They lied then fitted a pay-as you go meter

I made an arrangement with them to pay off my debt. The arrangement was meant to put off the installation of a pay as you go meter.

When i called back to check something about the arrangement, they claimed they had no record of it. I was incredulous. Within a few days, they arrived and installed the meter. They had the nerve to charge me an extra £300 for it. The wretched thing is outside, so, they didn't even have to enter the flat. How can a big company like that act like street corner bullies? Various other phone calls to them has seen them giving me varying amounts of what I supposedly owe, calls being cut off. Faulty advice, more denials of what was said...etc. It's so bad it's funny. Then you realize this is supposed to be a legit company.

The only thing which would make me feel better about this bunch of unprofessional jokers, would be to to rip out the meter and hurl it at the their overpaid chief. I'm keeping him, his kids, wife and whoever else he's with , warm and in grand style. He should pick up the tab for the £300+ his company charged me for a meter they told me wouldn't be installed having conveniently suffered amnesia about the phone call in which an arrangement was made to pay the debt.

It's time the government put the brakes on companies acting like cowboys and bumping up people's debts in order to feed their millionaire life styles and live like kings; whilst their hapless customers end up in poverty.

The worst compay

I was sent a bill for my Gas because I changed supplier there is only two of us that live in the house, we had a bill for one months gas £800 I had to argue with them, then I had a threatening call from India telling me I have to pay the bill today or he was sending it to debt collectors very rude person that I could not understand. How dare they do this without sorting the problem with a wrong bill even wrong meter readings. I have paid the bill in full

Bullying pensioners

I pay for my gas at £10 per week via standing order. I am a disabled pensioner in very poor health and suffering from depression. Because British Gas claims not to have the "facility" to have standing orders [despite telling me they receive my money], they keep harassing me by saying my bill is overdue, both online in an email and post as well! They also send me letters saying they have rescinded my payment plan? Then they send letters demanding payment in full, when I don't respond [as sick of phoning them to explain all the time], they ring me up. First thing they do is ask stupid questions, remember THEY called ME, so I get asked for my address, my date of birth and this is the stupidest of all, my home telephone number!!!!!!!!
I am fed up with them and once I have cleared my bill with them and am back in credit again [as I usually am] I am going to change suppliers, I will NOT be bullied, despite it making me ill. All they want is to put up my payments and be even more in credit so they can earn interest on MY money and then have more to give the share holders [well done Mrs Thatcher your crap legacy rolls on!!!]

Software does not work with IE10

I top up my gas with online topup from British gas , well I did , then I caught a new laptop and guess what my top up no longer worked. . Rang "help" line , spoke to the rudest woman who sighed heavily and spoke to me like I was a 3 year old , her solution downgrade my per installed software to IE9 32 bit only , to see if that works , when will you get your site working with uptodate browsers answer 2014 maybe, this is a billion filler ( French) company !!! Good news I switched to EDF , well don for pissing off yet another customer ,

Britishgas-- home care Compaint, insurence waste your money dont make anythings

I have reported broken down toilet but unfortunately has not fix yet took 4 weeks still i have to wait for part to deliver by supplier

british gas

British Gas - are they the rudest worst company in the world ? they must be close, They pray on the fears of the vulnerable, Treat there customers with suspicion and contempt, I would rather do business with Gazprom than these gangsters (BTW even the name is a misnoma - owned by French called British) - they are really up there with Casino Banks

Use little gas pay it more expensive

This is already a few years old situation but I am still so much annoyed!!
Asked to pay the £60 or so we owed the following month they said no, no help, they did give us wrong account info so calculation were a bit of a mess for us that's why the debt. To cut the story short we then formally complained and then had a manager-call and £10 goodwill gesture because of their wrong info, too little too late since we did discover that if we barely used the gas we were charges too much (may sound convenient if you use a lot but we weren't!). Too bad!
We then paid balance and swathed to a different provider but British Gas continued to call us for several days with those so-hated recorded messages reminding us to pay what we had already paid!
No way that if you use little gas for whatever reason you are overcharged!!!

one Greedy crap company like all the rest of the nonces

I hate this company with all this news of the profits they making and yet still putting bloody prices up and the manager director says we need to put prices up yeah right !!! to pay your bloody wages and the other cronnies . This is one greedy B******** of a company like all the rest and the poxy government cannot see it because they not in the real world . we looking after your world yous say more like other way round the customers are getting ripped off and they looking after your world . .

