Cutting off Customers as Winter Sets in

Island Energy Group has said customers in arrears need to talk to them or risk being cut off, but some customers have contacted and even made payments only to find themselves without heating.

The company has been in the firing line this week after MHK Jason Moorhouse raised concerns over people being disconnected as winter hits.

Mr Moorhouse had flagged up two incidents he had been involved in, after he was contacted by two local families who Isle of Man Energy has threatened to turn off their gas.

He said: ‘There must be other people in the same situation out there. With one a solution was found, but with another I found out too late. I will contact the company about that disconnection in the morning.

His colleague from Douglas South Claire Christian said she had been contacted by a constituent who was switched off despite speaking to the company and it saying they wouldn’t be.

A spokesperson for the company told Gef: ‘We are contacting customers who have significant arrears on their account and due to non-payment have built up a high level of debt. We want to ensure that customers do not get into further debt so we have asked them to get in touch and we can talk about ways in which this can be settled over a longer period. If customers do not contact us, we do have the option to disconnect their supply until the outstanding amount has been settled. We encourage customers to get in touch to discuss their circumstances.’

However, despite this, one read told us that they rang up the customer services centre in Scotland after receiving a seven-day notice letter, which quoted a figure that didn’t include their latest payment.

They said: ”They [IEG] told us that because we’d already made a payment towards the overall figure, we definitely wouldn’t be cut off. Then we were cut off on Monday without any further warning.

‘If they’d told us “you need to pay more right away” – they didn’t and we asked specifically – we’d have shuffled things around and done so. I have to wonder if, after giving us that assurance, customer services then ensured that information was correct, or whether anyone in the island double checks whether there’s been any further communication before giving the final go-ahead to cut people off.’