I’m currently renting my grandmother’s house while she is in a care home with dementia.
Soon after I moved in, I was hit with a £614 quarterly water bill from Southern Water. I was already paying £62 a month in direct debits but was apparently falling short.
I discovered the company had registered the wrong meter to my grandmother’s account and was charging her, and now me, for a neighbour’s supply.
It has thus been overcharging my grandmother – registered as a vulnerable customer – since she moved to the newly built estate 18 years ago.
Southern visited the property, admitted the account was linked to the wrong meter and installed a new digital one.
It said in December that it had cancelled the £614 bill, and that the account was £500 in credit. But now it has changed its story.
It has wiped the credit and is, instead, demanding I pay it £500, even though my new meter readings prove my actual usage amounts to about £100.
Every time I call, I get a different story, or a new “process” to follow that leads to a dead end.
It feels as if it is trying to cover up a massive 18-year mistake.
JM Horsham, West Sussex
It seems your grandmother, who lived alone and was on the priority services register because of her age and illness, has been paying for the water at a neighbouring house ever since she moved in. The mix-up wasn’t obvious when the neighbouring household was small, but her bills increased significantly more recently since four people now live there.
You immediately spotted that the meter serial number on your bills did not match the meter assigned to the house.
Instead of making urgent amends, Southern added the amount outstanding on the neighbour’s meter to the sum due on your new one. The result was a £500 bill sent days after written confirmation that the account was £500 in credit.
Southern admits that its complaints team contacted you and that the account was fully reviewed after I raised questions. By its calculations, your grandmother had been overcharged £893. You accept this figure.
The supplier has issued a cheque for this, plus £200 in goodwill, to your grandmother, and refunded £594 of overpayments made by you since you took over the account last summer.
Southern Water says: “We are very sorry for the mix-up in meter readings and the distress the customer experienced trying to resolve the issue.”
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