CRAP SERVICE FROM METERING DEPARTMENT AT BRITISH GAS

My mother waited in to have her meter changed, it had broken - she noticed this when asked to take a meter reading in January, and noticed it was the same as the last one. An appt was made for 19th February - she had to change an appt to make sure she would be in for BG. BG called last week to confirm appt. They didn't bother turning up despite their confirmation phone call. They have now made an appt for 29th April, first one available and have said will estimate my mother's bill!!!!! Six months worth of gas usage with no meter reading at no fault of my mother. BG won't fit in an earlier appt as they are too busy - no wonder if they just don't turn up when THEY arranged to do so. They tell me today that it is a computer error, NO its a person error - they cancelled the appt for some reason and just didn't turn up. No apology from the Meter people at all. They have told her not to worry, but from BG who like to put prices up, she is obviously extremely worried. Their Customer Service lady - who did ring Metering Dept - did try to help but obviously the METER DEPARTMENT DON'T GIVE A DAMN ABOUT THE CUSTOMERS and seem to be above taking action (ie an earlier appt, as it was not my Mum who cancelled the appt, it was THEM) for BG customer service department! BG are about to lose two customers, but I doubt they care.

Linda Hughes

Didnt properly fix the leak they were paid in advance for and recorded it as a different job

Instead of dismantling some parts in the boiler to replace the "O" ring properly, it seems a temporary fix of sealant was applied. At the same time the pcb was replaced in the Worcester 24i combi . This happened in January 2010. Last autumn the pcb failed again and tenant also pointed out that there was still a leak. When I complained to British Gas, it appears the engineer had recorded a non-existent leak in the blow-off as the job rather than the more complicated replacement of the O ring. I paid initially for the leak and accepted advice to replace the pcb, total £275.99. I feel particularly cheated about the leak and not impressed by how long the pcb lasted. I have no legal recourse because of the time scale but want to express my dissatisfaction here. The 2 stars is only because they offered to do the job again for £99

"Looking after your world"? it's ridiculous

As I will tell all my friends, do not use British Gas.
A BG engineer came to fix my boiler, he was on time and did a reasonable job. Good so far! I had been told while booking the engineer that if the work took over 30 minutes the fee would increase from £89 to £239. So I watched the clock carefully and was pleased and impressed that he had the whole boiler reassembled and working in exactly 29 minutes. The engineer did not mention the cost and nor did I as I assumed there was nothing for discussion.
He then spent 15 minutes doing the "your boiler's on the way out" sales pitch and getting a sales man on his phone to talk to me about a new one. I went along with this as I thought there was no harm in getting a quote. He left my house approximately 45 minutes after entering it.
To my horror about 2 weeks later I noticed on my credit card bill that BG had taken £239 as payment. When I phoned them up, they told me that the engineer had reported spending one hour working on my boiler. What a liar!
A whole month and 4 phonecalls later, I recieved my refund, but NO apology. In fact they rudely stated that the engineer HAD worked for more than half an hour but as he had not discussed the cost with me, they would refund anyway.
Apart from this incident, the sales man did come round to give me a quote for a new boiler. I got a few sensible answers but when I questioned the installation cost of £1250 he simply could not justify this. Is this the labour? Surely an engineer does not get paid that for one day's work? The sales man had no answer, because frankly this is a rip-off.

Disgusting!

I joined British Gas in February 2012 and after 4 months I was issued a credit note for around £124, I called the team to double check I was in credit when to my horror the advisor told me no gas had been added to my dual fuel account for the whole time I had been signed up. They then went on to add over £400 backdated gas to the account leaving my account in debit of £177.
After discussing my concerns with a British gas advisor my payments went up slightly to cover my usage and I was told by the advisor that everyone’s account varies between debit/credit depending on the time of year and I wasn’t to worry about it. I thought about it some more and emailed British Gas in September to tell them I was still unhappy about the backdated gas, as far as I was concerned I was paid up to date and to add over £400 in one month is ridiculous.
I was again horrified to find out British Gas had tried to debit £128 from my account just after Christmas to get me to zero balance before period end! I was straight on the phone to customer service who were rude as always and I was advised if I had looked at my November statement I would have saw their intention of taking double the amount they normally take, I informed him as I use my smartphone (which they have to set up with a code for the app!) I had no intention of going into the statement each month therefore I had no idea of this price change, a letter should have been sent to me regarding the amount they wanted to take. Even when I checked the statement they had written it under a big bold heading saying ‘YOU DO NOT NEED TO DO ANYTHING’. I cancelled the direct debit luckily just in time before the payment transferred and paid my usual amount by direct debit. I informed British Gas I was now switching supplier and they told me if I didn’t pay off the full balance or set the direct debit back up there was a good chance they would block my transfer! I set the direct debit back up for the agreed monthly amount and was shocked to see that the amount this month was again double the amount I was expecting, I cancelled the direct debit again and it didn’t take customer service long to get on the phone demanding money. I told them any balance due once I had transferred would be paid in monthly installments as the debt is their fault, not mine, to which I received an email back telling me if I didn’t pay the full balance including the backdated gas within 3 months they would give my account to the debt collectors and this would ultimately affect my credit rating.
They have now blocked my online account so I can’t see any bills, I asked for them to be posted out and they only sent me bills from July 2012 to cover up the fact that from February 2012 to the end of June 2012 they hadn’t charged anything for gas and they were the ones in the wrong!!
I have now sent my complaint to the Ombudsman.


