The above post I meant to post yesterday... I thought I had, but obviously not when I searched for it this morning... I have an immediate update to it: Having got the reading last night of 45290 I phoned EDF and spoke to someone at their callcentre in Sunderland. And they were actually very helpful. They said that the readings were unusually high (no? really?!) and went through a checklist of my usage to see if there was anything unusual which would cause a high electricity turnover. Having gone through their questions, (do you own a hot tub, a sunbed etc... how long do you have the TV on for in the evening... etc) they estimated my usage at 16 units a day. I reread the meter for them at the end of my call and in the 30 mins I had been on the phone with them the reading had gone up to 45295... 5 units in 30 mins! Suffice to say that they agree that there is something amiss and will be contacting me in the next few days to start their investigations... Any advice from people in similar situations would be appreciated... and if anyone does know how a digital meter is affected by powercuts then I would appreciate the info too... All power to my elbow! I'll update with any news... Cheers!

I have a 3 bedroom semi detached house, I am out at work during the day so the main amount of electric I use is in the evening, telly, lights, cooker, computer... the usual stuff... The heating is gas central heating on a timer which lights for 1 hr in the morning, and around 6 hours in the evening. I have dual fuel supplied by EDF. I have a digital meter for the electric. When the meter was last read in October 2008 the reading was 31731... Their latest bill, sent to me on 5th Feb 2009 gave an estimated reading of 33711 meaning I'd used an estimated 1980 units. Although the bill was high, its been winter so its not overly surprising. I have gas central heating but obviously with the darker nights I have my lights turned on more often. The bill was £258.58. I'm used to paying around £150-£250 so no major problem, but I always like to see what the ACTUAL figure is on the meter... It was 44891!! Woah! 13160 units since the last reading of 31731??!! I phoned EDF and paid the estimated bill by debitcard. I asked them what they thought the usual level of unit usage per day was and they said around 15-20... According to my meter I've been using around 150 per day every day for 3 months! They asked me to keep a daily check on my meter readings and so far they've been Sunday 44891 - Monday 44915 - Tuesday 45210 - Wednesday 45290 So thats a 'normalish' 24 units on Sunday-Monday then 295 units for Monday-Tuesday (and I wasn't even home for most of Tuesday!), and then 80 units for Tuesday-Wednesday... Other than reporting this for your consumption pleasure, is there any advice any of you can give me as to how to proceed? I've asked EDF to record it on my customer file and will be continuing to log the meter readings... Do I contact the Energy Watchdog? Or BBC Watchdog? Or who!!?? Help!! PS... The estimated Gas bill was within 10 units of being correct, so no problems with that then! - Just as an aside, we had a couple of powercuts a while back... How does a digital electric meter survive a powercut? Has it its own battery? What happens when the power is cut off for a while, can it possibly corrupt its readings?''

I hear that Watchdog took the Banks & Building Societies to task last night and, according to my wife who saw it, said that The Abbey was the worst of all... Tell me something I don't know!! (I plan to watch it later on BBC iPlayer...) I checked the Watchdog website and found this survey which I beleive they referred to in their report... BBC - Consumer - TV and radio - Bank poll Not a glowing reference for The Abbey eh?!! :cool: 11 February 2008 A total of 13,126 viewers took part, and the results were analysed by the market research company Mintel. Here is a summary of the vote results. Question 1. Overall, how satisfied are you with the service you receive from your bank / building society? ...60.0% of voters who banked with Abbey who said they were very dissatisfied with the service provided. Question 3 - What is the main reason you stay with your bank / building society? Voters who banked with Abbey were the most likely to state that they stayed with their bank because it was too complicated to switch banks. In addition, nearly half (47.1%) of Abbey voters reported that they were currently considering changing their account provider – a higher proportion than for any other bank or building society. Question 4 - During your time with this bank / building society, how would you say the level of service has changed, if at all? ...79.8% of Abbey customers who voted said that the service has worsened during their time with Abbey. Question 5 - How clearly do you think your bank / building society explains its policies and charges to you? ...27.3% of Abbey voters and 28.3% of Halifax customers who voted said that the banks’ explanations of policies and charges were very unclear. Question 7 - If you have had a complaint with your bank / building society, how easy was it to resolve? ...three quarters of Abbey voters and over half of both Halifax and Bank of Scotland voters reported that it was difficult or very difficult to resolve their complaints, and Abbey had the least number of voters stating that this question did not apply to them. Question 8 - If there has ever been fraudulent activity on this account, how satisfied were you with how your bank / building society dealt with this? ...voters who bank with Abbey and Halifax were the most likely to report being dissatisfied or very dissatisfied with how their bank dealt with fraudulent activity. Question 9 - Would you recommend your bank to someone else? Over 90% of First Direct and Smile voters would recommend their bank to others. Contrastingly, 83.6% of Abbey voters reported that they would not recommend Abbey to others.

