He was contacted by a pensioner who has seen her bill rocket, and says there are simple checks that could see payments slashed
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Martin Lewis has explained three energy bill checks you must make if you’re worried about being overcharged. The MoneySavingExpert was contacted by a worried viewer during his Money Show Live programme on ITV, reports The Mirror.
The viewer, Yvonne, asked whether it was right that her energy bill is rising from £49 to £123. She said: “I have just received my new monthly direct debit from my energy provider and it has gone from £49 to £123 from September and then £181 per month from October 28. I am in credit of £200, is this correct, as this will be one week’s pension money?”
Martin explained that normally, your energy bill should be roughly double what it was last year – but there are some exceptions. He said: “First of all, are you giving regular meter readings or do you have a working smart meter?
“If you don’t, you need to get in touch and do a regular meter reading because the estimate could be wrong. You’re in credit, not in debt, so that would indicate it shouldn’t go up much.
“The one other thing is, have you come off a cheap fix, in which case your bill would have risen by far more than double over the last year. If you’ve passed all those tests, then that would seem far too high for me.”
Martin recommended using an online energy calculator to work out if your direct debit is likely to be accurate. Once you’ve got a rough figure, get in contact with your energy firm and ask if why your direct debit has increased so much, he advises.
“Get in touch with the energy firm, call it up, politely – as the call centre operators haven’t done anything wrong – and say, please can you tell me why you’re putting my direct debit up,” said Martin. “If they can’t justify it to you, then you have the right under energy firm licence conditions to have your direct debits lowered.”