Licensee wins legal battle with Npower over electricity bill
Npower sued Leo Gillen, who owns the Golden Lion in Hartlepool, after he refused to pay the bill, which was backdated by three years and eight months and sent in 2009, nine months after he had switched suppliers to E.ON.
He said the bill rose to £58,000 after nearly four years of trying to resolve the issue.
Npower told Gillen there was a fault with its meter reading, meaning the pub had been undercharged. However, Gillen said it was wrong for the supplier to make a challenge after so long and for something that was not his fault.
'Faulty reading'
During the court case earlier this month, Gillen said it emerged that Npower had known about its mistake since 2006 but had continued to charge him based on the faulty readings for more than a year.
"We’re obviously delighted," Gillen told the Publican’s Morning Advertiser. "If you add to the bill their legal costs of £18,000 and my costs of £12,000, I would have had to pay £88,000."
The pub is part of family firm The Dunston Partnership, which owns 17 trading businesses, and Gillen said because the readings were validated he had no reason to believe he should be paying a higher bill.
Food for thought
Alex Smith, associate solicitor at Endeavour Partnership, the law firm representing The Dunston Partnership, said:
"Where utility bills are undercharged due to a provider error, it can be extremely difficult for customers, whether consumers or businesses, to avoid this liability.
"In the Golden Lion, the owners placed reliance on the bills received from Npower when they set the prices to their customers and it was this finding of fact that was particularly pertinent to the courts decision in this action.
"This decision should give food for thought for energy companies as to how they deal with such disputes and the need to look at the particular circumstances of each case on its individual merits."
The PMA was unable to get a comment from Npower despite several attempts to contact the energy company.
