Eon Next has agreed to pay £14.5 million, or an average of £144 per customer, after admitting to “unacceptable” failures in providing final bills and refunding credit balances to prepayment customers.
An error in the billing system of the German-owned renewable energy supplier meant that, between February 2021 and September 2023, customers who switched or ended prepayment meter contracts did not receive final bills within the required six weeks, according to the regulator Ofgem.
The energy watchdog stated that approximately 250,000 prepayment meter customers were affected.
Beth Martin, Director for Consumer Protection and Competition at Ofgem, said: “Prepayment meter customers are more likely to face financial difficulties, and during a period when households have been dealing with a significant cost-of-living crisis, it is unacceptable that consumers did not receive refunds for credit owed to them or the final bills they are entitled to.”
Eon will now pay £4.7 million in credit refunds, £6.6 million in compensation, and an additional £3.2 million as a goodwill gesture.
Eon, which reported the error itself, will also write off the debts of almost 150,000 prepayment meter customers who closed their accounts during the period of the billing failures, Ofgem said.
In cases where Eon cannot trace affected customers, it has agreed to pay the money into the Energy Industry Voluntary Redress Fund.