Why thank you! Theres nothing much to report at the moment... As I said, the bint from The Abbey DID call me when she said she would (makes a change eh?!) and offered me £200 for the trouble I've been caused. And I demanded the repayment of $190 worth of calls from the USA to the UK when they cut me off... I received the offer letter on Friday (for just the £200... no mention of the phonecall refund) and I'm just mulling it over... I did though consider it a little less than I would have expected bearing in mind they f'ked me around for 7 months with no chequebook, and for around 6 weeks of me calling them twice a day every day, so, before I got the offer letter I penned them a letter of my own... And here it is in its glory: FAO : V**** R******* - Executive Media Complaints Team From : Complaint Ref ****** Dear V****, Thank you for your call yesterday. With regard to the £200 'goodwill payment' you have offered, please note that I have not yet decided whether to accept this and will mull things over whilst I await the 'offer' letter from you. Considering the amount of inconvenience you put me to, the promises made to me, the phonecalls I had to make, the trips to my local Abbey I had to make, added to the problems I had by not having a chequebook sent to me for so long, I am beginning to be of the opinion that £200 is a reasonable *starting* figure to offer me... If you read fully all the emails I sent to you regarding case ****** it reads like a comedy of (The Abbey) errors and I'm sure that people like The Daily Mail and the FSO would be more than interested in investigating fully and publicising your inefficiencies. As I understand it The Daily Mail have already been in touch with you so perhaps you should reconsider whether £200 is a sufficient payment to make for causing me 7 months of problems. Having said that, I have already made you aware that, as well as a goodwill payment, I require the repayment of 4 phone calls I had to make to The Abbey when I had my card cut off when in the USA having advised you of my holiday there, and I enclose a copy of my Hotel bill to verify the amounts I had to pay to get my card working again. As you can see from the bill I made four Long Distance phone calls... At 22.12 USA time to: 11441908237 This shows the international dialing code, 11, the Country code 44, and the first 7 digits of The Abbey phone number of (0)1908237963 for calls from outside the UK. This was a first attempt to check my balance via telephone banking when it didn't work due to the 'System' having my wrong birthdate... This cost me $22.41 At 22.14 USA time to the same number: 11441908237 - This time I was able to check my balance by using my wrong birthdate to get through... This cost me $32.55 At 23.05 USA time (07.05 UK time) to the same number: 11441908237 - This time I spoke to a member of Customer Services who advised me about the stop on my card and told me to ring back when the fraud department was open... at 09.00 UK time... This cost me $58.03 At 01.06 USA time (09.06 UK time) to the number 11448456016 which is The Abbey phone number of (0)845 6016... for the Fraud Deapartment... This cost me $63.09 So a sum total of $176.08 spent getting my card turned back on and approx 3 hours of my wasted time having to make phone calls. Please get back to me via the various routes of contact you have for me to advise me of a new goodwill payment offer that I can give serious consideration to, and that you will be paying me back for a problem of your making whilst I was in the USA. Sincerely, Lets see what they have to say about that then!

Ooh... The woman from The Abbey just called me... Was pleased to hear that my chequebooks had finally arrived... And offered me a £200 'Goodwill inconvenience payment' for all the trouble I've been caused... So I said no. I want £200 AND the repayment of $180 worth of phone calls from the USA to the UK when they cut my card off when I was on holiday!! She's going to get back to me!!

