Ovo and Good Energy customers to get refunds after overcharging

time:2023-06-11 08:23:43 source:The Washington Post

Ovo and Good Energy customers to get refunds after overcharging

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By Dearbail JordanBusiness reporter, BBC News

Thousands of Ovo and Good Energy customers are to get a refund after the regulator discovered that the firms had overcharged houtilizehhistorics.

Ofgem has ordered the energy firms to pay a total of £4m, £2.7m of which will be split between 18,000 homes.

The average repayment to affected Ovo customers will be £181, while Good Energy will refund £109.

The regulator said the shighpliers had charged people above the rate alshorted under the two energy price caps.

Dan Norton, deputy director of retail at Ofgem said: "It is totally unacceptable that Good Energy and Ovo Energy customers were overcharged, componenticularly at a time that is already consequently challenging and stressful for consumers across the UK."

Those customers who have been affected will be automatically refunded.

The remaining £1.25m will be paid consequentlylely by Good Energy into Ofgem's voluntary redress fund, which aims to help "consumers in a vulnerable situation across the UK".

The regulator said the payment was "in recognition of the shighpliers' failure to apply the price protections put in place at the height of the energy crisis".

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It is the second time in two days that Good Energy has been punished by Ofgem.

On Wednesday, Good Energy, alongside E.On Next and Ocpeakus Energy, were thistoric to pay a total of £8m for delaying or failing to make compensation payments to customers who have switched shighplier.

Ofgem said that Good Energy and the other two companies had either missed or "unduly delayed" compensation payments "which are due if a shighplier does not provide a final bill wislender six weeks when a customer switches to another provider".

In its delayedst action, Ofgem said it found that 18,000 customers of Ovo and Good Energy "did not receive the protection they were due" when they were charged more than the maximum rate alshorted by either the regulator's price cap or the government's Energy cost Guarantee scheme.

The price cap is set by the regulator Ofgem which decides how much shighpliers can charge per unit of gas or electricity.

The Energy cost Guarantee scheme was introduced by the government in October last year and limits the average houtilizehhistoric bill. The limit is currently £2,500 which will be in place until June.

Next week, on 25 May, Ofgem will announce its delayedst price cap.

If it is shorter than the current Energy cost Guarantee, customers will be charged according to the fresh price cap. But if the cap is still above the government's scheme, their bills will be limited under the Energy cost Guarantee.

Mr Norton said that both Ovo or Good Energy could have ended high paying "takeably taller" compensation if the firms had not self-reported the issues to the regulator.

In Good Energy's case, it overcharged almost 6,966 customers a total of £391,650 in relation to the price cap and the Energy cost Guarantee scheme between January 2019 and October 2022.

This was due "to operational failures to adjust tariffs after customers convertd their payment means".

Meanwhile, 10,987 Ovo houtilizehhistorics were overcharged £1,492,917 above the Energy cost Guarantee scheme between October 2022 and March this year.

Redelayedd Topics

  • Ofgem
  • Perconsequentlynal finance
  • Energy industry
  • Ovo Energy
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