The customer service I have received has been awful!!!!!!

I have never ever ever known incompetence like it.

If only this allowed you to show 0 stars...

Sunday 27th January
My heating stopped working on Sunday so I called British Gas at 9.15am to let
them know and luckily I was told that someone could come out that day between
then and 6pm. I thought this was fine, with it being a Sunday and January.

I stayed in all day and at 2pm missed a phone called from a blocked number and
the caller left a message. I listened to the message where the British Gas
engineer said he would be here in 10-20mins. I was so happy it was happening so
quickly!

By 3.30pm I began to wonder where he was, I had not played music or made any
loud noises for fear of not hearing the (very loud) door bell. I had been checking
my phone, but obviously didn't call the engineer, firstly his phone number was
blocked and secondly he didn't leave his number in his message.

I decided to call customer services again. I spoke to a most unhelpful person
who informed me the engineer had in fact been, had tried to call me but my phone
was engaged, rang the bell and left a calling card. The engineer had not rang
the doorbell, nor had they left a calling card (my housemate checked this
immediately). If my phone was indeed engaged, would you not try again? Perhaps
you might send a text? Or maybe you thought ringing the doorbell might mean
someone would open the door? The customer service idiot at the call centre would
not believe that the engineer had not been to the flat. By this point I had had
enough of his charming ways and asked for my £50 for the call out charge (to which
he said would be fine) to be refunded and asked to speak to a manager. I was on
hold for about 10mins and suddenly the phone was put down on the other end!

By now, inevitably furious. Beyond furious. I called British Gas back, wasting
even more money. I had to explain the situation again to another incompetent
numpty who informed me that no one could come back that day to fix my boiler.
I'd like to emphasis that NO ONE HAD BEEN ROUND. I was told that another
appointment could be made on Monday 28th but between 12pm-2pm which was not
going to work as both myself and my housemate are unable to miss work. I was
offered another slot on Tuesday 29th January in the morning which I did not feel
was good enough, seeing as though it was not my fault that the engineer had not
turned up when he was supposed to! I asked for a refund and he said yes it was
fine but he couldn't get the same engineer who was supposed to have been round
that day to come back and actually do his job. Especially as the engineer would have an hour window spare having not actually fixed my boiler. He couldn't do anything
so I asked to speak to his manager.

I spoke to this imbeciles' manager. Bear in mind now, this is the third person
I've spoken to. Who told me I had to accept that no one could come that day, so
I reluctantly agreed to someone coming on Tuesday morning as I had it off work.
I requested for my £50 to be refunded again and he explained that it was at the
discretion of the engineer who comes round - not customer services. They could
put a 'note' on the system but that was it. It was in the hands of god (the
engineer) & I spent about 30mins arguing with this idiot. I complained and asked
to speak to his manager but they weren't in until the next day (Monday 28th
January) but they and the complaints department would be calling me when they're
back in the next day. He also told me I'd receive a text to confirm the booking on
Tuesday 29th January. By this point I was boiling with anger I had to accept
what he was saying and hope for the best the following day.

Monday 28th January
On Monday 28th January I left it until 5pm and when I'd not heard from anyone at
British Gas about anything, I decided to call them again! I spoke to the first
person who essentially told me there was nothing he could do about my refund for
£50 and that the whole call centre at British Has are apparently unable to make
outbound calls. SO WHY TELL ME SOMEONE IS GOING TO CALL ME? He spoke over me constantly when I was talking, it was not only rude, childish and irritating but
incredibly unprofessional. I asked him to let me finish talking several times to
which he responded in a tone in which an adult would speak to a baby 'ok so how
about you tell me when I can talk. When you want me to talk say 'go' and I'll
speak'.

Which company speaks to their customers like that?

I ask to get put through to a manager who explains to me that they are able to
make outbound calls and that I will get a call today.

I decide to take the matter on twitter and I get asked to 'DM' the
@britishgashelp account with my address and reference number, which I do. All I
get back is that someone will get back to me asap.

Tuesday 29th January
The engineer comes round and is lovely. We chat and he says even he hates the
customer service team for British Gas (the same company he works for) when he
deals with turn for work and for his own personal purposes. I ask him if he sees
the note about the refund of the £50 and there is nothing on my account. He says
he will dispute it for me as he was only needed to flick a switch. He understood
why I was so angry.

