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A struggling Exmouth British Gas prepayment meter customer is among many households who are still waiting to receive a vital energy voucher due to alleged address blunders. All households in Great Britain are entitled to £400 off energy bills, divided up into six payments between October and March as part of the government’s Energy Bills Support Scheme (EBSS).
While smart prepayment meter customers should get it automatically too, anyone with a traditional prepayment meter must redeem vouchers. These vouchers are being sent out each month by suppliers in the first week of each month, issued via SMS text, email or post. Customers will then need to redeem these at their usual top-up point.
However, still waiting for his October payment of £66 is an Exmouth man who has had to seek the help of a national charity to top up his key card meter so that he still has gas and electricity in his flat. The British Gas customer, who asked to remain anonymous, had been due to receive a voucher in the post last month but after it failed to arrive he has been regularly chasing it up with his energy supplier.
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This week he claims he was told by British Gas that the vouchers were sent out to its prepayment meter users, however, the addresses on the letters were only half complete meaning they were not able to be delivered and 11,000 customers have been affected.
British Gas has confirmed the customer’s payment EBSS payment was sent on October 18, and has now been reissued and will be with him ‘shortly’. However, it has not answered repeated questions from Devon Live to confirm why the payment was not received and how many other customers have been affected.
The Exmouth customer said: “Soon is not soon enough because it has had a big impact on me. I had to approach a national charity for help who sent me a voucher so I could put some money on my key.
“The payment is not something that should have been messed up. Ironically, after I raised a complaint, I was sent a letter from British Gas to give me a telephone number that I could chase it up with, but the telephone number does not work anymore. That just sums it up.
“If British Gas can’t even get its own letters sent out properly no wonder there’s a debacle with everything else.”
Frustrated by the delay, the customer says he conducted a poll on a Facebook poll community group page to see who was still waiting for their vouchers. It was responded to by 130 people.
He said: “A lot of responses were from people saying they had been emailed theirs, which some suppliers do. But 15 per cent – which is still quite high – said they were still waiting for vouchers.
“I chased mine up a few times last month and was told by British Gas it had been posted. I said it might have been done but I had not received it.
“I spoke to some friends who are also with British Gas and they had not received theirs either. On Monday I rang up British Gas again to chase it and I was told the letters they sent out were undeliverable by Royal Mail because they only had part of the address written on them.
“I read in the media that 400,000 people have still not received their vouchers and I’m starting to think how many of those are British Gas customers? It is now November and I’m still waiting for my first payment of £66.
“I received an apologetic call from British Gas yesterday [November 10] and apparently 11,000 customers’ vouchers were not received due to incorrect postal addresses.”
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British Gas has been approached for a comment.
Earlier this week, work and pensions secretary Mel Stride said there was a “blockage” in getting vouchers out to some of the millions of customers with prepayment meters across Britain.
Speaking on ITV’s Good Morning Britain, he said: “The most important thing, as I say, is that the government is going to be gripping this issue and doing whatever is necessary to make sure that we unblock the blockage that there is in terms of getting those vouchers out.”
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