A frugal life is an easy life!

New laws are being brought in to protect sales workers "from abusive customers"

I spent over 17 years in the retail trade, so I know where this is going.

A sales advisor is a front end, representative of the shop/store they work for.
If they do not know the acceptable position of a particular issue and are not willing to get someone in authority to assist, then, should the customer become irate, then it would be a criminal offence.
There are numerous problems with this approach.

As over the past few years, shops / stores/ banks, etc. have opted to take advantage of weak and long winded consumer groups, we are getting to to the point where something needs to give and it's not, simply making the customer or consumer a criminal.
The customer isn't always right, but very often, when the customer is right, they are left without any form of redress, out of pocket in money and time.

I can give you numerous examples of businesses flouting common law in England & Wales, quoting that their head office decides what is and isn't acceptable (Wrong! The law does this), rather than the customer's statutory rights, to avoid giving an exchange or a refund.

Sports direct: 
I've posted before about their selling of football socks, stated to be a size 10, but a change in design means they are completely unsuitable for a size 10 player to wear.
The branch refuses to address the issue with a simple refund or exchange, saying "It's up to our head office!"
Their head office says, "It's up to the store manager" and refuses to intervene to resolve the issue.
This is a breach of the customer's statutory rights and is a legal matter.
This simple scenario doesn't help the customer, they are given the proverbial runaround and get nowhere, ending up out of pocket.

O2:
Just witnessed an abysmal experience with O2.
Numerous advisors being unable to authenticate an account, despite the customer giving seven (yes that's 7) forms of ID to authenticate their account.
Advisors putting the customer on mute, then cutting the customer off, so the customer has had to start the whole process all over again, on numerous occasions.
Advisors promising a new sim card, then no receipt and no sim card, then customer has to go through the whole process again.
Advisors promising a "technical help team call back within 3 working days" - yes that's three days - to try to solve an intermittent fault with O2's service, you guessed it, the technical help team didn't phone back, so again the customer had to start the whole process all over again.
Advisors flat out lying to the customer regarding account details being "unavailable" when not two minutes earlier in the same call, they were discussing things on the account, which could only have been known had they access to the customer's account.
The long and short of it all, O2 wanted to change sim cards from the old 4g to the new 5g.
So the service for the old 4g sim cards became intermittent and resulted in lack of service for the customer.
Until such time as the customer became so frustrated with the lack of sensible service from O2 they were ready to cancel their contract.
Advisors also did not write up the enquiry notes accurately, which is a breach of the Data Protection Act, O2 have a legal responsibility to do.

Then and only then, did O2 sit up and take notice.
On the third attempt to send out a sim card, they finally did, only their "dedicated sim registration department" staff, were unable to activate the new sim card.
Leaving the customer to explain the whole process all over again for the umpteenth time, leaving the customer on the phone for hours at a time over a number of days.

No redress for lack of service, no customer satisfaction, no apologies. Appalling.
Head office do not make the law, governments and legal departments do.

So in this case, the customer quite rightly in my opinion, kicked off on the phone. They had just sat through over two hours of phone calls, getting absolutely nowhere.
The customer was refused a manager attending.
The customer was offered the chance to wait, "but it will be an hour" - that's OK, you don't return calls!
After ten minutes on mute, the advisor terminated the call without speaking to the customer again and didn't log any of this on the customer's account notes.
O2 advisors in this case have clearly broken the law.
So where's the redress? Where's the accountability? Where's the legal enforcement of the customer's rights?

Numerous businesses are claiming that refunds can only go back on the debit card that was used to make the purchase.
(Wrong again!)
A purchase made with a debit card, leaves the customer's bank balance immediately and a refund should be given as a cash refund if the customer requests it.
Ladbroke's won't even pay out any cash winnings on a bet, if it's paid for via debit card!

Utilita:
Guest payments are where a guest not a customer of the energy company, can make a payment towards the energy account of their choice.
Yet when Utilita fail to credit the account with energy, their system removes the purchase amount from the account balance of the payee, not the customer account.
The payee then asks for a refund or a credit to the energy account of the number given.
Utilita refuse, claiming, "We can only deal with the account holder!"
(Wrong again!)
Under the Sale Of Goods Act, the contract of sale is between the payee and the company/business, not the energy account holder the payment was being made to.
There then exists a stalemate and the payee is left without the funds or the energy credit on their meter.