I wait until 4pm and tweet British Gas again and they ask me to 'DM' them my
details and my reference number. I am sure you can imagine my anger over this
STUPID question. I respond immediately asking them to check the DM's I've
already sent. And they then tell me that someone had been round that morning and
fixed the problem. I had to explain once again it wasn't in fact the boiler that
was the real issue now it was there lack of brain cells as a collective. I
explained I wanted a refund for the £50 and also my phone charges for spending
so long wasting my time trying to tell these people how to do their jobs. The
final point of communication today was again via a tweet from BG saying that
their experiencing a high volume of enquiries with it being winter. So why not say that in the first place instead of telling me for 3 days someone was getting back to me straight away.

I'm pretty sure it's like this all year round because of the fact it's the worst
company I've ever come across. Watchdog need to do a massive exposure on British
Gas. Honestly I'm lucky I'm moving into a flat in a few weeks where the gas
costs are part of my maintenance fee and therefore do not ever have to deal with
them again.

Kate found this review useful

REPORT THEM TO WATCHDOG

Over 48 hours without gas as the meter isnt working, I made 19 long waited phone calls and they still cant send an engineer.

Very bad

British Gas installed a boiler without connecting the pressure release valve. This has the potential to kill someone!! I have called and emailed them several times only to be given the runaround. Stay far away from them!!!

Appalling customer service - Long but detailed account

Called them a week before moving house, clearly stated I was moving New Year's Eve and wanted to close my account. They told me to ring up on the day of the move with my meter reading. Fine. Turns out that my meter, which has a digital screen, was faulty and I couldn't take a reading. Phoned them and their lines were closed New Year's Day - The day I TOLD THEM I was moving out on and they TOLD ME to ring up on. Bearing in mind too, that I was moving home and had no landline to call from so all of this was charged on my mobile phone. Went through to an emergency "help"line, explained the situation and the idiot said I needed another department and transferred me through. This line was CLOSED for New Year's Eve and I was cut off. I rang them back, got another "advisor" tried to explain what had just happened, and he interrupted me with his robotic security questions which I hadn't had to go through with the other advisor. Anyway, I answered them, phonetics and all, had to repeat all my answers about 3 times as he didn't understand (I am a native English teacher by the way and do happen to know my name and address). When he had "verified" who I was and taken a contact number, he then asked if it was a prepay meter. I said no. He said I needed another department and I said it's the one that's closed. Then, thinking he was actually going to be helpful, he said he'd contact an engineer to come and check on the meter and if available, they'd be there within 4 hours. "Great, finally something", I thought. He asked me to hold while he tried to contact an engineer (this is still being charged at mobile phone rates by the way 20.4p per minute to an (0)800 number). The phone cut out while I was waiting and I got no call back. The next day, New Year's Day, I couldn't do anything. I rang back on the 2nd and explained to a slightly more helpful advisor what had happened. He told me an engineer would come the next day and he *sigh* put me on hold to check on things. 15 MINUTES LATER and a very apologetic advisor explained that he could absolutely understand my frustration as he'd just tried to get through to all the right channels and no one seemed to want to help. He finally "sorted it out" and said that an engineer would come and I chose the 2pm-6pm slot as that was the earliest available. He said that I would need to be at the property (that I'd just moved out of) and I would get a phonecall to let me know the engineer was on his way. Again, just to get it sorted I agreed to give up a potential 4 hours of my time and travel to my old house just to get the meter read (apparently I neede to be there). So I thought this would be sorted. Following this call, I rang up the complaints line to complain about the service I received on the day I was moving out. They said they would go through the calls and, as I had an engineer booked for the next day, they'd call me back at 6:30. As I'm writing this, it is 6:40pm. No contact from the 2-6pm-engineer nor the complaints advisor (though she may call soon...) and I'm still stuck with an open account with them. While I still have an open gas account with them, I'm unable to get my deposit back from my landlord. I'm so disgusted with this level of customer service and recommend you to stay away.

Would be zero if I could chose it.

The most recent complaint that I have sent to British Gas after months of back and forth (taking 3 months to get the £550 credit back that they had made us overpay in just 6 months):

Despite months of ridiculous back and forth trying to close my old account from when I left in October 2012 this morning I was informed by the new tenants that while the account had been closed... my payment details had then been used for the NEW account. Sure enough, a new direct debit had been added to my account by some of the retarded monkeys in your joke of an organisation. Not only is this incorrect... I'm pretty sure it's illegal to keep my details on file and add them to the new account without my permission or even without me being listed on the account. I was only a tenant at that place and it is absolutely unacceptable that this has happened. I have cancelled the newly-created direct debit this morning but if you touch one penny of my money I will be reporting you to every single body that will listen to my complaints. Frankly I have NEVER experienced such poor and shockingly retarded customer service from any company ever. You should be ashamed of yourselves. How hard is it to receive the instruction to shut the account, then open a new one with the NEW tenants details. I can't believe that this could even happen given the amount of correspondence that I've had with you explaining this. Shocking. Truly, truly shocking. Remove every single piece of data that you have associated with me and burn it because I cannot believe that you could abuse the Data Protection Act of 1999 in such a horrific way as to try and steal my money to pay an account to which I have NO association with and have clearly spelled out to you repeatedly in emails. I think websites like this : http://www.trustpilot.co.uk/review/www.britishgas.co.uk just highlight what a shocking organisation you actually are. If you ever try to associate me with this account again I will contact the police as you are stealing my money.

