Commercial energy contracts – any legal rights?

As a community we bought our closed and failed pub. The electricity was cut off, and we had it reconnected a couple of weeks ago. Since then they’ve tried to bill us for 1,500kWh to cover a 5 day period – a time when there was nothing physically connected to the meter.

Their argument is that it’s a smart meter and is generating correct measurements. We’ve literally sent them photos of the meter showing no usage day-to-day, and nothing connected to the load side. They won’t accept it (“our meters don’t make mistakes” and have sent a final demand 3 days after generating a new bill. It’s been reconnected for less than 20 days.

They even sent me a spreadsheet showing their actual measurements and it includes 5 kWh over a period when the entire village was without power. Clearly they’ve assigned the wrong meter to our account.

Obviously we can’t move away as they’d block the transfer, and advice on the internet seems to be entirely for domestic users.

Is there any kind of dispute resolution scheme for commercial entities?

All you can do is keep sending the meter readings in – i.e. copies, and keep calling and making a pain of yourself. You’ve obviously got photo evidence of the day it was connected and the readings now.  Have they got the right meter number ?

That was my first port of call, but the meter doesn’t have the MPAN printed on it. I’m not sure it would help as they just say over and over again “it’s not possible for us to assign the wrong meter”.

Will be on the phone to them again later today.

Micro business are protected in a similar way to domestic customers, so I’d suggest you follow that route rather than using terminology like “commercial” which is treated very differently.

Keep a log of reads and photos, and raise with energy ombudsman if you’re still not getting anywhere.

the meter doesn’t have the MPAN printed on it

There’ll be a serial number which is mapped to the MPAN – they should both appear on the bill

Micro business are protected in a similar way to domestic customers, so I’d suggest you follow that route rather than using terminology like “commercial” which is treated very differently.

Ahh… that’s good to know, thanks. Definitely no serial number on the bill, just the MPAN.

I worked with domestic supply customers.

There is no end to the lying and incompetence suppliers will try to get £ from you without doing their job.

Keep pushing back, complain, look into mark88’s scheme. Good luck

If commercial contracts are anything like those for a mobile phone then you’ll have few rights of cancellation or anything else. Avoid the “C” word if at all possible

Are you willing to name the company in question?

Quite often, much like the domestic suppliers, the company who send you the bills have little to no relationship with the company responsible for accurately maintaining the meter database.

You need to make quite sure that the meter which is on the bill that they sent matches the meter at your premises – there will be a serial number on the meter. Once you confirm to them the meter serial does not match your meter that should stop them taking any action.

If someone came to reconnect the supply, they can at least book appointments with the meter operator to check meter details. This would have the effect of updating the MOP databases, but there would still need to be some work on the part of your supplier to remove the old meter (once the MOP have send the relevant data over).

Makes me wonder if the pub went under due to crippling energy bills, and this was the cause!

You can check who the network operator is here https://www.energynetworks.org/customers/find-my-network-operator

UK Power Networks have a tool to check the MPAN they have for an address, to check the meter on the bill, other network operators may be the same? https://www.ukpowernetworks.co.uk/who-is-my-electricity-supplier-and-what-is-my-mpan

I would probably start a formal complaint procedure, since the company aren’t listening to your responses, and are threatening with final demands in unreasonable timeframes when their data is incorrect. Good luck. https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/information-consumers/energy-advice-households/making-complaint-about-your-energy-supplier-or-network-operator