Energy Australia have admitted that they cancelled our direct debit without informing us . Because of repeated billing errors from them, such as trying to bill us after 11 months, as well as being so far in credit due to their estimated payments required, we only check that we are still in credit. When we weren’t we contacted them, and were met with unhelpful and rude call centre staff that gave conflicting stories. When I requested the bill be wiped, the woman told me that she was only authorised to credit $100. Unsurprisingly, after mentioning the ombudsman, the offer was raised to $250, conditional on NOT going to the ombudsman! They sent me their reconciliation of our account which differed wildly from the bills we had been sent.
As a side note, under the law, service providers cannot back charger for any more than 10 months. Again this was something that Energy Australia forgot! This resulted in a $2000 credit .
Has anyone else ever had problems with them?
For many years we were with TRU Energy. We had no issues with TRU Energy during all the years. In Nov 2012 without notice we received our electricity accounts from EnergyAustralia. We were told that EnergyAustralia took over from TRU Energy.
From day 1 we had difficulties with the billing. In the beginning EnergyAustralia estimated the consumption which increased our bills dramatically. We had to involve the ombudsman to sort out the ‘overcharges’.
Following that we discovered on numerous occasions that we were overcharged again. Again we had to involve the ombudsman. According to the findings EnergyAustralia had ‘systemic issues’ with their billing system. It took over 12 months to ‘fix’ the issues.
After that I discovered that EnergyAustralia was still overcharging us. When we looked at the current readings and previous readings over two billing periods the difference in actual kWh usage and charged kWh was different. Needless to say it was always to our disadvantage. Every time we received a bill we had to go back to EnergyAustralia and asked them to fix the charges. Accidently I found out that a friend of mine had the same issues with being overcharged frequently. Same issue.
After we had a 4.5kW solar system installed the charges went up instead down. After contacting EnergyAustralia they provided the electronic readouts from AUSNET. The spreadsheets showed that in the middle of the night all of a sudden the power consumption increased even while we were on holiday.
We couldn’t be bothered to involve the ombudsman again. Instead in Nov 2015 we switched to Powershop.
Since than we hadn’t had an issue and our bills are considerable lower.
Yes, very similar issues to those described here, and more than once over 2-3 years. I changed our provider, and now review every couple of years to find the best deal. This is easy to do, either using online comparison sites (though be careful as some are on commission to ‘recommend’ certain suppliers and do not list all available), but changing is very easy. I would never return to Energy Australia, and keep telling them this when they send me ‘welcome back’ offers (can’t seem to get rid of the pesky beggars). They would need to supply me with free energy for ten years to induce me to even consider using them again! We are currently with Powershop and are very happy with all aspects.
Yep. Same same. Dump Energy Aust ASAP is my advice. Estimating usage, charging thousands more than actual, not reimbursing, threatening legal action and heavy handedness, and none or rude and threatening customer (non) service is the Energy Australia way.
Go to the Victorian Government energy deals website switchon.vic.gov.au and choose the best deal for you.
I’ve heard that Momentum and Red Energy are Australian owned but don’t know how true it is.
I’m with Momentum, have been for years, and no problems. Each year I get them to send me a Usage Data File (which they have to do by law if you request) that plugs straight into the Switchon website and brings up the best deals for you.
Definitely worth checking out.
Good luck.
Paul
It’s a relief to hear others have the same problems with Energy Australia and it isn’t just me!! My bill went from $400 or so each quarter with another company, to $3000 with energy Australia. I protested of course and they went to great lengths (including a tech coming to the house!) to prove I had actually used that power. I paid the bill, because I pretty much had to, changed to Momentum, and have halved the amount I pay each quarter. This still doesn’t explain the randomness though. $400, $$3000 then $1500 with 3 different companies.