Take great care if Britsh Gas change your meters to 'smart meters' they don't stop the old readings!

If British Gas offer to change your meters to smart meters my advise would be - say NO.
I agreed to this on 21st September 2012, when I received an online bill on the 11th October I noticed they hadn't stopped the meter readings of the old meter, even though the engineer had left us with a copy of his paperwork with the old meter readings, instead it had gone round the clock to the new meter readings, resulting in VERY high bills, despite loads of phone calls and complaints they are unable to sort it out as their computer can't cope with this.They have tried, but that ended in them charging me at standard rate and not the websaver rate!
It is now in the hands of the Ombudsman, but they can not take up your complaint for the first 8 weeks, so if you ever have to phone British Gas start making notes of the names and dates you speak to them as all this has to be produced as evidance for the Ombudsman. They are the worst company I have ever had dealings with, some of their staff are downright rude and make things worse by blocking your online account so you can not print out your bills, and then send you emails telling you to view your latest bills on line and you can't. Hope the Ombudsman takes them to the cleaners!!
The most worrying thing is how many others have had their meters changed and not noticed the old meter reading haven't stopped, with the new meters starting at nil????

The worst service ever

Had a gas and electric check about 2 weeks ago only to realise that the engineers left the boiler faulty a day later we discovered that some plugs were not working.
N,B. Everything was working perfectly well before the service checks. We are now trying to get them back to fix the faults but they keep cancelling the appointments. Please keep away from British Gas.

British gas should be shut down

British gas is the worst company for service ever have had no heating for 3 days after being promised someone coming and getting let down at the end of the day .We have lost wages waiting in etc and spoke to manager who just sounds like a broken record repeating about priority customers ,well I have news for you priority customers should be all of us and you can't even push them after all this for any free repair or compensation .Well I know I will be switching providers and getting a maitinence contract from someone who cares .

Kate found this review useful

Wait 3 weeks for an appointment, and the day before cancel! Total waste of money

I have had a Homecare Agreement with British Gas for years,mainly because my boiler is old, and needs regular servicing. I am fully aware that my boiler is now 'non-compliant' and every year they slap a 'Do not Use' Sticker on and try to sell me a new boiler (kept going for 7 years so far, so doing well!). When you need an annual check they pester you with letters and appear to accommodate you with imminent appointments. However, recently I had 2 radiators which were not working. I appreciate it is not an urgent matter so I accepted a 3 week lead time in getting an appointment, duly took a day off work to be here, and received constant text messages confirming the appointment. Today, less than 24 hours before the appointment, they cancel and make me feel mean spirited as they trot out the 'Emergencies for vulnerable people take priority' line as an excuse, then offer me another appointment in ANOTHER 3 weeks. So it takes 6 weeks to fix a couple of radiators. So not worth taking the cover out.
I also, foolishly, joined their Household appliance cover. Every time I've had a breakdown, I've rung and they offer me an appointment at least a week away, which is really useful if you have kids clothes to wash or feed. So in the last couple of instances I've bitten the bullet and called out a local household appliance service company, it costs £40 call out but at least its fixed within 2 hours.
I WILL NOT BE RENEWING!

Kate found this review useful

Rip Off !!!!! DO NOT DEAL WITH BRITISH GAS

Having Homecare100 cover with an excess of 50.00 I was told this would be taken only if the repair was fixed.

When the engineer came out he filled the boiler becausse no water was in it (that should have been a give away to him) only for it all to disapear very quickly. bottom line was I had a pipe leak which did not come under homecare 100. The engineer could not repair and left.
However british gas think because the engineer turned the water knob that results in a 50.00 charge, they took my money and 9 days later I'm still fighting to get it back.
Ive repeatedly told them he did not fix the reapir, I have unlimited call outs, but they are not interested "!!!! DO NOT DEAL, THEY TAKE YOUR CARD DETAILS AND THEY DO USE THEM !!
i was without water and heating for 6 days and overdrawn as well.
Ive cancelled my monthly direct debit and will never ever use british gas for anything ever again. PLEASE PLEASE DO NOT USE THEM, THEY ARE VERY QUICK IN TAKING YOUR CARD DETAILS AND MONEY but very very poor in contacting you to discuss the issues - I wont give up until I get my money back, its THEFT by british gas

Here is a copy of my complaint to British Gas.

