Absent neighbour, communal hall and e-on wanting to break in to change meter, please help

[brokenheartdog]

Long story short

House converted into two flats, communal hallway and front door. Two pre payment E-on meters in the hallway, mine is visible, neighbours is in a cupboard.

Neighbour has been away for at least six months with a relative due to personal reasons. I have no contact with them and the situation is complicated.

As the neighbour is away they have not been topping up the prepayment meter which means they haven't been paying the debt on it.

I picked post up in the hall today and it had been elastic banded with a parcel, I opened a letter which was amongst it before realising it was for the other flat.

The letter states that as the other neighbour has not been paying the debt on the meter they are coming to change the meter (it is already prepayment so not sure what to) and if they don't gain entry they will get a warrant and force entry.

I am very unwell at the moment undergoing injections at the doctors three times a week and a lot of hospital treatment and testing for bladder cancer and I now worried that I either cancel my appointments and let e-on in so they can access the other flats meter in the communal hall at the time stated or I am going to come back from hospital one day to find they have forced entrance and I cannot get into the communal hall to my own flat.

I am also really worried as my meter is visible and the other meter isn't and I am worried someone not realising it is two flats will take the wrong one and I will end up with a meter with debt on.

I don't know what to do. I cannot contact e-on as it is not my name or my house number but I do not need this stress.

Leave a note pinned to the door asking them to contact you for access? At least avoid them forcing the door and causing damage. Make clear the property entrance is shared.

You can contact E-on via online chat here. It says they're offline at the moment, so try tomorrow in the day.

Clearly Mark your metres and as pp says leave a note but to be honest if I was worried I'd call them explaining that you accidentally opened the mail and discuss options.

Try and contact E-on anyway, ask to speak to a supervisor if you get a "computer says no" type. You're not trying to get info on the other customers account, you are also their customer and you don't want them forcing access to your shared entrance but you are willing to arrange a time where you will grant them access.

Attach a note to your own meter confirming this belongs to flat x and the other meter can be found in the cupboard. There must be serial numbers they can check if they don't believe you.

Thanks all, don't need this stress on top of everything else :(

Each meter has it's own unique serial number and this will be used for changing the correct meter- check the meter referenced on the letter again at yours if its not the same then they would have no reason to touch yours (Although mark it if you feel appropriate) it supprises me that they would do this with a ppm in place... It may be an hiatoric debt and it's going through the motions or the meter may have changed. It may also be to check the meter hasn't been circumvented illegally if it's not registering activity and they haven't been informed.
You see don't need to let them in... But they will have an obligation to make the building secure if they force entry.

Sorry for typos... fat fingers and bad auto correct!

Thank you.
Will they check the serial numbers?
I'm more worried that they won't realise it is flats as it looks like a normal house and only my meter is visible

I'm wondering if they are checking meter hasn't been tampered with.

It's possible that with no usage for 6 months+ e.on suspect that the meter's been tampered with, isn't it? You can probably do without it at the moment, but as PPs have said you should make contact with e.on, explain the situation and arrange a mutually convenient time for them to come to do whatever needs doing.

Thank you. I will try and get onto the online chat or call them. I'm more than happy to let them in but I'm not waiting in in a six hour time slot for them.

If you ring them, follow up with an email. We are going through every level of Eon's complaints department at the moment due to their incompetence with billing - it'll be worth you having a 'paper trail'. We are now going to the ombudsman following a series of Eon's cockups and outright lies.

I truly wouldn't rely on Eon to get this right - have a back up plan and written correspondence.