There has to be some form of redress for the customer. Always.
Not in "Three working days!"
Not when a manager can be bothered to ring back - if they ever do - at a random time, over a 24 hour period.
NOW!

If you businesses don't like this, then shut up shop and close down.

Using your customers like this is not an option.
It's time this was recognised and not brushed under the carpet by the powers that be.
Making a customer a criminal is not the way to go.
Making businesses accountable for the way they behave, is.

Ovo’s senior resolution manager could not determine, from the billing that SSE sent across to Ovo, on the transfer of the account, answers to the questions put to him.

In response, Ovo’s senior manager stated,

“I will now try to get the data directly from SSE Energy's system, as opposed to the data that is passed to us from them. This may take me a day or so to attain, if at all possible.
I will contact you after I have laid eyes on the raw data to better understand what SSE Energy have communicated to you historically”

I thought it strange, that Ovo’s senior manager may not able to view recent data on the customer’s account (as highlighted in his response above)?

After checking and viewing “the raw data from SSE” Ovo’s senior manager then stated,

“It is worth noting there was another customer reading submitted online that was added on the 21/05/2021 of 1414”

Ovo’s senior manager went further in a later reply, stating,

“When I advised of the reading you/customer/3rd party have provided via the online service, it is the online portal entry that I have viewed. This is not a point of debate, it absolutely happened.”

Only there wasn’t a customer reading of 1414 submitted by the customer via the online services, this is complete fabrication.
As is the date it was supposed to have been submitted to SSE.

Ovo’s senior manager (whom has seen the raw data from SSE it’s claimed) stated that the meter reading of 1414 was submitted by the customer on 21^st May 2021.

Yet SSE’s own billing, sent over to Ovo when the account was transferred, shows that a bill was generated on 27^th April 2021, quoting an actual meter reading of 1414 as “the previous reading” on the account.
This is almost a month earlier, than Ovo’s senior resolution manager states after “viewing SSE’s raw data”

How can this be?

• Is Ovo’s senior manager lying?
• Has Ovo’s senior manager actually seen “SSE’s raw data”?
• Ovo’s senior manager has confirmed, “the previous reading given by yourselves of 2148, given on the 25/05/2021 at 9:28” was on SSE’s billing system, so why did SSE quote 1414 as being the previous reading used in their billing?

As if the inaccurate statements coming from Ovo’s senior resolution manager weren’t bad enough, imagine my surprise, when attempting to view the customer’s original SSE billing, sent over by SSE to Ovo on the transfer of the account, via their online Ovo account…

The January to April 2021 bill, that has the 1414 reading added, is missing!

Further viewing revealed that the 1644 reading, said by Ovo’s senior manager to have been submitted by the customer (which is in dispute as it was not submitted and readings of of 2148 and 2422 have also been confirmed as being on SSE billing system) in January 2022, has that bill in question also missing!

I refer you back to the highlighted point earlier,

         “This may take me a day or so to attain, if at all possible”

In three separate replies, I have asked Ovo’s senior resolutions manager,

• Where is the missing billing?
• Why can we not view the missing billing?
• Why is this billing missing from the account SSE transferred over to Ovo?
  (Especially as bills from before and after for both gas and electricity are present, yet not the two bills that are being disputed?)

Each time he has chosen not to answer.

In his final reply, suggesting “a £100 goodwill gesture” as a final settlement, he asked which missing bills I was referring to.

I find it very strange that selected bills, that are being disputed, are missing from the customer’s online Ovo account?

Meter readings underpin all energy company charges to the customer. They have to. It’s standard practise for the industry.

So when Ovo and SSE are unable to account for the meter readings they have used, on their records and used to bill customers, it is a very strange state of affairs.

When Ovo’s senior resolutions manager explains what SSE have done and it can be proven that what is being claimed/they are saying, is clearly false, as a customer, I would expect Ovo’s senior resolution manager to go back to SSE and clear the matter up with them, before reporting back to the customer.
(Is this unreasonable?)