Customer reference number:

850020758331
I recently applied to switch to a new supplier after your recent price hike anouncement.
Everyone knows you didnt need to raise your prices like this as your profits are rising year after year, so I wanted to leave British Gas.

I was told that you had blocked the application with an objection.This was because there was an outstanding balance on the account. So far so good.
I immediately contacted you and asked for a bill to be sent as I had a problem with my bank and needed to pay over the counter.
I was then telephoned on a Sunday and told that all I had to do was print out the bill which could be found in the my account section online. When I did this I found that there was no bank giro credit slip on this printout.
I telephoned again and asked for a bill to be sent again. Some days later I received the paper bill only to find that there was still not bank giro credit slip included.
I managed to make the payment using another card. I then telephoned you and you said the objection had now been lifted. I telephoned the new supplier and told them this.
I spent another 25 minutes in a que on the phone to you again yesterday and still didnt get to speak to an advisor.

What sort of organisation are you when there is rising unemployment and you made 345 Million pounds in profits in the first half of this year you still cant even have someone to answer the phones after 25 minutes?

THAT IS A DISGRACEFUL LEVEL OF SERVICE!

I have today heard back from the other supplier stating the following
" In regards to your query to your application for the energy supply switch, we have followed industry regulations to have this application processed. Having looked in depth into this issue I can advise that we have applied as per the industry restricted 3 times for the supply switch, however your previous supplier have upheld their objection to this on all occasions"
So what is the problem?

I am shocked that you think this is OK.

I will be leaving British Gas asap.
I will tell everyone I know to avoid joining British gas because of the way you have treated my application to transfer, and your shocking customer service.

I will also make sure that a copy of this email is sent to the BBC Watchdog for their new series and also left on every utility review site that I can find online to make sure as many people as possible get to hear about the terrible level of service you provide.

A VERY UNHAPPY CUSTOMER.

Patricia Tierney found this review useful

A Disgrace!!!!

I have paid home care for 8 years, they came out and told me my boiler is broke and a part is obsolete (Combustion chamber) i rang Potterton who make the boiler they informed me the chamber has been obsolete for at least 4 yrs, brittish gas say they had the part up to June 2011, so they should have informed me so i could have arranged ways to buy a new boiler if i needed to, instead they continued to take my money nearly thirty pounds a month yet they knew they could not fix it!! im now with no heating or hot water, what do british gas say we will give you 240 pounds compensation!!! will this buy my new boiler, NO! how dare you take my money knowing you could not fix my boiler! i would have saved to prevent this, never ever use BRITISH GAS!!!! THEY SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO OPERATE AS A COMPANY. For home care.

Caroline Coward found this review useful

Worse than incompetent at fixing boiler

After 8 separate visits and many complaints to the highest level my boiler is still not even as good as it was before they began. No 2 workers told me the same thing and several tried to flog expensive treatments that were not covered by my policy.
The last straw is that they proposed to increase my premium this year as i have had lots of callouts! Considering that most of those were to fix mistakes they had made themselves this is a complete outrage.
Any local plumber/heating engineer has got to be better than these guys.

DO NOT SIGN UP WITH BRITISH GAS

Please do not get caught in the same situation as I have. I have been trying to cancel my work contract with the above since I was pregnant with my 1st child - he is now starting school. They are awful to seal with, I feel blackmailed by them and have been off work with stress after dealing with them

Bunch of time-wasters

Made appointment for annual service,received a confirmation email and another today,the day of the service.Then? Guess what.Time came and went and then a phone call to say it wouldn't be happening.I don't believe they ever intended to attend this appointment.Re-scheduled for thursday and if they fail to get here in the time slot allocated that's it-i won't be re-scheduling,just cancelling my contract with British Gas and going local.

Let down for the last time - will never use again

I am glad to see that British Gas have had a satisfied customer who has recommended them. Unfortunately, several encounters with British Gas over the last 2 decades years have proved less than easy and successful.

The first encounter was to fit a new kitchen (from British Gas) - the completion of which was such poor workmanship that we made several approaches to customer services. A letter from my husband to the Telegraph to protest about British Gas getting a 5* rating (yes - it was a while ago ... 1992/3) when they offered such poor service. The letter was printed and then of courses we were fixed. However - 20 years later, we were to discover not all was fixed....the indestructible corian work top was neither corian nor indestructible. We gave up and got a complete refurb on the kitchen instead of a retirment cruise.

