Hi Martin,
In 2007 was misold a tarrif from british gas for £8pm for gas and £8pm for electric.
Only today did i get letter telling me that i owed them £199.00

To cut along story very short, a rep selling this tarrif set it all up for me in my home, i paid this for 18months, without a call or letter stating that this was wrong, i had no idea.

Until i got a letter stating that i owed them in total just under £600, in 2008 January, after lenghty discussions, letters and annoyance on my behalf they agreed that i could settle both accounts in installments.
I was paying the electric off at £15 a month form 2008 till 2010 (may), but paid the Gas bill off earlier.
I did not get a letter or any correspondence for British gas for either bill.

Today, i rang them yet again annoyed, knowing i had paid it off.
 They sent me an email after being on the phone for about 1hour saying they were sorry and i had paid this account off, it was an error and they were sorry.

All this prevented me form changing suppliers as i was told i could not leave British gas because of the outstanding money…….i will be looking for a cheaper supplier tomorrow

Wendy..

Signed up for EDF Online Saver tariff.  It was not made clear that it is not a Fixed Rate as opposed to a Fixed TERM rate which is in fact variable.

A Southern E rep knocked on my door and insisted he could beat my current tariff. I showed him a bill, he got out a mind boggling grid then said i’d get it cheaper. I’m not convinced. I had to pay a early cancellation charge with old supplier but offer £40 cashback voucher to cover it.

Husband’s on the phone as I write. Did a comparison and found a cheaper provider! (arn’t you proud I would never have done that once that’s thank to you)  told E-on we were leaving they said they would cap a lower rate and keep us cheaper. Letter came through the post with new direct debit amount of £47 more a month than we pay with THEM now………… Go figure !!! hopefully will get there in the end

This happened just over 10 years ago, I was 8 months pregnant with my youngest.  There was a bloke for Cambridge Gas asking me if I was interested.  I did say I wasn’t interested so he said could I sign a form to say he had called, I refused and said I wasn’t going to sign anything, he kept pestering saying he needed it signed to say he had called, in the end I confirmed with him that I wasn’t signing over that it was just to say he’d called and I could be sent information.  Very naive I know but I had 2 other children running about and needed to get them in the house.  The next I heard was about 4 months later with a bill from Cambridge Gas demanding I paid a bill.  I had no idea where this came from so contacted them immediately with information about my then current supplier.  They agreed it was a mistake and that they would sort it.  Eventually they decided to take me to court.  | went straight to the CAB who were great, they put me in touch with the Energy Watch Dog, who let me down big time, they didn’t get in touch with Cambridge Gas, it went to court and I ended up with a CCJ against my name. The person from the Energy Watch Dog that initially took the call off the CAB eventually went off on long term sick and the first they heard about my case was when I constantly kept phoning to get some answers.  They apologised and said there was nothing further they could do.  I had confirmation from Transco to say that at no time did I ever have gas from Cambridge Gas.  Cambridge Gas no longer exists. 

I’m a director of a management company for an apartment block. My managing agents promised me they had a specialist team that get us the best deals. It turns out they had never negotiated a better deal after our properties were built. Equally bad is that E-On have now offered us a 3 year fixed rate that is 60% cheaper, which would have saved us £3500! Who is worse?!

NPower knocked on our door when I wasn’t home and my fiancé answered. To cut a long story short they told her that they would do a price comparison if she signed a letter and they would then come back with the figures. 1 week later a “Welcome to NPower” letter dropped through the door. 

To say I was livid was an understatement. It took me 9 months to get the contract moved back with the eventual help of Energy Watch even though the sly switch they performed took all of 7 days.

Scottish Power rep knocked on my door and said he could beat my local tariff. We agreed a monthly payment of £100 pm. This was in November. “009/2010 was a very hard winter, and in April they reviewed the tariff as £140 pm, a 40% increase. I thought I was locked in for a year. I complained, protested that my husband had just left and that the household income was reduced by 50%- all to no avail. I moved house in March this year to a smaller, more energy efficient house. By July this year my account was £400 in credit-it has taken them 6 months  to review my DD payments, and refund the £400 plus. I have moved supplier to Utility Warehouse, and pay £50 pm. Not at all satisfied with Scottish Power!

As part of a regeneration with lots of new builds a guy came to the door with a clip board and said he had just checked the communal meters please sign here – handed me a clipboard with a blank sheet of paper covering a form leaving just the signature part. I asked to read the form and was told it was standard, asked again and was myself asked if i didn’t trust him? Told him no i did not and if I could not read it it would remain unsigned.

