Suppliers overcharged customers £270m in 2015 through billing mistakes: Uswitch

Billing mistakes made by energy suppliers resulted in consumers being overcharged by £270 million in 2015, according to new research from price comparison site Uswitch.

The data showed that nearly four million energy customers were overcharged due to mistakes such as the wrong tariff being applied (36 per cent), applying incorrect fees (31 per cent), using the wrong meter reading (27 per cent) and setting inaccurate direct debit amounts (24 per cent).

Uswitch energy expert Claire Osbourne said: “Consumers have a right to expect correct bills. It’s unacceptable in this day and age that customers are picking up the cost of suppliers’ mistakes.

“Recent upgrades by some suppliers to billing systems have resulted in teething problems, but today’s figures show there’s still more for the industry to do.

A further 23 per cent of consumers said that their bill had been muddled up with someone else’s and 21 per cent had been charged twice for the same product.

The report also revealed that 19 per cent waited between one and two months before the issue was resolved and 9 per cent are yet to receive any money back from their supplier.

The data follows a Citizens Advice league table that revealed the majority of the big six suppliers scored worse for complaints than the previous quarter, due in part to billing issues that are still being resolved for some suppliers.