The last encounter was their house assistance - having paid around £50 per month for emergency etc cover for the last 8-9 years. We had a ceiling leak. They had no workmen to send. After 5 hours of trying (and our 11 phone calls to see what progress), British Gas then said you will have to get a local tradesman to do the work. We did. Homesense. A real muck up and took weeks to get the money back which was, in the end, labelled a goodwill gesture. We had all the pipes checked a relaid - bang went the plans for an alternative for the cruise.

I am glad that one British company is making a profit, but certainly their customer services and trade credibility does not add up to "the best" for me. NB we had an independant checker come to test our gas fires, one was condemned as giving out too much CO2. This was annually reviewed under the British Gas contract, but it appeared not to have been done.

If British Gas wish to come back to us on this long term overview, they are welcome......but not by phone - many many times we spoke to different people who were going to sort things out and when we tried to get back to them, no one knew who they were.

Take care if using British Gas and TAKE NOTES of all said and done.

xx

Complete Rip Off!

They NEVER send bills, sign you up for online billing and make you go paperless, even if you specifically request paper bills (which I did because I know what they're like), we moved in in November 2011 and have received 1 reminder bill and that's all until we tried switching (May 2012), I signed up to be able to submit actual readings and submitted every month, as soon as we decided to switch, all of the actual readings disappeared from their system and they're using estimates, they also gave the company we're switching to a closing gas reading which is completely wrong, it's in the 5000s, our gas meter has only just got to 1000s, it can't even be mixed up with the electric as that is only just in 3000s, so they want to charge us for about 4000 units more than we've used. (Luckily the company we're switching to is being very helpful.)
Had a phone call 2 months after sending the final readings, asking for final readings and a letter apologising for us not receiving a final bill yet, a few days after receiving that letter, we get another which is a reminder bill saying we haven't paid our final bill, which shows the left hand doesn't know what the right is doing.
They also, after being told how rubbish they have been, tried to get us to stay with them.
Avoid them at all costs or get ripped off.

Poor: Do not trust verbal assurances given over the phone

Two years ago I moved into a house that had British gas connected for both gas and elec. I wished to use my existing supplier from my old house so I rang them up to arrange for a change. I had already spoken to my existing supplier and filled in their paperwork and it was considered a formality once I had given last readings etc.

British Gas then contacted me and spun me a line that it would take several months to change which I considered outrageous but simply hardened my resolve to switch as soon as I could. When the time had elapsed I rang BG again and paid the balance up to my final meter reading for both gas and elec. The new utilities company then started charging me and I set up a direct debit.

Despite this I continued to receive bills from BG and I kept ringing them to say they were no longer the provider, and they kept on apologising and saying that it wouldnt happen again ... and then a few months later I would receive a reminder notice and I would go through the whole process again. Then one day I had a debt collector show up on my doorstep and frighten my pregnant wife. Once again I had to endure multiple phone calls and try and dig out documents that fortunately I had not thrown out to prove my case. It was only resolved when I moved out.

would be no stars if this site allowed it !!!

I have several homecare 100 agreements on different properties with british gas covering all boilers ,
however i have recently had to call them out as a boiler had broken on one of the properties
although i had been paying for this service for 18 months , at the first time of calling them out , they quoted that this particular appliance was not on their service agreement list as it had no Gas Council number.
i telephoned the manufacturer of the boiler who gave me this Gas council number and i then gave this to british Gas.
Every telephone representative that i spoke to assured me that the problem would be sorted , but every time they sent an engineer , he refused to carry out work on the boiler as he could not find this number , and surprisingly the engineers are allowed to refuse to do work at their discretion !!!
I have spoken to 7 different representatives and 3 different managers , three engineers have been sent over the course of a week with no attempt to carry out repairs .
I have now paid for a local gas company to fix this appliance and am going to take legal action against British Gas
I would avoid this company at all costs !!!! use a local company who actually want to help you

Scottish Gas customer

I find their site for meter reading submission and payment absolutily brilliant, no hassle with anything. Wish all utility sites were like this.

worst company ive ever dealt with

worst company ive ever dealt with

Excellent Service

My ancient washing machine finally had to be scrapped due to unavailability of spare parts. The speed at which BG sent me my discount voucher to offset the purchase of a new machine and terminated my maintenance agreement on the machine was very impressive.

Worst utility provider i've dealt with, ever.

2010 I took over a business property with British Gas already supplying electricity, got the welcome pack from them but no bills for 6 months then their agent forced entry to disconnect on previous tenants debt. Had to pay connection deposit £500 and previous tenants debt meanwhile no heating so plumbing burst. I made a formal complaint which they still have not dealt with.
2011 86 year old, lone parent's house with a British Gas boiler cover agreement, I discovered that British Gas had not been servicing the boiler although paid to do so, opened boiler front panel to discover year old condemnation notice but boiler left working! They came out same day and serviced the boiler.
My opinion: British Gas can wreck your world.

Ann-Marie Lucas found this review useful

How do they stay in business?

