New contract, but no rebate applied

Sally changed her electricity plan with her retailer as her current benefit period was ending. The retailer said the new discount would be higher and her bills would decrease.

Sally had lived at the property since 2014 and her normal electricity bills were about $350 per quarter. She received an electricity bill for 19 January to 20 April 2022 for $560, which she considered to be too high. She contacted her retailer to dispute the bill and it said it would review the bill and contact her within 48 hours. Sally did not hear from the retailer and tried to contact it on multiple occasions, however she was not able to resolve the issue. She received another bill for 21 April to 17 July 2022 for $480. She contacted the retailer again, but did not receive a response.

Sally contacted EWON for assistance and said she thought she was given incorrect information before changing contracts, as her usage on the disputed bills was similar to her historical bills. We initially referred the complaint to the retailer at a higher level, however Sally returned to EWON as she was not satisfied with the information she was provided.

EWON contacted the retailer to discuss the account and it said the NSW Low Income Household Rebate had not been applied to the account because of a mismatch with the address on her concession card, the Market Settlement and Transfer Solutions database and the address on the account. The retailer applied a credit of $285 to Sally’s account, to backdate the missing rebate for a period of twelve months, confirmed the details on the account were updated and confirmed the rebate would apply to future bills. 

The retailer acknowledged that the electricity plan offered was not the most beneficial to Sally and offered to apply a credit of $450 to her account, which represented the difference between what she was billed and what she would have been billed on the old contract rates. It also confirmed that she had since been moved to the best available offer.

The credits applied to the account reduced the balance to $750 and Sally was referred to contact the retailer directly to discuss payment of the account, if required. Sally was satisfied with the outcome.
 

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