A pensioner has been forced to fight an energy firm that told him he owes it nearly £1,000 a month after he left to join another provider.
Bryan Wolsey, 70, from Ticknall, in South Derbyshire, claims his time with German-owned E.ON had been a "nightmare from day one" since his original provider Igloo Energy went bust in September 2021 and became part of E.ON. He told Derbyshire Live he is prepared to take the energy giant to court, believing that it owes him hundreds of pounds.
Mr Wolsey says his account showed he had £544.86 credit when he provided E.ON with his final meter readings in February this year. But days later, he logged in to the website to find he had been charged more than £1,508 in two separate bills with no explanation.
Mr Wolsey said: "It's ridiculous. It's just 'computer says, you must pay'. Apparently there's a £2,000 difference in our calculations and it just makes no sense to me whatsoever." E.ON has apologised for the problems and says it is working to resolve the matter.
Mr Wolsey was with the now-defunct Igloo until its takeover by E.ON following its collapse. He says the issues began after he started sending manual readings in every month, having been told that his smart meter was broken.
He then claims he didn't receive his first statement until March 2022, at least five months after he became an E.ON customer. And he complains that the bill was very unclear when it arrived.
"I couldn't make head nor tail of it. There were payments in, payments out, ridiculous amounts of money. Nothing tallied or reconciled with the facts. And that's how it's continued ever since," said Mr Wolsey.
Mr Wolsey left E.ON to join new provider Octopus on February . He sent his final meter readings in with his account showing as being £514.86 in credit on February 13.
But he did not receive his expected refund and he claims to have received "contradictory emails", further complicating the dispute. He said: "I've had a load of nonsense. I get polite emails saying they'll resolve it, then I email back. Nothing happens."
The final straw came last month when he checked his account again to find two charges, for £1,144.28 and £363.76, billed to his account on the same day. It reversed his credit to a debit of £963.18.
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It was around the same time that Mr Wolsey came across the story of a 24-year-old Derby student who had an almost identical issue with E.ON and ended up with her bill being wiped after she complained. He said: "I thought, 'Ah, there's a pattern here.' It rang bells with me. I thought it sounded identical to my situation."
He has calculated all his readings himself on a spreadsheet and believes that his workings are correct . He has now tried to raise a formal complaint but claims he is still awaiting a return phone call.
He said: "I've had no apology, no response of any substance and no explanations in the two months since I left. My calculations may be £10 or £20 off but not £2,000. My next step is to go to Ofgem and the Energy Ombudsman. I'm a rather persistent sort of chap.
"I will persist with it. Now they've really got under my skin, I'll go for every penny. If that involves court proceedings and whatever then so be it."
An E.ON spokesman said: “We are aware that Mr Wolsey has experienced issues with his metering and billing and we are sorry for this. We are working to resolve these issues and will confirm the outcome of our findings to Mr Wolsey as soon as we can.”
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