10 days letter I was welcomed to British Gas asa new customer.

I called them and very calmy told the woman I was prepared to explain myself once and it would take 5 mins which was free, after this I would charge £60 per hour up to the nearest hour. I was told I could not charge for my time, so I explained the price had gone up to £180 per hour and they should not waste the 5 minutes…..

2 days later I had an appology letter confirming I had been signed up in error……

I had an N-power rep at my door trying to get me to switch over today! His biggest selling line was that Mr Martin Lewis himself endorses N-power and how wonderful financial sense it would make to switch if he says so.

(After I had finished chuckling to myself) I challenged this rep to find me a better deal …. (I shop around as I use the money mantra LOADS!) … He couldn’t!! He walked away (with a flea in his ear!)I was with British Gas for dual fuel then swapped to EON and price fixed for 2 years earlier this week. He told me I would be stung for the cost of swapping by Brit Gas and later if I wanted to leave EON …. but he was willing to bridge that potential expense with £200 ‘off’ my bill, as long as I swapped today!
Another good line was “a lot of your neighbours have changed to us already and the more people in your area the cheaper we can supply it!” How?! Does each company have a different pipe to the road? I think not! It’s not cash n carry! Us lil folks can’t buy in bulk to save cash!      
He had already asked me if I was between the ages of 18 and 65 … therefore he knew I WAS NOT born yesterday!!!

I am quite savvy when it comes to door-to-door energy salesmen so it was a bit of a surprise when I got a ‘Sorry you’re leaving us’ letter from my supplier, Scottish Power. Being a curious kind of chap I phoned them up to discover that I was in the process of swapping to Scottish and Southern. SP said that they would submit a protest on my behalf and in the meantime they would swap me back. To add insult to injury a couple of weeks later I got a letter from the ombudsman, or whoever looked into it, saying that they had looked into it and I had meant to switch (no evidence to back it up their conclusion). If I had wanted to switch I would definitely have gone through a cashback site like Quidco. 

Just managed to grab NPower’s Go Fix 6, through Quidco, 2 days before it was withdrawn at a saving of -£215

I called npwer around 12 months ago to get abetter deal. Npower told me on the new discounted tariff i could reduce my energy payments by £50 a month  months down the line i was £200 in debt and wanted to re calculate my payments to almost double the original amount

I don’t really know if this classes as being missold but here is my story anyway! I switch my energy suppilers every year to get the best deal. I had been paying £14 for my gas, and recieved a letter saying my payment was going to £52. I couldn’t believe that was accurate so I called up and gave a meter reading to generate a more accurate bill. The new bill was £61. Apparently the £14 payment was massively underestimated despite the fact I gave a meter reading whenn I switched, and despite the fact we’ve probably turned our gas on twice since Feb. I now owe them about £200, thanks to the underestimated payment. The truth is I don’t really understand how it all happened! Is it my fault for being naive, or have they tried to pull the wool over my eyes? The one thing that I do know is that I’m going to struggle to re-pay a debt that I didn’t even know was building up

i am a door to door energy salles man and like to think i am one of the good guys, i work for one of the suppliers not under invrestigation for miss selling so i would like to give you all a little info . as martin says a fixed online taffif will offer the best deal but, this is the important thing when you go to the comparison web sites use your  ANUAL consumption figures not your monthly repayments to work it out this info can be found on the statments sent to you.

it is easy to see why the more nasty salesman will dupe you , we all chase the ££££ but be wise if i asked how much is a pint of milk , it would be fare to say its a simular price in all shops +/- 1p and energy is much the same. an average house consumes aprox £1200 p/a this is £100 per month if your offerd £80 p/m expect a realignment of £240 at the end of the year , to sell it at £80 is miss selling i always use the annual KWH to work it out as this is what the house has used, usualy the price is the same or fractionaly less sometimes more thus the reason to change is usualy for the bolt on items like loyalts points or customer service

and on a final note loyalyt pays no dividend, the number of people who have been with xyz co for 30 years astounds, i know there are better deals for that person but the wont change or tqlk to the supplier and ask for a cheaper tarrif and thats where they have you , i know a lot of people will just sit back and accept this round of rises and not do a thing and so do the energy companies   

I signed up to Southern Electric (S.S.E.) after being told they were the cheapest, not only did I find out they weren’t the cheapest but also 2 weeks after I signed up with them, they hiked up the prices (cheeky monkeys). I am now very wary of door-to-door salesmen and also the “loiter-around-the-entrances-of-supermarkets” squad as they also tend to try to get people to sign up prior to a price hike, so be afraid. be very afraid!!!

