I
once watched a U Tube video with Sociologist Jock Young who said, “we are
attracted to war, it is central to our entertainment history”. While I am not
convinced my argument about “backbilling” with my energy supplier is
entertainment, my war with them is real. It’s an annual event where they make
errors and I have to pay for it.
Electricity
has been around since the 1850’s, that’s about 160 years; you would think that
after all this time they would at least have the invoicing part right. But they
don’t, they continue to send unsuspecting customers invoices owing
extraordinary amounts, leaving the consumer shaking their head. And that’s how
I felt when I thought my energy company had made a mistake surprising me with
an additional invoice only a week after paying the meter read account. So I
rang the Call Centre for a “please
explain”.
The
Call Centre explained the energy had been incurred over the past nine months,
since the installation of the Smart Meter. When I asked for more information I
was told none was available so I asked to speak to someone with a little more
“power”. This wasn’t well received when they snapped; “they will only tell you
what I am telling you”. What! … Was that a trained robot that just spat those
words at me? You don’t have to
answer that by the way. I felt a serious amount of indignation at this
response; that an employee felt I should pay the unexpected invoice without any
further investigation or explanation as to how it came about.
Finally
I was allowed to speak to someone with “power”. The more senior employee
quickly informed me the account was for something referred to in the energy
sector as “backbilling”. It is perfectly legal and can be the energy company’s
very costly mistake to you the consumer.
What
it means is, under the legislation your energy company can charge you for energy
you have used up to nine months prior. Research shows that amongst high bills
and billing errors, “backbilling” is one of the most common Billing complaints
received by Energy and Water Ombudsman of Victoria “EWOV”.
As I
listen to the justification of the enormous “backbilling”, I casually ask if
others had rung to complain with the same issue. There was a moment of
uncomfortable silence which in return gave me the answer I had already
suspected; quietly she admitted there had been others.
I
knew this account had come out of nowhere, printed off by the thousands, sent
out to innocent and unsuspecting people who knew as much about “backbilling” as
I did. With no resolve to my demands for a line by line explanation I was
transferred to the Billing Department. As I was reminded of the debt I began to
wonder if that was the true cost of what I owed. So I decided to speak to my
own expert, someone who could tell me if the numbers were right, I went to my
husband.
My husband knows numbers
well. He keeps records and writes things down. When the power account arrives
on the kitchen table he paces with his notebook out to the metered box checking
the numbers against each other; I then get a mutter saying it’s ok to pay.
But
not this time, this time the account required discussion; it was a discussion
that would eventually turn me into the prosumer of my own energy account,
simply because until that day I didn’t know a kilowatt from a megawatt.
As
the dust settles and the homework is done, my husband informs me that something
in what the energy company have said is right; my “error energy” must be paid
for. But he said, “not the full amount”. He goes on to inform me that there are
most definitely errors in their energy account.
The
phone rings and in between the rhetoric of element registers and dedicated
circuits, they admit to making a mistake. My instincts were right; located in a
basement somewhere sat a machine that spat out “backbilling” invoices by the
thousands. Never touched by the human hand, the money slides threw the envelope
stuffing machine like liquid gold.
Suddenly
this demanding and impenetrable number has been reduced by 75%. A few days
later at the letterbox I see the familiar blue and white envelope. I open it
and wonder what awaits me now, I laugh at its contents; inside the message
says, “Welcome to Australian Power and Gas”.
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