Gillian Evison, 60, from Thornton, received a letter from debt recovery agency Capital Resolve on April 22, telling her she owed £414.72
A woman was left stunned after she received a debt letter for a British Gas bill that dated back nearly two decades ago – a mistake for which the energy firm have now apologised.
A debt collection notice left 60-year-old Gillian Evison from Thornton greatly distressed. On April 22, she received the letter from Capital Resolve, stating she had an outstanding bill of £414.72 to clear with British Gas. The note demanded: “It’s time to pay your British Gas bill of £414.72.”
Gillian told the Liverpool Echo: “I felt upset and shocked. I’d never received anything like that before. I’ve always paid my bills on time.” Gillian called up British Gas, only to receive another shocking update. The customer service advisor informed her that the debt dated back to a bill from 2006.
Gillian linked it back to when she switched to a pay-as-you-go meter. At the time, Gillian assumed the underpayment had taken care of. But she claims that due to a system error on the part of British Gas, they only recovered £16 of the money. She said: “If they’d tried to contact me in the first place, I would have sorted it out. But I had no correspondence from them, then 18 years down the line I get a letter from a debt recovery agency, not British Gas. I’ve been a loyal British Gas customer for 19 years, and this is how they treat me.”
The Liverpool Echo understands that the debt recovery letter was sent automatically when British Gas installed a smart credit meter at Gillian’s address in February this year. This apparently caused the “debt” to be automatically added back onto her account.
On April 25, British Gas reportedly closed Gillian’s account with Capital Resolve. However, Gillian didn’t find out about this until May 2, when she called Capital Resolve to find out what was happening. She said was “left for a week worrying” unnecessarily.
A British Gas spokesperson responded by saying, “We’re sorry, the letter relates to a historic balance from 2006 and was sent in error. We’ve reassured Miss Evison that the bill has been cancelled, we have apologised and have also applied a goodwill credit on her account.”
Ofgem guidelines state that you cannot be charged for energy used more than 12 months ago under the following circumstances: you have not had an accurate bill for it before, even though you asked for one; you have not been informed about any charges due via a statement of account before; or your direct debit amount was previously set too low to cover any charges due.