Bill shock for thousands of energy customers as leading supplier admits charging blunders

Now the supplier is to refund any money overcharged and is making a small goodwill payment to the 17,000 customers affected.

One electricity customer was incorrectly told he owed €287 and was sent an estimated bill even though he has a smart meter.

He explained: “Our energy provider is SSE Airtricity and last week we received a weird backdated electricity bill where SSE was retrospectively charging us from May 2023 to December 2023, even though we pay bi-monthly, by direct debit and have a smart meter, so no estimated bills. The bill was for €287.”

When he rang customer support, he was told there had been a billing error.

The customer said: “If we had not noticed the error the money would have automatically left our account in March.

“Now we have received a new email from SSE claiming they undercharged us on some of our electricity units but we would be receiving a credit on our bill.”

In the past few days, the customer got a new communication from SSE Airtricity showing the bill had gone from €287 to €0.

An email sent to customers affected explained there had been a charging error.

“The amount of electricity units you have been billed for is correct, but some of these electricity units have been charged at a rate that is different to the time band in which they were used.

“This error has now been fixed and all your electricity is now being billed at the correct unit rate.”

A spokesperson for SSE Airtricity said the billing issue affected what it said was a small cohort of its customers. The company has around 700,000 customers on the island. It said it informed the energy regulator, the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (CRU).

“We are working through the agreed remediation plan. We are contacting all affected customers directly and in all cases, the impact on the customer is cost neutralised through re-billing. We apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused,” it said.

It added that the issue is estimated to have affected around 2pc of its customer base. The average customer overcharge is around €34, with the average undercharge estimated at €28.

“As per our remediation plan, all ­overcharged customers are being recredited and provided with a goodwill gesture of €30, to be applied automatically to their accounts on re-billing. SSE Airtricity will not seek to pursue undercharges from affected customers.”

Last October, it emerged that the country’s largest energy supplier, Electric Ireland, breached conditions of its ­licences by overcharging 48,000 customers a total of around €1.1m.

It also issued delayed bills to another 25,000 customers.

The CRU said at the time that Electric Ireland customers, as well as some former customers, had been overcharged by an average of €23 over a 12-month period up to August 2023.

All customers who were overcharged were refunded, while those overcharged by more than €40 also received some compensation.