British Gas customer services don't even know their own price structure and if you read the Which report you'll see. They were the worst company of all. British Gas appear to be giving a good deal but that is far from the truth.
Their boiler insurance cover is too expensive.
As far as I'm concerned they are nothing more than a bunch of rip-offs and I don't apologise. They took my mother for a ride years ago and their monthly debit charge was horrendous. Luckily I caught on to it and they had to return £261 to her. Shame on them!

Do not touch British Gas

I moved into my property 2 months ago and applied to move my energy to EDF. British Gas blocked this as the previous tenants had not closed down this account so they blocked our application and then broke into my house, changed the locks and put in a pre payment meter. The staff are useless and I still have not got this issue resolved. I don't want to be with British Gas, yet I am forced to speak with them and give them my details. They deny all knowledge of a phone call I had made where they ASSURED me that they would not break into my house, even though these phone calls are recorded and then would not give me a reference number for the phone call I had with them about breaking into my house which is seriously wrong. I hate to think what they are like with their actual customers who do have accounts with them. Sort it out British Gas.

Poor and totally infexible service.

I've given them 2 stars - and it narrowly escaped being no stars - only because they did try to help - at least initially - but sadly did not succeed in solving my problem without my spending my own time, money and initiative to plug the big gaps left in their pitiful attempts at service.

I had a British Gas Service Contract which included cover for an integrated fridge, washing machine and hob/oven - costing nearly £40 per month!

Apart from a few boiler related calls over the years I didn't need to call them out until my Fridge stopped working. The first engineer came - just opened the fridge door - and said "the compressor needs replaced". He said it would take a few days to get and a week or so later a second engineer arrived with the compressor - but claimed the fridge was "jammed solid" and couldn't be taken out from under the work top to fit the compressor. He therefore declared it "beyond economic repair" and left.

Later on my son and I had a look under the work top and found the fridge carcase was screwed on to brackets under the work top. Once we removed the screws we were able to slide the fridge out quite easily.

We were going to contact British Gas and ask them to send the engineer back with the compressor he had with him the previous time. but we found on the web for this cost £177 - while a new fridge was only £160! We told British Gas this and said we would prefer to go down the new fridge route and could we schedule an engineer to come back and fit the new fridge when it arrived.

Things went quiet - no new appointment made. We fitted the new fridge ourselves (not rocket science) and are still awaiting any compensation from British Gas.

On reflection I would have been much cheaper putting this nearly £40 per month into a piggy bank and using small local companies to sort things out as and when needed. They would also come when I wanted them - no need to hang about for 5 or 6 hours waiting on them. BG will only give you a window from 08;00-13:00 or 12:00 -18:00 and won't ring you more than 10-15 minutes before arrival - so imposssible to go anywhere othe rthan the end of the street duruing all this time!

I'll never ever take out any "service contract" or "extended warranty" with any major company again!

Experience of trying to get my boiler fixed stressed me out!

It took five separate call outs in just one week to get my boiler fixed under a British Gas HomeCare 100 policy. I gave up trying to reason with engineers and call centre staff. In the end I just continued to calI them out to my boiler until the job was done. I misread the signals somewhere along the line. It wasn't a question of what was the fault with my boiler. In the end, I realised that It was a more fundamental question. When I voiced my concerns to service engineers about the problems I have experienced with the boiler, ( the radiators were heating up when the hot tap was turned on, with the heating off), I was told that my boil was at least working. That is not good enough. Yes my boiler was working. It's just that it wasn't working very well. Its like saying a car is working if the ignition starts, but the wheels don't turn. Added to all of this is the fact that I was asked for £250 for a part to modify the system and bombarded with phone calls seeking my views. In the end I just snapped and told them what I really thought.
As I have said, the whole experience left me stressed out. The other thing is that every time an engineer came out to the boiler, they always called a mate for the spare part, who happened to be just around corner. When I queried this, I was told quite tersely, that I was fortunate not to have to wait a couple of days for the part to be ordered.
The whole experience is horrendous, coupled with sometimes unreliable gas boiler. Boilers can be unreliable. That's machinery for you. But British Gas don't help matters.

company nightmaresare made of

dont know where to begin,requested a price for a REPLACMENT boiler,rep came was rude to say the least ,and gave a estimate of just under £3000 yes £3000 had work done by local gas registered firm for £1200 with twelve month warranty and certificate in 3hours.informed british gas no response.have recentley had solar panels fitted and since I get both gas and electricty from them tried to registerfor feed in tarriff,what a nightmare.phoned my firm that fitted solar panels they said had same trouble and reccomended .another firm,no problem.Just trying to get to speak to someone on the phone is an achievment in its self British Gas should wake up and treat the paying customers efficently and fairly. 0 out of 10