Octopus Energy - £4k elec bill for 11 months?

how long does the 4k span over.

There’s something about it charging back over 12 months.

He needs to do a reading and then submit another possibly each week to get a base line on what the meter is reading/what he’s using.

Ridiculous amount!

Write to the Guardian!

https://www.theguardian.com/money/series/yourproblems

I used to work for Octopus. I haven't worked for Octopus for nearly 2 years now, so some of my knowledge may now be outdated, but I am hoping it isn't so that I can be of some help. Sorry in advance for the long reply.

Firstly, you need to ask them to re-bill his account up to date. The general advisors you talk to on the phone can do this, but if it's a more complicated case, they may pass it onto a billing expert.

If your brother doesn't have a smart meter, does he send in his meter readings every month himself, or does he not do this and therefore Octopus have to estimate the usage? This can also massively contribute to "debt" that isn't really debt, but because they're going off of estimates rather than actual readings, they'll be using estimates from other similarly sized properties.

If your brother can't access the meter due to mobility reasons, he can ask Octopus to come out and read his meter every 3 months (I believe it is).

Second of all, get the MPAN from his electric meter and check that it matches the one they have on his account. MPANs get mixed up more often than you'd think.

I also agree with @RollerSkateLikePeggy. Get him to write down the kWh usage that is currently displaying on his meter. Then, get him to turn off all of his appliances at the sockets for 10-15 minutes (except for the fridge and freezer). After 10-15 minutes, he needs to go to his electric meter again and write down the new kWh usage. If it's the same, it's unlikely that the MPAN is wrong or that someone is stealing his electricity supply. If it's gone up, more than you would expect it to with everything being turned off, it's more that it could be a crossed meter or that someone else is using his electricity supply. You can contact Octopus and they will tell you specifically how to do this, if I haven't been clear enough.

Also, start an email thread with them. They say the calls are recorded, but sometimes the recording fails and advisors can't listen back to previous calls (though they need to ask for your brother's permission to do this).

It could also be that his day rate and night rate run separately. Day rates are usually more expensive because more appliances are being used, whereas night rates are generally cheaper. (This is called Economy 7, and is common in electric-only households).

Octopus are fantastic and will help you to the best of their ability.

We had a similar overcharging problem with octopus. Basically the old meters (with dials rather than digital displays) are in imperial measure rather than metric. This means the numbers go up approx 3x faster due to the conversion.

When we moved to octopus they marked us as imperial and charged us 3x amount even though display was clearly digital.

As your 4k figure is approx 3x larger than expected this may be the same issue. So check your daily usage and that the meter is digital and if approx 3x then ask for it to be logged as a formal complaint.

Edit: you can see on gas bill what unit you are being billed in matric should be in m3

Also they owe me for electricity export as we have solar panels. No credit since May. There has been a lot of sun since then and they owe me £150.

No way that can be accurate, is he paying for the whole block?
We're with octopus, have underfloor heating in kitchen and bathroom, do 8-10 loads of washing a week, live in an old house with high ceilings and I'm not swaddling up in Oodies and blankets in the winter, the heating is on. We pay £200 a month and usually end up with a little credit left by the end of the winter.

And he's already paid about £1,500 and they want four grand on top of that? Fuck off.

Octopus are better than some but I still don't trust any of them. They are supposed to do monthly billing but can't seem to manage that and keep leaving it two months, or randomly deduct money from my credit several days before the bill is produced. I wanted bills on 1st of the month, but they do it on 8th. When they remember as half the time they seem to forget and do it on a random day. Does my head in.

That sounds clearly wrong. At tbe height of high energy prices ours was that for a year for five people gas + electric for 12 months.

I’m with octopus. House is a three bed/three reception room 1500 sq ft and is totally electric for heating, cooking and hot water. Two
people. £100 per month in the summer and around £180 in winter. Total over a year is around £1700, we are also home most of the time as retired. Something is clearly wrong. He needs to take a meter reading every day for seven days to work out the amount of kWh he is using every day and multiply it by his kWh price and add the daily standing charge. I’d suggest If it’s more that £4 a day this time of year something is wrong. Turn everything off at the mains and see if the meter still moves significantly, also properly check the immersion if he has one as if he leaves it on 24/7 it will eat it up.

I’m with octopus, 3 bed townhouse, 2 kids and me. I work from home. I pay around 140 a month for gas and electric. I have a smart meter. That amount sounds insane. The amount he’s been paying seems very high as it is but guessing maybe his heating and cooker etc. is all electric.

We live in a 5 bed detached, family of 5. We have an immersion that gets used too frequently, underfloor heating, an electric car and our usage (actual usage not the DD) is approx 130 pm in summer rising to 190 ish in winter. There is no way he can be using that much electric unless someone has tapped his meter!

That’s ridiculous and i would think its wrong. I pay no where near that for mine and im a family that leave lights on/tvs blaring (thanks kids). Is there an ombudsman you can complain to? Any of his neighbours in similar situation?

The first question is always do you have actual meter readings or is it a smart meter

Have you/he checked his actual usage in a day? Checked whether he had left an immersion heater turned on? Turned off everything and checked if the meter is still running? The first thing is to try to work out if the bill is actually potentially accurate.