That Ovo’s senior resolution manager is unable or unwilling to do this, instead choosing to offer a token “goodwill gesture” to close the complaint and leave the customer facing a huge bill, without any explanation of the false meter readings, raises fundamental questions about the policies Ovo and SSE are following.

Here’s the meter readings, you judge for yourself.

• 27^th April 2021 – actual reading of 1847 (SSE confirmed)
• 21^st May 2021 – actual reading of 1414 (Ovo senior manager’s claim was “submitted by customer” after viewing “the online portal entry”) (SSE cannot confirm this)
• 25^th May 2021 – actual reading of 2148 (Ovo’s senior resolution manager and SSE confirmed)
• 12^th January 2022 – actual reading of 2422 (SSE and Ovo’s senior resolution manager confirmed)
• 19^th January 2022 – actual reading of 1644 (Ovo senior manager’s claim was “submitted via the online portal by the customer (web app or website)” SSE cannot confirm this)
• 30^th June 2022 – estimated reading of 1821 (final account reading sent by SSE to Ovo, prior to transfer of account to Ovo)
• 3^rd July 2022 – actual reading of 3833 taken from smart meter by Ovo advisor

After receiving this information from Ovo’s senior resolution manager, two readings stood out straight away.
I’ve highlighted them both in bold italic for you to see.

The meter readings claimed to be the case by Ovo’s senior manager, of 21^st May 2021 and 19^th January 2022, cannot be accurate.

Here’s why.

27^th April 2021 – meter reading of 1847 is an actual reading, confirmed by SSE and accepted by Ovo’s senior resolutions manager.
21^st May 2021 – meter reading of 1414 is claimed by Ovo’s senior manager, to have been submitted by the customer via the website or web app.

1. Customer has no internet device and is over 80 years old, so would not know how to submit a meter reading “online”.
2. Confirmed that family representing them had no access/registration to website and hadn’t downloaded SSE’s web app (no such account was set up on customer’s account)
3. If the customer had submitted a meter reading of 1414 (which is 433 metered units LOWER) SSE’s system would have rejected the reading.
   As confirmed by Ovo’s senior manager later and SSE staff, the meter reading submitted would have to follow on from the previous meter reading on SSE’s system, or it is rejected.

This immediately set alarm bells ringing for me.
I replied to Ovo’s senior manager and offered written copies as proof.
He didn’t want to see them.
I asked how could the customer or representative submit a LOWER reading via the online portal, when the system would have rejected it?

Ovo’s senior manager declined to answer.

All he stated was that, “The meter reading of 1414 was submitted by the customer or a 3^rd party via the online portal”

I contacted SSE staff.
“Can a 3^rd party, ie, a meter reader working on behalf of SSE, submit a lower meter reading than is currently on SSE’s billing system?”
The reply was an emphatic, “No.”
“To submit a lower meter reading than is on SSE’s billing system would require a manual over-ride, as the billing system cannot calculate for negative energy usage.”

So to have the meter reading of 1414 put on the customer’s account, would have required a manual over-ride by an SSE member of staff, which shows clearly that the customer/their representative/a 3^rd party, could not have submitted the lower meter reading via SSE’s online portal, as the Ovo senior resolutions manager had claimed.

I went back to Ovo’s senior manager, once again, he was unable to answer.

Instead, he stated, “you/customer/3rd party have provided via the online service, it is the online portal entry that I have viewed. This is not a point of debate, it absolutely happened.”

Sorry Mr Ovo senior manager, it absolutely did not.
The only way it could have been put on to the customer’s account, is by an SSE member of staff, over-riding their own billing system.

Then the question of why SSE stated in writing that the current meter reading on their billing system was 2148?
Why not the 1414 as claimed by Ovo’s senior manager?

I then questioned the other (highlighted) meter reading of 19^th January 2022, which I was told by Ovo’s senior resolutions manager, was a customer/representative/3^rd party actual reading of 1644.

I pointed out the same points as above, about not being possible to submit lower readings, but with additional points of fact, that the reading couldn’t have been submitted by the family or a 3^rd party.

Ovo’s senior manager claimed that the 1644 actual reading was submitted via the online portal on 19^th January 2022.
SSE have confirmed in writing that their billing system had on the 12^th January 2022 (7 days earlier) accepted an actual reading (that SSE based their billing upon) of 2422.

