My autistic son lives in fear of bailiffs from Ovo breaking into his flat
A Guardian reader from Edinburgh wrote to the paper's Consumer Champions column after her autistic son was repeatedly harassed by OVO Energy over a supposed debt, despite having no account with the company and being supplied by Scottish Gas instead. Years of letters addressed to "The Occupier," phone calls, and even a home visit by an OVO agent failed to resolve the issue, leaving him afraid that bailiffs would eventually force entry into his flat. The case highlights how errors in the national energy database can cause prolonged, distressing harassment for consumers who have no actual relationship with the company chasing them.
OVO traced the problem to an address error on the national database, which had wrongly linked gas and electricity meters from another property to the son's flat. It corrected the gas registration, but the electricity meter was owned by a different supplier that had ignored multiple requests to fix the record. After the Guardian intervened, OVO suspended the demands and issued a deadlock letter allowing a complaint to the Energy Ombudsman, which found the electricity meter belonged to a neighbouring address but had been mistakenly billed to the son. OVO was ordered to pay £150 compensation, and the demands have now stopped.
- Autistic man wrongly billed for years by OVO despite having no account
- Database error linked a neighbour's electricity meter to his address
- Guardian intervention led to £150 compensation and demands ceasing
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Concerns raised to Ofgem and consumer groups about billing errors in Britain's energy market are not new, but cases involving vulnerable customers highlight the human cost when systems fail. OVO Energy is one of the UK's largest energy suppliers, formed after acquiring SSE's retail arm, and like all suppliers it relies on a shared national database that records which supplier serves which gas and electricity meter at every address.
When that database holds incorrect information, a customer can be wrongly linked to a debt run up by someone else, even if they have never had a contract with the company chasing them. Untangling such errors usually means the supplier work with whichever other company is genuinely responsible for the meter in question, a process that can take a long time if either side is slow to act.
The Energy Ombudsman exists to resolve disputes between customers and suppliers once a complaint has reached deadlock, and can order compensation or corrective action. Cases like this are often only resolved with outside help, such as media intervention, raising broader questions about how well the industry protects customers, particularly those who are vulnerable, from the fallout of its own record-keeping mistakes.