Friday night 1 Feb 2008... I arrive home from work... AND THERE ON THE DOORMAT WAS A CHEQUEBOOK!! Yay!! So... 14 months since I moved house. 50 days since the problem was first discovered (13th December). 30 days since I first got Milton Keynes involved (2nd January). And 7 days since The Daily Mail apparently got involved (!!) ... I finally get a chequebook. And also, amongst my post, was a letter from The Abbey telling me that it was four weeks since I first raised a complaint and that they were sorry it was taking so long to sort out!! Does the right hand know the left hand exists? Let alone what it is doing? And then... Saturday 2nd February 2008. ANOTHER chequebook arrives!! So from having none sent to me for around 7 months I now get two in the space of 24 hours... The Abbey are nothing if not efficient eh? *cough* So... Lets wait and see what the woman from the 'Executive Media Complaints Team' has to say when she phones me today as she promised!!

Ahh... The end of another week without a chequebook... Its the start of a month which naturally means I have some bills to pay... I've had no calls this week except for the 'Media' girl... lets hope she calls me on Monday eh?!!

Are we publishing SPAM emails on this website in the guise of advise now?

At least you got a phonecall from them... I had to do ALL the chasing when my card was stopped.

Tuesday... Other than the call from 'V****' from the 'Executive Media Complaints Team' I have no other contact from The Abbey... And when I get home there is, not unsurprisingly, no chequebook... There is, though, a letter from The Abbey waiting for me... I quote: ''Dear Mr ****** Thank you for your recent communication to the Daily Mail who have contacted our Media Relations team. We will investigate your concerns and reply to you and the Daily Mail within ten working days. If you need to speak to an advisor about this issue in the meantime, please call us on 0845 600 6014. For your information, I enclose our ''How to Complain'' leaflet, which details our complaints process. Yours sincerely... Etc Etc...'' A couple of things I would like to comment about this... Nice of them to include a leaflet this time... not that I need to know 'How to Complain' as it is the very process of me complaining that has brought about this situation in the first place!! Also... Isn't it strange that they will respond to my complaint within ten days... Normally it is within FOUR WEEKS... could it be anything to do with the fact that the Daily Mail is 'on the case'... And, most interestingly... Isn't it strange how things seem to be moving soooo much faster now that the Daily Mail is interested... I wonder why?!! Heh.

Have you met The Abbey?

Precisely... Hence my error!

Are you contacting the complaints centre in Milton Keynes? Go to them rather than Customer Services... Phone: 0845 600 6014... Get a complaint reference and the name (or names!) of the people you are speaking to to be able to call them back at later dates... (Try and speak to 'Liz' (Oops, there goes her anonimity!) as she's been the most helpful...) It looks like you are in the reverse situation to me... I was getting statements sent to my new address so I thought nothing was wrong (until no chequebook turned up for 7 months) - You are getting chequebooks but nothing else... Don't take no for an answer and hassle them... tell them I sent you!! Haha...

Well... No call from L** yesterday... But today I get a call from a 'V****' who, apparently, wears three hats at The Abbey... Shes part of the: 'Executive Media Complaints Team' She's also a part of: 'Senior Customer Resolution' But she prefers to be titled: 'Complaints Manager' I firstly questioned the 'Media' part of her title and she said that she was responding to the fact that The Daily Mail had been in touch with them about my case... (Excellent!!) Then we had a long phone call about the joke of my situation to which she responded that The Abbey had a lot of teething problems with their new system and, whilst they were currently ironing things out, situations like mine were not acceptable... No poo sherlock! She then confirmed again that a chequebook had been ordered (not that I've got it yet) and that she would phone me next Monday to take the next step as far as compensation is concerned... This phone call on Monday, she said, would also allow time for a chequebook to arrive with me!! (I'm not holding my breath...) More news as and when!

What?? Have you seen where the damage is on the car? WHICHEVER way you approach the pipe the ONLY way you can physically drive into it would involve part of your car broaching the paved area... Especially with the damage as evidenced... You *could* cause damage to the car if you nudged into it when parking your car at a right angle to the paved area, either forward, or in reverse... But you certainly wouldn't cause THAT amount of damage...