Discrepancies:

1. Why was the actual reading of 1644 not shown on any SSE billing?
2. How did the alleged meter reading of 1644, said to have been submitted the same day as the bill was generated, get used?
   (There is a 48 hour delay to meter readings, before they show on the billing account)
3. As SSE confirmed they were using the 2422 actual meter reading, why 7 days later did they supposedly use a reading of 1644?

I thought my questions were quite reasonable and were at least worthy of further investigation.

Ovo’s senior resolution manager thinks that “we are going around in circles” and these discrepancies in meter readings don’t require further investigation.

Bearing in mind that these alleged meter readings are the root cause of an extra £652 bill (already taken from customer’s credit), I’d say it was important that these questions were answered.

One final point on these mysterious meter readings:

Ovo’s senior resolution manager stated in one of his replies, that “There were no [meter] reading entries for January 12^th 2022.”

He then stated in the same reply to another point, “That [2422 actual meter reading] was a reading that was provided online on 12/01/2022”

Now when it’s factored in, that the bill being questioned, is the only bill in over two years covered, that SSE haven’t transferred over to Ovo, available on the customer’s online account to view, it’s a little odd, don’t you think?

Representing an SSE customer, whom has had their energy accounts (for gas and electricity) transferred over to Ovo (the company that own SSE).

A simple process, which has been over complicated and left the customer’s account balance over £1300 worse off.

Ovo’s online staff and senior complaints resolution staff, have been obstructive, misleading and inaccurate in their responses.

Ovo senior staff have deliberately attempted to confuse issues, even when a same basic question has been put to them on several occasions, refusing to answer.

Ovo staff have gone even further, in attempting to persuade others to make themselves financially liable for the account, before responding/discussing the account, quoting inaccurate legal positions/requirements, while failing to abide by current legal practices required (under common law for England and Wales).

SSE’s staff refuse to even discuss the issues (let alone act) and simply refer directly to Ovo’s staff.

The complaint:

• SSE have billed the customer in the past.
• The customer was over £700 in credit.
• Ovo took over the account via transfer from SSE.
• Ovo have read their smart meters.
• SSE have re-billed the customer.
• After “Checking” with SSE’s back office, migration team, Ovo have applied their re-billing to the customer’s account.
• The customer was put into debit on their Ovo account, by over £650.

Now under normal circumstances there would not be an issue.
However, a succession of misleading and inaccurate statements from Ovo staff, led to the complaint being escalated to Ovo’s senior resolution staff.

Ovo’s senior resolution staff gave explanations that can be proven to be false/inaccurate.

When questioned to justify their position, Ovo’s senior resolution staff have been unable to answer several key facts.
I put these key questions to the senior resolution staff again.
Again, they refused to answer what are to me, basic questions, that would justify their position.

Their response was, “We are going around in circles here” and “You are simply refusing to accept the answers I’m giving!”

This has led to Ovo senior resolution staff offering “A £100 goodwill gesture credit” to close the complaint.

This has now gone to a “final resolution letter” and the energy ombudsman option.

I’m happy to deal with the account, however, I’m not happy to proceed unless fundamental questions can be answered, especially when it can be proven that the claims of Ovo’s senior resolution team (via SSE’s migration/accounts team), are false and inaccurate.

At the very least it requires SSE and Ovo to explain what has been done.

There will follow here, a series of posts, regarding the transfer of an energy account from SSE to Ovo.

Complete failings in what has occurred includes inaccurate Ovo staff reporting, failure to escalate/register a formal complaint, a huge reduction in the account balances for gas and electricity, unexplained SSE meter readings, missing billing, unexplained billing and an attempt at back-billing by SSE via Ovo, dating back more than 12 months.

To write one post about the case, would result in a very long post, with so many facets that it would be hard to follow.
Also, others are reporting similar issues with certain aspects of this case about SSE and Ovo.

These posts will serve as a reference for myself (as is the case with many posts on the website) and may shed some light on certain aspects, for other cases.

I hope this will help.

SSE to Ovo transfer – What’s the complaint?

SSE to Ovo transfer – Unknown meter readings!

SSE to Ovo transfer – Missing bills!