British Gas customer mistakenly billed over £600 for £4.90 charge

A woman who was left shocked when she received a gas bill of over £600 for a three-week period has warned consumers about the dangers of incorrect billing.

Danielle Aleshia Mason, 32, a mental health housing officer, told Yahoo News she gasped when she saw the three-figure bill. She immediately called her energy provider, British Gas, to ask how the bill had become higher than usual and was eventually told it was an error.

Mason said her usual monthly gas bill is around £30. She primarily lives alone in South London and shares custody of her four-year-old daughter, who stays at her home for half the week.

She said her heating has mostly been off as it is no longer winter. Mason said, "A couple of times that it has been rainy and cold, I've put it on for half an hour and turned it off straight away."

After receiving the high bill, Mason contacted British Gas, who told her the bill was issued because their system incorrectly noted that Mason had her gas meter removed.

They then cancelled the £608.54 bill and she was later issued a new one of just £4.90.

Mason posted about the bill on X, formerly known as Twitter, and updated people with the outcome and wrote: "You see these b******* corporations. My bill is actually £4, and they said it was an error on their end. This is why I don't have a direct debit set up for them because they would have just taken that money Kmt."

Her post sparked a conversation about cancelling direct debits with their energy providers. Mason said she cancelled her direct debit with British Gas when the prices for household energy bills in the UK increased in 2022.

Mason is worried some vulnerable customers are being charged too much for their energy use as they may not be able to query it. She said: "My fear is that a lot of people are just paying that money that they shouldn't.

"I just feel that they're doing what they want on their end, and they know a lot of their customers haven't got the capacity to pick up the phone to call them to see what's really going on."

What to do if you believe you have been overcharged

If you receive a bill that is too high, you should contact your energy provider to find out what caused the figure. You will be asked to provide an up-to-date meter reading, as most bills are estimated.

Ofgem, the government regulator, advises that people with unaffordable energy bills should enquire about schemes and grants their energy supplier may already have in place.

In April, Scottish Power customers who overpaid via direct debit due to a technical error were paid £294 each after Ofgem found that 1699 customers between 2015 and 2023 had been affected.

Scottish Power apologised to customers and is paying £1m to the Energy Industry Voluntary Redress Fund for their charities and community projects that help vulnerable customers.