And I will say again that the only way you could hit this pipe, and from the damage caused to the car, is if you mounted the pavement... From your picture 2: Showing the pipe, and from your picture 5: Showing the front of the car... Picture 2: If you were driving from left to right in the picture, your drivers side wheel would be on the pavement... If you were driving from right to left then the car would be straddling the pavement... If you were driving towards the viewer of the pic then you were about to bounce over the pavement... And if you were driving away from the viewer of the pic then you have already bounced over the pavement... By all means you should write to the store or the petrol station to point out the hazard nature of this item but as your car shouldn't have been in any position to hit it in the first place, bsically, you only have yourself to blame... (For example... would you blame the store if you'd punctured a tyre by bouncing up on the pavement you so obviously hit?)

Wherever the pipe is sticking out from the ONLY way you are going to be able to drive into it is by mounting the pavement in some form or other... Any claim by you for driving into the pipe will be countered by their claim that you are guilty of careless driving... And anyway... you have freely admitted you were on their property after they closed... Trespass anyone?

Ariston... And on... and on... Friday 25th January... I receive a call from L** in Milton Keynes, who, good to her word, has called me twice a day every day to keep me up to date with news... And, finally, she has something to report to me... The new address details I first let them know about in November 2006 are finally correct on all their systems... Or portals, depending on how you wish to refer to them... So it only took 15 months to get it right! Apparently, my complaint will now escalate to the hands of 'C******', L**'s boss who will refer the case to a Complaints Handler to deal with compensation... (Perhaps if my case had been referred to a single Complaints Handler in the first place so I had a single point of reference to refer to in Milton Keynes then things might have been sorted sooner...) But, hey ho... who am I to advise The Abbey how to do their job properly?!! L** now tells me she will order a normal AND an emergency chequebook for me. I said again that I would believe the whole thing was sorted (as far as getting a chequebook was concerned) when I had one sitting on my doormat on arrival home from work... I also mentioned to her that I had yet to receive a £60 refund for the 6 counter cheques I had done for me by the Leather Lane branch on the Wednesday... She said she'd investigate and get back to me in her afternoon call... I had cause to visit the Leather Lane branch of The Abbey that lunchtime to pay in a cheque, and, as I was doing so, I caught hold of the Manager S**. He was aware of my shameful situation and promised to refund the £60 by the end of the day. He said he'd been speaking to L** in Milton Keynes and knew my case and he also said he'd investigate the whereabouts of my chequebooks and call me on my mobile. 'Don't waste any more of your time on this'... he said. (Bearing in mind the amount of time The Abbey have wasted on my behalf over the past 7 months I couldn't help but laugh to myself at the sheer ridiculousness of the situation.) S** duly called me at 1330 to say he'd actioned the refund and it would be in my account by the end of the day... He also said that he'd heard that the chequebooks had been ordered and would I like to collect them from his branch, or would I like him to forward them to my home address... ''Nooooooooo... Please don't send them to my house... I'll collect them from the branch...'' He said he'd let me know when they arrived. I said to him that it surprised me that they were sending them to the branch as I had recalled being told in the past that The Abbey DON'T send chequebooks to branches... (This also goes against news I'd had from Milton Keynes, from a couple of the thousands of people I have spoken to there that they have record that at least two chequebooks had been sent there for me...). S** said that he hadn't worked that long for The Abbey, but he'd been in banking for years and that sending chequebooks to a branch was not a problem he'd encountered previously. He hasn't worked for The Abbey for long enough to get to know them then, as, when L** called me at 1630 I mentioned his assertion that chequebooks were being sent to the branch and she said NO, they don't send them to branches... She said she had been trying to get hold of S** at the branch but he'd been busy with customers... To add to the complete madness of The Abbey, the staff at Milton Keynes cannot email their colleagues in The Abbey branches because they aren't allowed their email addresses!! They have to contact staff members by going through the Area Manager and not directly. Have you ever heard of anything more inefficient? Anyway... L** tells me that The Abbey 'Banking Centre' have told her that they are not sending a chequebook to the branch, BUT, the branch could supply ME with an emergency chequebook!!?? Jeez... Is it any wonder that this whole sorry affair has carried on for so long when the right hand of The Abbey plainly doesn't even know it has a left hand, let alone what this left hand is doing? L** told me she would investigate and also advised me that now my complaint was nearing completion (but not until I get a chequebook...) that a 'Customer Resolution Manager' would be assigned to my case... (What ever happenned to the 'Complaints Handler' I was supposed to have assigned?!) It this point my head was spinning, and, having spent another 30 or so minutes on the phone wasting my time I asked L** to find out what she could and get back to me on Monday... Its now 1640 on Monday and I've had NO calls from L** today... Oh dear.