When Npower sent me the information re a direct debit for dual fuel in November 2010 I was delighted at the DD price they had set.  I even phoned their customer services to confirm the level of payment as it was so much less than my previous provider. What has now transpired is that I have, after six months paid only half of what I need to pay and a mountain of correspondence has ensued as I challenged their assessment of the cost for my usage.  I had provided my previous 12 months’ usage when I was transferring.  They continue to investigate endlessly.

When I was at University around 2004 two guys knocked on the door and asked us to fill in an ‘energy survey’. They claimed to be from ‘National Power’, a ‘Government body’ conducting research into energy usage. After they had finished asking questions we were then asked to sign the form to ‘agree to our details being included in the survey’. Two days later a welcome pack from Npower dropped through the letter box congratulating us on our choice of new supplier.

i would go to citizens advice bureau they should be able to help you

Just a few weeks ago on the advice of this site I used a price comparison site to find the cheapest supplier and changed from Scottish Power to British gas. The comparison site said I would make savings of over £300 per year. I received my first bill from British Gas only to discover that I am now going to be paying £45 more a month than my previous supplier. When I rang them to query this, I was informed that they have nothing to do with the price comparison sites (even though the account i took out is called the “Websaver”!!!!) They did however reduce it so I am now saving £10 a month on previous supplier – though how long this will last with all the prices going up I don’t know!! To top it off I had Scottish Power knock on my door a couple of days ago asking me not to leave. I told them it was too late as i will now be charged to leave British Gas. He told me I will be charged £50 for leaving Scottish Power – even though when I joined them I specifically asked if I could leave at any time and was informed that I could (they just forgot to mention that while you can leave at any time – you will be charged fo doing so). I am going to dispute this as it was definately a little bit naughty – The Scottish Power man said they would pobably let me off with it as it’s so tightly governed now… my advice query everything do not automatically go with price comparison sites, do a bit of research first!!

This is exactly what happened to me.

They also spin you a  line about how they own the local power station or something like that and tell you that as a result the cost of their energy is cheaper. Doorstep seller told me that they could get my DD down from £120 to £80. 3 months later, first meter reading and its over £140 per month!

hi martin we decided to change our energy supplier from british gas to n power after they knocked our door with the promise of annual dual fuel discount(£100).they were very persuasive.we have a meter for our electricity which was already there from the previous tenant.at the time we did ask if this would be possible to change,so we could pay for our gas and electric by direct debit in order to qualify for the discount.they said it wouldnt be a problem and it would be sorted in due course.this has never been done and i’m annoyed that we have missed out on the extra savings.we have been with them for about 3 yrs now and are looking in to switching to another supplier.

we switched to npower in march 2009 paying £91 duel fuel gas/elec, nov 2009 got a statement £693 in credit – they refunded us £265 & dropped payments to £41, leaving us £400+ in credit. march 2010 got a statement £1083 in debt, but no change in payment, dec 2010 £1588 in debt, but still no change in payment. june 2011 statement £2500+ in debt and change in monthly payment to £360. rang to complain that we couldn’t afford the monthly payment, but they insisted the debt had to be paid within 12 months. we pushed the point that our monthly payment had not been reviewed for over 18 months, got passed to the complaints department who after some negotiation agreed to let us pay over 2 years. still paying over £200 a month which is going to stretch us a bit. i know we should have got the payments changed, but the statements just got filed away assuming npower would change the payments at some point.

I was told by Scottish Power on the phone I would definitely be cheaper with them than with Scottish Hydro Electric and after three months with them my bills went up and up. I was so annoyed I decided to go to USwitch to change never done a comparison site before and then after signing up with British Gas their price rises were announced and Scottish Power are charging me for cancelling which was never mentioned at any point.  I am so p*ssed off I wish I had never left Scottish Hydro.

 P.S. Tried to get the free insulation from British Gas as some kind of consolation but whoever they farmed this contract out to is so incompetent I didn’t bother and paid £5 for it from a local contractor.

I sell gas and electric door to door for EDF energy and would reassure anyone who is cautious about us not to worry. I can honestly say i treat everyone as if i was selling to my own gran. Our 2014 fixed tariff beats everyones fixed deals, Fact. Generally its about up to £10 more a month to fix (sometimes cheaper than original rates) but really its about £5 to £10 cheaper a month (sometimes more if your a bgas customer) when these rises come into place.

