Thanks. They are clueless. I know more or less how they've come to that figure, so I (and my landlord) have tried to explain it to them, but they don't get it.
Basically, there was a meter mix up that lasted the first 6 or so of 10 the years I've been here. They were billing me for my neighbours meter (and my neighbour was generally out 8am to midnight, so his bills were relatively low) [ As an aside, the were billing my neighbour for his meter too - not sure how that worked - we initially assumed they'd done a swap/mix up]
They always had someone check the meters, so they usually weren't estimated bills, But the issue was discovered when because of COVID, they asked me to send them a reading, because their meter-reader couldn't get out.. I don't even generally have access to the meter room, so arranged it with the landlord, and reported the "right" meter.
The figure disparity was so ridiculous that SSE (at the time) didn't believe me. I had to send numerous photos of the meter (both they and OVO seem to have collective amnesia between phone calls as if they don't record any of the information you send on the account)
Eventually they said "you're right", the meter is obviously buggered. don't worry, we'll sort it out after lockdown.
They never did. Then my account went to OVO, and SSE passed them the same ridiculous meter reading from before (as I said, total amnesia). When I phoned OVO, obviously initially, they had done nothing to be blamed for, so I was hopeful I could update them on the situation, and they would sort it out...
Again, OVO needed photos etc. and said they'd sort it.... The next thing I know is that the "correct" (but flawed anyway) reading had been put on the account, but with no details to the problem as i'd described to them.
From this point, they had me going from about 480 units to about 38,000 within the state of a month. No internal systems picked up on any issue, so they tried to bill me - and that was at the huge gas price we had during the start of the Ukraine war.
It got compounded as they used this as a monthly average usage for my subsequent bills, which is what knocked up my direct debit from 30 quid (or so) to 1,500 ! (I forget the exact figures offhand)
As I said, the landlords employee is mainly dealing with this now, and I liase through her. She did tell me about a month ago that she got through to someone sufficiently high up in the chain that when he was shown the issue he was able to say "there's no fucking way he used that much in a month. it's bloody ridiculous. I'll sort it" (I'm paraphrasing slightly, but the colourful language WAS used. This implied to me that he was someone with clout, and not just a script-reader.
However, it's been a month, and he's gone quiet, so the press is probably the next step..
I'll let you know if I'm going to be on TV!
Biting the hand that feeds IT
