Good Energy in Wiltshire failed to refund thousands

Good Energy, based in Chippenham, was made to pay the huge figure in compensation and redress after it failed to deliver final bills and refund credit to over 2,000 prepayment meter customers.

Energy regulator Ofgem says 2,284 customers were affected by an error with Good Energy’s billing system between 2014 and October 2023.

This meant those who switched to another supplier or ended their contract did not get a final bill within six weeks, as required by the watchdog.

In total, Good Energy paid out £150,067 averaging out at £66 per customer.

While around £55,000 of this was compensation and refunds, £94,786 was given to the industry’s voluntary redress fund, which supports vulnerable customers.

Ofgem says that Good Energy has updated its systems to rectify the error following a detailed investigation.

Beth Martin, director for consumer protection and competition at Ofgem, labelled the failures “unacceptable.”

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She said: “At a time when so many households are facing financial difficulty, it’s unacceptable that Good Energy failed to provide refunds of money that was owed to customers, compensation they were due, and final bills they were entitled to.

“Driving up standards for consumers across the board is our top priority, and improving billing accuracy is a key part of this.

“We also expect suppliers to make sure they have robust systems in place to limit the risk of issues like this happening, and to proactively report problems when they arise.”

Good Energy chief executive Nigel Pocklington says the firm was “dismayed” to discover the error and has since implemented changes to ensure it does not happen again.

He added: “We were dismayed to find the billing system issue causing these prepayment customers to have not received their final statements and we deeply apologise to all those affected.

“As soon as the issue was identified we put in place a manual process to ensure it did not continue and have since made changes to make sure it does not happen again.

“We have also made every effort to provide due compensation to affected customers.

“This includes goodwill sums in excess of their potential credit balance plus interest, and the general standards of performance payments for all customers who do not receive final statements in time.”