Most people in the UK have both an electricity and gas meter that need to be read every so often so the energy companies can charge you correctly for the amount of energy you consume.
The problem is that this requires either the homeowner to read the energy meter or an energy supplier employee to visit the property to make the reading. Now, as you might expect, the energy companies are loath to do this because it costs them money so often rather than putting the obligation on the homeowner they decide to estimate the energy usage.
The estimate is pretty much always based on historical data – so why can this cause a problem?
Estimated readings overestimate actual energy used
Since the energy companies are looking at old data to base their predicated energy usage on, they may overestimate the energy actually used in the house. This means the energy company is charging you for energy you don’t use. Now we have seen customers who have never changed energy supplier who have had their energy bills estimated for years.
This means when the energy company finally gets round to sending someone to your house, there is a high chance of a huge discrepancy in the actual energy usage figures versus their estimated readings.z
On the flipside, and this is the worse scenario for the home owner, they could have underestimated the energy usage – which means you have a shock bill to balance your energy usage.
This is a problem and we see it with our customers, they suddenly get a huge energy bill when they can least afford to pay it.
Estimated readings when you switch
This has happened to me personally, but when I left Npower in April this year, they gave my final reading as an estimated reading. This in theory was fine, except I got a huge ‘closing bill’ from them. Having swapped to Ovo (who I am delighted to report are a pleasure to deal with), they used this estimated reading as a opening balance.
When I gave my actual opening reading to Ovo, it appeared that I had been charged for 2,800 kWh more electricity than I had actually used.
This has still to be resolved, but Npower are adamant I owe them a decent amount of money despite the fact that they charged me for 2,800 kWh of electricity that I didn’t use.
I have no doubt this will be resolved, but it does involve painful negotiation between Ovo and Npower deciding where responsibility lies (I know this is my fault!)
Our No.1 Tip – Provide actual readings to your energy company
To be honest there is one outcome from all of this and that is to provide actual energy readings to the energy suppliers.
This means that they won’t hold on to more of your money than they should, you will receive no nasty surprises when they have underestimated your usage and also (and perhaps most importantly) you won’t have the energy companies on your back trying to charge you for energy you didn’t ever use!
It seems the energy companies are acting like wounded dogs at the moment, licking their wounds over repeated attacks from OFGEM and the Labour party. It is highly unlikely they are going to suddenly spend money to try and send more of their employees into peoples homes to take readings, so in this blog we show you how to read your electricity meter and in this blog we look at gas meters as well as how to turn those readings into approximations of how much you will end up owing your energy supplier!
Think we missed something? Do you have a different opinion?
Comment below to get your voice heard…
I never trust my meter. But what can you do? We are at the mercy of the energy companies
read your meters every 30 days even if you have smart meters keep a record ,give a reading on your energy web site then check it against your bill ,it stops them estimating !
I tend not to spend that much time in my property so I was getting annoyed by the fixed bill charges and the estimated readings, so to be honest that is when I switched to a pre-pay meter. Don’t have any of that hassle any more.
The same thing happened to me when I switched from BRitish Gas to E.On. They charged me based on estimated readings and I later found out they had overcharged me by £427. Took about 4 months to get it resolved. Definitely good to make people aware of the issues of estimated bills although I guess when smart meters are introduced they will become a thing of the past.
Npower is pure evil. They did the same to me, AND didn’t even bother sending a bill at all for 6 months. I’ve complained to the Ombudsman but surely these companies need better regulation?
Surely all this teaches us is to always provide actual readings to the energy companies. This makes estimated energy readings irrelevant and always means you pay for what you use.
Karl,
I couldn’t agree more. If you are in a financial position where the money the energy companies are holding on to is important to you, then you need to take your own readings and be a bit more proactive.
I think that is the problem. People on the whole are too lazy to get off their backsides and check these things unfortunately often until it is too late.
The smart meter was supposed to take care of the readings but is that the case how many people are having excess money taken out of their bank accounts to pay for an estimated bill or a price hike ,energy companies have millions in their accounts that belong to the public .
One example is Octopus energy ,i have old style meters but give readings day one i get their email but on checking their website i saw they estimated one month as 2 days here 2 days there and a period of 20 days ,so not even a month ,i demanded the money back in the account and set up a Pay point account to pay for what i use ,the next bill was for £131
instead the £270 they estimated , it took a six week battle using You Tube for them give me back another £270 they took from my account a day prior to me closing it …
The way to accurate billing is to read your own meters on a 30 day period ,keep a book on the readings then go to your energy website and submit a reading then check it against the bill they gave you !