A RENTER whose pre-payment meter has seen his costs rise by more than £100-per-month has vented his fury.
Justin Valmassoi, 43, used to pay around £200-a-month to keep the electricity whirring in his flat.
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But when Utilita smacked him with a monstrous £300 monthly bill in October, the chef’s world turned upside down.
Justin, who insists he hasn’t changed his energy habits in four years, told the Daily Record: “[Utilita] said my consumption only went up by seven pence per kilowatt hour.”
Ever since October, bills to his Glasgow flat are now “£300 or more” each month.
As he is on a pre-payment meter, he has been forced to continue paying the top rate to stop his electricity getting cut off.
But a desperate bid to plead his innocence, Justin, originally from Detroit, Michigan, sent 48-months’ worth of bills to the firm.
Despite first complaining two months ago, the problem was never sorted until the firm said they would send an engineer out to see if the meter had a malfunction.
Justin explained: “They couldn’t figure out how or why it would cost that much.”
But it is too little, too late as Justin is already on the way out of his Victoria Road home as he simply cannot afford the bills.
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To add insult to injury, the chef was only recently forced to close down his South-East Asian ‘Nanika’ restaurant when energy bills soared from £250 to £1000-a-month.
Despite his plight, Utilita claimed Justin had previously been undercharged for his usage due to network problems.
They added that he is now being charged at the correct rate.
Utilita told The Sun Online: “Mr Valmassoi’s energy bills have increased as he is now being charged the correct amount for his usage.
“Previously he was being undercharged, through no fault of his own, nor Utilita’s.
“Unknown to us, his smart meter had been failing to receive tariff updates because of an issue with the smart metering network in his area – something that is beyond our control.
“Due to recent network improvements, Mr Valmassoi’s meter is now successfully receiving tariff updates.”
PRE-PAYMENT METERS EXPLAINED
Around 4.3million people in the UK are on pre-payment meters.
Some people find that a pre-payment meter helps them plan their spending and avoid surprise bills.
You only pay for the energy you have budgeted for but it is important to keep the meter topped up so you don’t lose power in the middle of a wash or during the finale of your favourite series.
Pre-payment customers usually spend more on their energy though as the tariffs on offer from suppliers are usually more expensive than standard meter deals.
It is usually possible for pre-payment customers to shop around for better deals on comparison websites to see if you can pay less for each unit of gas or electricity.
The difference in price caps between standard and pre-payment meters means customers on pay-as-you go deals could typically be paying £46 a year more.
