...to ask about prepayment gas meters.

[Autumn82]

We have recently moved into a new (rented) house and have 'inherited' a prepayment gas meter. It's costing us £5 per day which we think is totally bonkers. The heating and hot water are on a timer and only on for a couple of hours in the morning and again in the afternoon.

My question is- if you have a meter, how much do you put on it a week and how often do you use the heating etc. ?

I've worked for an energy company for many years, I'm afraid a fiver a day in winter is about right. Check your boiler has been serviced and is running efficiently.

We have an electric pre payment meter and spend £20 a week in winter, £10 in Summer. We only have rubbishy electric heaters which are on a couple of hours a day, shower once a day and washer on a few times a week.

No way, that's too high! I put £10 on last Sunday and it's just ran out.

I would get asking for a switch to prepayment. There's a six week waiting list, but you may be able to get someone out quicker if you're lucky. It doesn't sound right really and I'm sure you'd save some on prepayment, you might even get put down for a smart upgrade when they swap it!

They are sending a new card that will reset the meter. It's showing that there is debt of £211 on there but the people on the phone said that it will 'disappear' over the next few months and there's no way of removing it without getting a new meter but it shouldn't take money off us for it. Man on Twitter said the card that he's sending us will remove it so we will see what happens.

When I just put £10 on though it took 42p for debt so they are obviously lying to us.

How does the debt run up? If its pre payment? We go into emergency and after that it stops working

Try emailing the ceo, you shouldn't have been put in this position.

Is the house properly insulated etc?.

i have a two bed flat with gas boiler and cooker. i put on £10 a which last 8 days, thats with £3.50 debt to, i have hot water set to come on twice a day and just put heaton when needed.

you are paying p#way to much.

i would ask them to check for a gas leak or if some one else has wired up to it

fluffy you are wrong very wrong, even with my heating on all day it wouldnt come to a fiver

Fluffy- we have a brand new boiler.

We've worked out it's charging us £1 per hour.

2mins- the previous tenants can't have paid their gas bill so got the meter installed then left without telling British Gas.

We have no gas appliances- just the central heating and water. The electric meter on the other hand is fantastic- used less than a fiver in a week and one of us is usually in the house all day.

We also have recently moved into a house that already had a pre-pay meter installed.

I like the idea of getting no bill, but now the weather has set in I would say we are also using £5 a day to heat a 3 bed house (with a loft conversion making it up to a 4 bed) and that's just me, DH and DS.

We are all out of the house Mon - Fri and like you have the heating on timer for an hour in the morning and a couple of hours in the evening

It seems very expensive, but maybe that's just rising gas prices :( I'd put it on more tbh.

There is a wood burner in the dining room so we will be getting some wood in tomorrow

Right, I've got a new build with a new boiler etc and our gas useage was £15 last month. I have heating on 4-5 hrs a day too.

If the debt is the old tennants they have no right to make you pay it. I'd ask them to fit a proper meter.

They can't have any reason to refuse as you didn't build up the debt & they have no reason to suppose you will.

I'd ask for a refund of any of the debt paid so far. Don't go to customer services, go to the ceo instead because they can make things happen.

If you don't get what you want go to the ombudsman.

A lot of families in winter would use a fiver a day , and that was five years ago when gas was cheaper. I hope it goes down a bit when you reset the meter with a new card. I admit that May have been in a poorly insulated property.

cat the gas price has halved since last year.

The industries making more profit on it.

The debt listed on the meter will indeed disappear but that will be because you are paying it off

Exactly what I said, needsasockamnesty... The rude woman was having none of it though.

Are you allowed to switch electricity suppliers?

We bought a house in July with prepaid meters supplied by British Gas and they have been a pain to deal with. They won't change over the meter to credit without a credit check. Between myself and DP we've failed the credit check 4 times which is ludicrous as we have excellent credit history, to the extent I filed a formal complaint with BG about their credit checking process. However, Google is full of stories about BG having an impossibly high credit check threshold.

At the moment we are using around £15/week for gas but we don't use much heating - 3 hours a day.

We've since changed to EDF who are slightly cheaper on prepaid gas tariff and they are fitting credit meters for us for free in two week's time. They will also switch without a credit check.

aha, so there IS debt. Thought so.

looks like you've already tried twitter - keep raising merry hell and also set up a formal complaint with them, threaten Watchdog, etc. the debt CAN be removed by zeroing the meter.

I also moved into a rental with a debt left on the meter. different supplier but the principle is the same.

I would change your supplier, they sound rubbish

I would touch British Gas with a barge pole.

Shop around.

I have a direct debit of £47 per month and normally get a rebate at the end of the year.

My heating is on 25 constant and I have gas cooker plus a combi boiler for water.

It's a 3 bedroom house.

I know this thread is a few months old, but I'm having problems with our pre-payment gas and electricity after moving in to a new house, and this thread came up when I searched.

I'm wondering how the OP got on?

We're also paying five pounds per day on electricity and I think we might be paying off a debt, even though the landlord and lettings agent gave in meter readings and started us off with a tenner on the gas.

I'm going to ring tomorrow and see what's going on but I'm dreading them saying that it's right, because that means we won't be able to afford to stay in this house next winter and we're looking at another move.

If you watch the screen when you next top up it should say something like £xx on card, £xx for debt, and then £xx for gas if you're payong off a debt, at least that's what ours did when we moved in here.

When you moved in you should have got a.new card sent out with instructions on how to use it and this is supposed to cancel out any debt left by previous tenants but ours didn't, I rang British gas and they sorted it out there and then, it was a few years ago but we've never had any problems since.

I've spoken to the utility company today and there's no debt, it really is that expensive.

Well, that's it then, unless the landlord makes some big improvements, we're going to have to leave and find another house. I absolutely hate private renting.