Martin Lewis gives voucher advice to those on prepayment meters
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Students in a university accommodation have been left outraged after an energy firm had an expensive prepayment meter forcibly installed in their home, despite paying their bills. According to reports, the accommodation firm UniHomes failed to pay the energy firm, despite receiving payments from the renting students. As household energy bills reached unaffordable levels for millions of households over the past year, energy suppliers have been accused of routinely fitting thousands of prepayment meters to recover debts.
The students lived in accommodations managed by UniHomes, a platform that works with partner letting agents across 36 cities in the UK, offering students packages that cover rent, energy and Wi-Fi bills in one fixed-price payments.
Even though they paid their bills to UniHomes, the students from a number of different universities told openDemocracy that they had been threatened by bailiffs, debt collectors and energy companies.
Among them includes Lucy, a PhD candidate at the University of Southampton, who along with four other PhD students in her home, were cut off from their power supply.
As UniHomes failed to pay their supplier Scottish Power, on 26 January, one of her housemates returned home to find that debt collectors working on behalf of the firm had forcibly entered the property and installed a pre-payment meter.
Households who have such meters installed pay for their gas and electricity before they use it, on a pay-as-you-go basis through credit, usually with a key or smart card, and adding this to the meter.
It works if you use gas or electricity, the credit on the meter is used up. This form of energy payment is generally considered to be more expensive. According to the Money-Saving Expert, this is because it is more effort for the suppliers.
Their site says: “Providers prefer to get regular, automatic payments for your energy, which is what you get with direct debit payments on standard credit meters. This is why it’s the cheapest way of getting your energy.”
Lucy told openDemocracy: “We felt just incredibly uneasy and uncomfortable that people had been in our home without our permission. To arrive back home to men we don’t know in our house is just scary, particularly when it’s not our fault.”
After complaining to UniHomes, Lucy and her housemates were informed that the company would top up the meter. However, little over 24 hours later, the credit ran out, leaving the students without power for a weekend.
The renters couldn’t even contact UniHomes, as their customer service office was closed on weekends.
On Monday, the company credited their energy account with £187 for the month, which Lucy noted fell far short of the £380 that the household pays for their “unlimited” energy usage.
Lucy noted that on 21 December, she and her flatmates received a letter from a debt collection agency, claiming they owed Scottish Power £2,632.96.
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Despite UniHomes promising the students that the issue would be resolved, a month later they had a prepayment meter forcibly installed in their accommodation.
Since then, Scottish Power and other energy supplier have suspended the forced installation of pre-payment meters until the end of March, after being ordered by energy regulator Ofgem to do so.
UniHomes’ director, Phil Greaves noted that the issue faced by Lucy and many other students had been “fully resolved”, the students told openDemocracy that they were still being pestered by debt collection agencies.
Mr Greaves also said: “Our priority continues to be doing everything we can to support customers. Our internal procedures ensure bills are paid, with every effort made to mitigate exceptional instances.
“However, this has become more challenging because of pressures among [energy] suppliers. In the very few cases where this impacts on customers, we do our best to support them and resolve the issue as quickly as possible. We’re continuing to call for more government support for households, including continued support on people’s bills.”
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