Tenant/electric supply

[montysma1]

I am renting out my flat. It's just had a change of tenancy.

Previous tenant phoned in end meter readings. I phoned in with same readings as start readings for me.
Property was then empty for month getting work done.

Meter reading taken on day new tenant moved in. I phoned to say that new tenant was in and to give these readings. The electric company said that I couldn't supply tenant name, only they could do that.

The tenant can't get them to take her info either. Asking for all manner of random paper work and just being difficult.

Its a long time since I have had to do this but according to all I have read, it's meant to be as simple as new tenant phoning with meter readings and their details?

Also my my start and finish meter readings for the vacant month haven't prompted a bill for me either.

The company is Utilitas who apparently are awful but we are slightly stuck as we have a 2 meter storage heater tarif as we are rural and very few companies support this.

What does a tenant actually need to do to/provide to take on a utility account?

I don't know about residential but I recently had the same problem with a commercial. It is a new build property I bought back at end of November last year. Since purchase it has been empty right up until last month so nearly 5 months. I have never received any communication or bill of any type from the electricity supplier even though power is on to run fire alarms and lights etc. When I rented it out last month I contacted the developer to find out who was the supplier, got the details and phoned them to give new tennant details. They wouldn't speak to me because they say I don't hold a contract for supply. I went back to the developer to check had they given my detail to the supplier when I bought the property - which they had.
Anyway it turns out that they have an online only system which is convoluted to the extreme. New tenants or owners have to give all sorts of information in an online form process, this then has to be matched by same details from the outgoing Tennant or owner before supply is registered to the new occupier. You can't deal with them by phone or even email. Each party must do the online process fully. To date I still have no communication or bill - even though I supplied everything (even the new land registry title in my name). My Tennant has also had no communication or bill. I have given up chasing it for now as the developer is still paying the bill even though they also went through the online process. They are a massive cluster fook.

All utility companies are a nightmare. I think utilita request proof of tenancy by email.

We have a storage heater tariff (Economy 7) through Octopus, who are extremely easy to deal with - it's all online so no hanging around on the phone. I'm wondering if a switch would trigger Utilitas pulling their finger out.

I would love to change but I have also discovered that this wired 2 meter tariff we have, called THTC, which isn't quite the same as E7, is going to be done away with and the signal which controls it switched off in 2024. So I suspect no other company will want to take us on ....