I assume that the accident happenned where the driveway crosses the pavement... The OP was reversing out of his drive and the little old lady was travelling along the pavement and the two of them met at the junction of the two...

It has to be said that in order to drive over that pipe the driver of the vehicle actually had to mount the pavement the pipe is sticking out of... The driver had no reason to drive over the paved area and therefore has to bear full responsibility for the damage caused to their car...

If you have a prescription then use these people... Fantastic service and dirt cheap prices... http://www.glassesdirect.co.uk

Thing is, you only find out that HFC don't accept debit card payments until your account is in arrears when you try to pay them to STOP going in arrears! By that time its too late! And the point is, why should I have to set up a DD? I have been asked by Credit Cards in the past if I want to set up a DD and I've always said no. I prefer being in control of my money and sometimes want to pay more than the minimum payment, which is what the DD would be. Anyhoo... All charges are fully attributable to my lack of a cheqbook for 7 months so will be charged back to The Abbey. Talking of which... progress is being made with The Abbey... And The BBC has been in touch... More on Monday!

Todays email to The Abbey: January 24th... 22 days after I first spoke to Milton Keynes... And counting. And my address details and birthdate details are still wrong. And I still have no chequebook. But progress is being made... I have L** at Milton Keynes calling me twice a day to update me on my situation... Which means, basically, she calls me to tell me that nothings changed. Useful. But at least she's calling me! Unlike any of the other people at Milton Keynes who promised to call me back and didn't... Finally, a person at Milton Keynes who knows the meaning of Customer Service. In her first call to me at 0950 she told me about the various 'Portals' on their computer system that store customer information. From what I recall theres the 'Customer Portal' which seems to be their database for notes about their customers. This HAS been updated with all my correct address and birthdate details, and it is to this that they refer when you call in to complain, or speak to customer services... But there is also something called the 'Servicing Portal' and this is the area where The Abbey keep customer address and birthdate and Data Protection type info and this is the portal that they refer to when sending correspondence and/or chequebooks (or is it..? read on!) - L** tells me that this portal is STILL wrong as far as my details are concerned. The thing is... as I have been telling everyone until I'm blue in the face, the reason I didn't think there was a problem with things until I noticed that I wasn't getting chequebooks was that my statements WERE coming to my new address... So how can the database (or Portal) which contains my old/wrong address be able to send statements to my new address when it has my old address stored in it... This is a question that L** can't answer... And seems to be as baffled as me. Anyhoo... Apparently I'm not the only person who is being given the run around by The Abbey and there is a HUGE meeting of Abbey glass-tower-dwellers who have spotted a slight problem being reported about their system... The results of this meeting will, I hope, be imparted to me (if I'm deemed worthy) tomorrow... With no other news to give me L** tells me she will call me later. She does indeed call me later, at 1630 to tell me... No change. So now, as I type this, I await my morning phone call from her to give me some news... Presumably theres no change but I'm tingling with anticipation... Actually... I'm tingling with anticipation at some news I have to tell her about... The fact that I checked my mini-statement at an Abbey cashpoint this morning and the £60 I was charged for having 6 counter cheques produced for me on Wednesday has NOT been refunded to me... (The previous £10 I was charged by The Abbey for making out 1 counter cheque on the Tuesday was refunded within 24 hours...) What a surprise. I hope L** is ready for me...

Oh I certainly will be... After its all sorted. I'm a determined type of person and I WILL get a result in my favour... I'm actually making progress though... I've now got a woman in Milton Keynes who phones me twice a day to tell me that nothings happenned so far... Well at least she's calling me!

In my case I was in the USA when I was cut off and they made absolutely no attempt to contact me on the mobile number they have for me, which is triband and works in The States... They cut you off and expect YOU to contact THEM, rather, as I suggested to The Fraud Department, that THEY contact you BEFORE cutting you off, to see if you know anything about these so called 'unusual' transactions... They always blame it on 'The System'... The System cut you off etc etc yadda yadda...