Can anyone explain this on my gas/electricity account?

[HPFA]

Checked how my gas and electricity account was going today.

Shows we're in credit by £210.

But also says this in the direct debit section with a big warning "!"

Your balance is set to be -£731 by 31 March. Your minimum monthly payment is £731.

Obviously I've sent them an email asking them to explain this but has anyone had something like this come before?

So the way DD works - you are making payments into your account and building up a 'credit'. But you probably only get billed quarterly. So the 'credit' is just the payments you've made but no cost of gas and electric deducted. Once you pay for Jan-March usage it will take you into a negative balance.

One possible explanation I should have said.

Is this OVO?
Just seen a post elsewhere that is very similar. If it is, it may just be the OVO system has thrown a wobbly.

Alternatively: how often do you get billed?8

Thanks for the replies.

We pay £81 monthly and get billed monthly - over the winter it's been about £90/100 per month - we had quite a bit of credit built up over the summer.

It is OVO so sounds like it could be a glitch, as @SpringOfContentment suggests.

I know the charges are changing tomorrow so perhaps some wobbly from that.

I was with boost, part of ovo. They estimated I’d use about £20,000 over the next 12 months. I emailed and phoned so many times to be told it was due to the increased costs. They wouldn’t accept they made a mistake so I left them. They have been an absolute shambles of a company over the last 2 years. They were great from 2014 onwards but something went wrong somewhere.

Googling suggests OVO is terrible with billing problems and customer service

I had similar with Shell when we were over £900 in credit. To be fair it was easy via the app to change the direct debit. I saw it as Shell wanting to make as much interest as possible on our money.

Just checked my account and lo and behold, the message about £731 has disappeared

Presumably even on Easter Sunday someone was monitoring a whole load of WTF? messages on their helpline!