To give you an idea of peoples mindset, 2 weeks ago a guy was with E.O.N but was like I am not changing I will wait and see what my company does. I aint too pushy, so thats fine mate you will regret it. What happens, EON prices up on Friday. Today I was in an Npower customers house who said the exact same thing. People do not realise these good deals will not be here after everyone puts there prices up because simply the company does not need to compete at low rates. I’m assuming if you are on this page its because you are interested in saving money so you probably get what I am saying does make sense. The problem is the perception of people like me knocking on your door to folk who just don’t get it.

As for some of the stories I have heard of people changing over and the two companies making a mess of things its no wonder people get scared of changing. When someone changes supplier there should be a middle man who deals with everything between the two companies the problem is easily fixed.

I sell gas and electric door to door for EDF energy and would reassure anyone who is cautious about us not to worry. I can honestly say i treat everyone as if i was selling to my own gran. Our 2014 fixed tariff beats everyones fixed deals, Fact. Generally its about up to £10 more a month to fix (sometimes cheaper than original rates) but really its about £5 to £10 cheaper a month (sometimes more if your a bgas customer) when these rises come into place.

To give you an idea of peoples mindset, 2 weeks ago a guy was with E.O.N but was like I am not changing I will wait and see what my company does. I aint too pushy, so thats fine mate you will regret it. What happens, EON prices up on Friday. Today I was in an Npower customers house who said the exact same thing. People do not realise these good deals will not be here after everyone puts there prices up because simply the company does not need to compete at low rates. I’m assuming if you are on this page its because you are interested in saving money so you probably get what I am saying does make sense. The problem is the perception of people like me knocking on your door to folk who just don’t get it.

As for some of the stories I have heard of people changing over and the two companies making a mess of things its no wonder people get scared of changing. When someone changes supplier there should be a middle man who deals with everything between the two companies the problem is easily fixed.

I did not switch but had to pay extra for previous bill. I was given amount to pay to cover gas and electric and pay off previous bill. Six months later I had a letter from N Power ststing that I was paying to much and reduced my monthly payment. Six months after I received a bill for £400.00 on top of the payments I had already made, this meant my 2 bed house was costing about £1200.00 pounds per year( I work full time so the house is empty all day). I called to be told taht this was correct and I would now have to pay £100 per month to again clear the o/s bill and cover my gas and electric. Last week I had another letter stating I was not paying enough and my payments have now gone upto £115.00 pounds per month. Is it ever going to end?

I was approached in M & S to sign up for there energy via Southern Electric just about 12 months ago. The salesman “jamie” told me that the good thing about this partnership was that the M & S brand and service was one you could TRUST. He told me that they absolutely guarantee to be cheaper than every other supplier during my time with them, this was a special deal for M & S customers. On the basis of this I signed up. I have just had a letter saying prices are going up and I got straight on the phone to customer service. I pointed out that this increase makes them more expensive then many other companies and that I had been told that I would always be on a cheaper rate than competitors.The call taker offered to send the salesman a “Feedback form” but i pointed out this was more serious than a slap on the wrist, I had been mis sold my gas and electric. They simply cannot claim to remain cheaper to suck you in then put the prices up. I am awaiting a response from the legal department at present, wish me luck! Claire

  I had a British gas door salesman call at the door i, would not normally speak to them but times are hard, he promise that he could better our gas and electric prices and that british gas was the cheapest in the market and had literature to support this, he asked how much monthly dd was on both and then gave his prices.I then asked about the change over he said they would handle all that and that we would not pay both suppliers for the same months gas. this did not happen and we were charged by both incurred bank charges  a week later our original supplier called explained that this man had been doing this everywhere and that the prices he was quoting you would be reviewed by the supplier at the first opportunity and then increased to more than we were paying originally so we then moved back to original supplyer as it was within the cooling down period. 

what about the hundreds of people that have signed up on the doorstep and saved money???? OK i will admit that the industry has been plauged with cowboys but it has done its best to weed these out. Great news that some companies have made all the doorstep staff redundant i hope your all very proud of yourselves. I have(as you might have guessed) been doostep selling since deregulation and pride myself on my ethics and i have genuinly saved people a lot of money. i can see people have been misold i see it every day..the same as i see banks taking millions and car parls chargeing extortionate money..but no its the little working class easy target that gets it in the neck..come on Martin we are all energysured and audited now stop this before we all lose our jobs please