Jasmine Birtles
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OVO and Good Energy customers to be refunded
Isobel Lawrance
18th May 2023
Customers overcharged by providers OVO and Good Energy are to be refunded.
Are you an OVO or Good Energy customer? Then you may be owed a refund.
Energy regulator Ofgem found these firms were overcharging households for energy use – and have been ordered to refund customers. The firms must pay a total of £4 million, with around £2.7 million of this being split between 18,000 households.
OVO customers will receive an average repayment of £181 and Good Energy will refund £109 to affected homes.
Ofgem found the suppliers had charged customers totals above the energy price caps set in place to protect people from energy companies charging too much. As customers had been charged above these rates, the regulator has now ordered these firms to return people’s money to them.
Customers affected will be refunded automatically. It is important to note that even if you are an OVO or Good Energy customer, you may not have been impacted.
But what about the other £1.25 million owed? Well, it will be paid by Good Energy directly to Ofgem. It will go into the regulator’s voluntary redress fund, which aims to help those in vulnerable positions across the UK.
Not the first time
Shockingly, it is the second time in just a few days that Ofgem have come down on Good Energy for failures in following policy. This week, Good Energy, E.ON Next and Octopus Energy were ordered to pay a staggering total of £8 million. This is due to either delaying or failing to make compensation payments to customers.
According to Ofgem, the three firms had either missed or “unduly delayed” compensation payments. These are due “if a supplier does not provide a final bill within six weeks when a customer switches to another provider”.
The energy price caps are put in place to protect customers from unmanageable prices. It is set by Ofgem and outlines the maximum suppliers can charge for gas and electricity, per unit. The next price cap announcement is due on 25th May.
Overall, providers failing to adjust tariffs in line with new price caps resulted in Good Energy was found to have overcharged nearly 7,000 customers a total of £391,650 between January 2019 and October 2022.
Almost 11,000 OVO Energy customers were overcharged £1,492,917 between October 2022 and March 2023.
Dan Norton, deputy director of retail at Ofgem said:
“It is totally unacceptable that Good Energy and Ovo Energy customers were overcharged, particularly at a time that is already so challenging and stressful for consumers across the UK.”
Well I have my fingers crossed , I live in a 2 bedroomed house, Before the issue that has come to light,I had over 7 hundred pounds in credit, never missed a payment, ThenI was paying £100 a month in total for gas and Electric with Ove Energy, and then it started ging up and up the last payment was £238 in May and my credit was gone, so where they paid you a better interest rate more than the bank rate. Not seen any ofthat either, I have an electric stairchair, stopped charging the wheelchair power pack and the… Read more »