure your account is opened to a reading that fairly reflects your usage.

I’m not disputing the meter readings I just want them to use the ones that were estimated on my final SSE bill and not some other ones that they seem to have manufactured.

Hey @awills61,

I’ll get Forum_Support to reach out to you, please keep an eye on your private messages. 

I’m in the same situation as awills61.  As SSE’s closing account estimated reading is quite different from the opening reading that ovo are choosing to use for my first billing, I’m being charged twice for the same units of electricity. I would not have a problem if they both used the same readings. My understanding is that there should be a third party looking over this process but as this seems to be all in-house they think that they can get away from the Ofgem agreed process and double charge people. 

That’s not necessarily the case. How do you know the third party didn’t screw up and override both SSE and OVO?

Never speculate with these things - it can come back to bite you later.

Yet another bizarre and inflated final bill for me supposedly from SSE at the end of August, although technically Ovo had migrated me by then, so I seem to be chasing both up with neither so far correcting it.  It’s happening to so many people you have to wonder what on earth is going on.

I am a member of a group on Facebook for people with complaints about Ovo and it has nearly 8,000 members quoting horrendous problems.

Sorry to hear about these final bill problems from your previous supplier. 

As you’re an OVO customer it will be us that sorts this. As Abby mentioned above this may require a reading dispute. No matter what reading is used, it is an error if the final reading from your previous supplier isn’t the same opening reading as your new supplier. 

Until those readings are aligned, it’s on us to sort it, so don’t worry about any charges that relate to this miss match. 

I can’t word my next bit of advice better than Abby so: