prepay power

mfjwhelan

I switched to prepaypower.ie on 29th of October.
I observed the operation of the switch for 7 days and concluded that the switchover was costing me 40 per cent extra on my bills not the 20 per saving as promised in advertising.
On 6th November I called customer service at prepay and advised them that I was unhappy with the service and wanted to terminate as I was within the cooling off period of 14 days.
My original electricity bills were always around the 80 euro mark for 60 days, that's about 1.33 euro per day. The calculated daily cost with prepay is circa 1.70 euro per day.
The operator informed me that the start of the cooling off period was the 20th, which was the day that I called prepay power to organise the installation of the prepay meter. She told me that I was outside the 14 day cooling off period and that I was now subject to a 12 month contract.
I didn't sign any contract until the date of installation which was 29th.
How can I be subject to contract from the 20th when I didn't sign the contract until the 29th.
They also did not furnish me with a copy of the contract.

I have complained to the energy regulator
I have complained in writing to prepaypower.

thisistough

As far as I know the contract and therefore cooling off period starts from when the service actually starts. I'd call them back and ask if your contract then ends on the anniversary of the date that you signed up or the date of installation. If they're not playing ball is ask to speak to a manager, front line staff might just not understand the cooling off period

brightspark

The extra you are paying is approximately the increase in standing charge (about 40c per day)

The only way to save with either prepay power or pinenergy is to become more energy concious and switch off anything you can. (But if you did that with other companies you would save more!)

I'm guessing that with a bill of just €80 for 60 days you were already being frugal with your usage. (Your original daily bill was made up of approx €1 usage and €0.33 standing charge, now you have a €0.70 daily standing charge)

Not sure if you have any way of cancelling though.

Personally I think the prepay companies are comparable to loan sharks, profitting from those who can least afford it, i.e. those with poor budgeting skills who have little or no savings and need to pay their bills in small amounts.

Next time you are changing any provider, be it phone, gas, electricity, broadband or TV. Go to bonkers.ie first.
They even have some banking comparisons too.

Never believe any advert without checking first.

brightspark

From

http://prepaypower.ie/docs/default-source/Terms-Conditions/terms-and-conditions-19082014.pdf

2. THE CONTRACT
2.1 Save where clause 2.2 applies, this Contract will commence, or will be deemed to commence on
the Commencement Date which will be either when:
2.1.1 you and we agree on the phone that we will supply electricity to you at the Premises and you verbally agree to accept these terms and conditions; or
2.1.2 you sign up via our Website and click that you accept these terms and conditions.

I don't know if the contract would stand up in court, (and no one here can actually tell you) but it looks like your cooling off period started when you spoke on the phone to them.

Fred Swanson

This post has been deleted.

foggy_lad

brightspark wrote: »

The extra you are paying is approximately the increase in standing charge (about 40c per day)

The only way to save with either prepay power or pinenergy is to become more energy concious and switch off anything you can. (But if you did that with other companies you would save more!)

I'm guessing that with a bill of just €80 for 60 days you were already being frugal with your usage. (Your original daily bill was made up of approx €1 usage and €0.33 standing charge, now you have a €0.70 daily standing charge)

Not sure if you have any way of cancelling though.

Personally I think the prepay companies are comparable to loan sharks, profitting from those who can least afford it, i.e. those with poor budgeting skills who have little or no savings and need to pay their bills in small amounts.

Next time you are changing any provider, be it phone, gas, electricity, broadband or TV. Go to bonkers.ie first.
They even have some banking comparisons too.

Never believe any advert without checking first.

This company and others offering similar prepay meters for electricity charge an extra €13 per month on top of the electric Ireland standard rate inclusive of all standing charges and carbon taxes.

The only way to save is to first reduce your usage by approximately €136/year and any reduction on top of that will be your saving!

brightspark

foggy_lad wrote: »

This company and others offering similar prepay meters for electricity charge an extra €13 per month on top of the electric Ireland standard rate inclusive of all standing charges and carbon taxes.

The only way to save is to first reduce your usage by approximately €136/year and any reduction on top of that will be your saving!

As I said, they are no better than loan sharks, penalising those who can least afford it.

niall1811

The beginning of your cooling off period was the day you either contacted prepay power too sign up or someone called to your door to sign you up. On that day a meter reading was taken and that is when your cooling off period begins. I work in electric sales (not for prepay power though) and legally speaking that's when your 14 day cooling off period will begin. Also no electric company gives you a paper copy of a contract the day you sign up to them. Unfortunately in my experience prepay power are a living nightmare to deal with, they push the boundaries of what is allowed in the energy market and the commission of energy regulation are powerless effectively to stop them. There is also rumour that in the small print of your contract that once the meter is installed it voids any cooling off period too, but I can't be 100% on that.
Genuinely consider paying the exit fee to them as even after that initial outlay it'll work out cheaper on a bill with a discount. I spend most of my working week helping people leave prepay power and even when the contract is ended they will not let people leave easily.
I get you're unhappy with the way they did this too you...but you're going to get nowhere. The CER will send you a generic response and do nothing about it as you aren't the first and won't be the last with the same complaint. Prepay power themselves won't care they'll just fob you off.
Lesson in the electric market is don't fall for someone saying they have the lowest this or best discount this. Ignore all of it and break it down into unit cost and standing charges and see which of those is the best, discount percentages and promise of the lowest this or that are misleading.

LollipopJimmy

I know a bit about the workings of switch overs. In general when switching utility provider it's the phone call when the contract begins, at that point the provider will apply to ESB to take you on supply, as with anything else you would have been advised of this over the phone at the time, you can request a copy of the call under DPA, most places charge 6/7 quid for this. The providers are also limited by ESB in the time they have to switch you back to your previous supplier.
If it's the case that you made the sign up call on the 20th then you would be outside of your cooling off period and the company are well within their rights to hold you to the contract but you could try and approach them and tell them in a nice way that it's not for you and you might have some joy.
It sounds to me like you treated the cooling off period as a trial period which it's not, it's more to protect against pressurised selling and allowing you time to change your mind. It's not and never has been to let people try things out, I mean when you get your first bill from SSE or Energia etc your cooling off period is a good 6 weeks expired.
I doubt very much your experience would have been any different with another supplier, I've done work for some of them and I know for a fact the ones I've worked for would have given the same response and given the info available I would say they were following standard market practice

Pelvis Parsley

I'm biting my lip on this crowd tbh. I have dealt with them on many occasions in the course of my work.

I have known them to install meters at the incorrect address, which was fun once the error was uncovered, usually months down the road, and refuse to present customers migrating away from them with a vend code to lock on their meter (with the result that the customers in question continued to feed credit into their meters, and funds to prepay, even though prepaypower were no longer their supplier).

Not only that, but their customer contact staff are woefully ill equipped or unable to deal with anything outside the norm.

The sooner the rest of the suppliers provide prepay meters on demand (EI are already!) the better.

dudara

Posters - please stick to offering advice to the OP, rather than posting anecdotes about providers.

dudara

mfjwhelan

They now tell me that the standing charge is 99 cents per day!! I have never been told that, just that there would be a standing change for levies etc. The other electric companies put this at about 54 cents per day! On top of this they say that a customer cannot switch more than once in 21 days. So even if I wanted to cancel and move to another company I couldn't do it. I was with Airtricity initially, then switched to prepay. Very unhappy with prepay but I cannot switch to a 3rd company for 21 days, so the 14 day cooling off period is rubbish anyway. I'm not letting this one go. Anyone suggest any other avenues to raise awareness on prepay power other than CER and consumer association.

LollipopJimmy

mfjwhelan wrote: »

They now tell me that the standing charge is 99 cents per day!! I have never been told that, just that there would be a standing change for levies etc. The other electric companies put this at about 54 cents per day! On top of this they say that a customer cannot switch more than once in 21 days. So even if I wanted to cancel and move to another company I couldn't do it. I was with Airtricity initially, then switched to prepay. Very unhappy with prepay but I cannot switch to a 3rd company for 21 days, so the 14 day cooling off period is rubbish anyway. I'm not letting this one go. Anyone suggest any other avenues to raise awareness on prepay power other than CER and consumer association.

Ask for a recording of the call, if you were misinformed you have your evidence to take to CER

Just FYI the other companies on PP aren't close to 54

If you activate your cooling off period you must go back to your previous supplier and not on to a third company, that's an ESBN rule and all the suppliers are powerless with regards to this.

My opinion as somebody involved with energy, I don't see your issue unless you were misinformed on the initial call, if you were you can be damn sure Prepaypower would have let you go outside the cooling off period so as not to cause a fuss

I worked for a rival company and am now involved in something else on the gas end btw, that's where my knowledge comes from

sconhome

It is all going to boil down to the phone conversation and the recording of the same

Just a quick look at the website and the headline claims have some nice caveats (my bolding):

* Unit Rate comparison was made against all electricity suppliers’ standard unit rates on 01/10/2015. All pricing is subject to change. Standing & Prepayment service charges apply. Savings quoted relate to a reduction in electricity usage. All information correct as of October 2015. Click here for full pricing details

** Analysis of 15,422 PrePayPower customers found an average annual consumption reduction of 9% after switching to PrePayPower. Over 26% of the sample reduced by over 20% annually. For more details seewww.prepaypower.ie/save

I think you are stuck under the terms of the contract agreed at the time of verbal inception of the contract

THE CONTRACT
2.1 Save where clause 2.2 applies, this Contract will commence, or will be deemed to commence on
the Commencement Date which will be either when:
2.1.1 you and we agree on the phone that we will supply electricity to you at the Premises and you
verbally agree to accept these terms and conditions; or
2.1.2 you sign up via our Website and click that you accept these terms and conditions.

The only hope is something was said in the phone conversation that was misleading and off script that could be challenged or that you take a legal challenge that the T&C were unclear or misleading. Problem is you are deemed to have read these and agreed BEFORE the conversation or agreement to sign up took place.

Looking at Clause 6. I would be getting a notification of termination off to them ASAP and deal with the arguing afterwards. Get yourself out of the mess first.

mfjwhelan

I agree that they no better than loan sharks, preying on the vulnerable. Everything they advertise is clouded. Its only when you sign up that you realise all the catches. They even have the 14 day cooling off period covered in the fog. Even trying to break contract is covered in the fog.
I have made formal complaints to CER, ASAI, CAI, Liveline, Conor Pope and have written to all my local TDs. It transpires that they are many many complaints concerning how they operate and there are some horrendous cases of how they have victimised some elderly constituents. There are several Dáil questions pending for the relevant minister.

LollipopJimmy

Have you got the recording of the sales call? I'd be interested to know if all of the above was covered, if not there's the out from your contract. It could also help your case with all of the above named agencies and media outlets to hear that call

nailer54321

Why oh why oh why would anyone ever switch to these prepay electricity things, it is mind boggling how so many people think that they are saving money by doing this. The only way you save money is to switch off what you are not using, research what you are changing too and don't be fooled by all the hipe and celebs advertising these products, I wounder how many of these celebs have changed over , again do you research before you change over and if you are unsure ask someone who knows how to calculate the real cost.