Last year, the Guardian featured the plight of Fiona Porter, whose British Gas account was showing £1,525 in credit before it was migrated to the company’s new billing platform. She was promised a refund when her house was sold but, instead, received a bill for a similar sum she reluctantly paid. She complained, and the company decided that it, in fact, owed her £2,650. The promised cheque never came. Instead, she received a bill for £3,000.
That’s where I came in. British Gas blamed a faulty meter for the confusion and said an agent had erroneously recorded the £2,650 credit. It refunded her an unexplained £1,201 and declared the account clear.
Unconvinced, Porter took her case to the energy ombudsman, which ordered British Gas to recalculate five years’ of bills. The result? A year after the house was sold, that £2,650 popped up again, as a debt.
Back I went to British Gas. And, guess what? It says an agent recorded the £2,650 debt in error while implementing the ombudsman recommendations – just as agent error had apparently conjured a £2,650 credit months earlier. British Gas now says the account is actually in credit to the tune of £424.
If you are a British Gas customer, beware. Based on this case, its arithmetic would seemingly shame a primary school class.
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