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Hello everybody.
I would greatly appreciate some guidance and advice please regarding an ongoing dispute with UK Power Networks that is in a County Court process.
Back in April 2018 a contractor working at my ‘self build’ house refurb caused sparking on the main power cable from the street supply into my property (about 10.00). We were digging (safely) looking for the water main connection to the water meter. We find out later that the water meter that had been installed previously (prior to my ownership of the property) had likely damaged the cable and an unofficial repair of some kind had been made. I reported the matter to UK Power Networks as you should do and later that evening (18.00) a team arrived.
Eschewing a simple and straightforward repair on the basis that they didn’t want to disrupt the neighbours power supply they then commenced a long winded and ultimately costly repair when in fact a simpler and easier repair could have been done. The first man (lead jointer) on site decided to dig a hole in the footpath rather than further excavate the hole where the damage was.
He was also later misreading his testing equipment and thought there were additional faults on the cable, these results were in fact caused by the houses having a three phase supply. This was pointed out to him by a supervisor who arrived on site several hours later but by this time there was a large hole dug in the footpath and another team of subcontractors called in with a digger ready for further excavations. Only one man ever got out of the van and they did not work and then left after an hour so. UKPN had 3 men on site, one a labourer who spent some while asleep in his van when not needed.
The repair was completed; they did no backfilling of the hole (left to other contractors) and departed the site around 03.30. Within 48 hours another surfacing contractor arrived and carried out what they considered was a suitable repair. This was extremely shoddy work which I had to put right so I could access the driveway.
After about 8 weeks I was contacted by UKPN and advised that they will be invoicing me for the work. I half expected this but not the size of the invoice, close on £3k which included all the hours 3 UKPN men spent on site (one asleep in the van!) some bits and pieces, nearly £500.00 for a contractor they called out but didn’t need and poor / substandard road repairs that I put right.
My contractor who had by this time finished and been paid wouldn’t accept fault and refused to engage with me further. I have then got involved in lots of correspondence with UKPN regarding the costs. They did offer a few hundred pounds of reduction but refused to investigate or accept my arguments about the work being unnecessary. I do work in the building industry and I spent the entire time on site watching these works until the repairs had been complete around 03.00.
I had questioned the job process even before they got started and said that they were going the long way round for the fix. Really all they needed to do was go to the substation, about 300m away, turn of the power, fix the damage and turn it back on again two – three hours work at best.
Correspondence was ongoing until 2019 when after receiving continuous demands and threats of court action (I responded to all letters) I advised UKPN to crack on with Court action or stop pestering me. They couldn’t or wouldn’t engage in proper discussion and failed to review all the facts as I presented them (they declined to come and meet at the site) nor would they supply copies of the pictures they took of the damage which would have supported my case of prior damage that led to our cable strike.
At this point I stopped hearing from UKPN and assumed they had reviewed the matter and decided to cease action. I heard nothing for some while. Six months later Covid hit, I recall at some point a computer generated letter arrived, but then nothing.
In the past few months it has all kicked off again and I now find myself with a County Court summons, not only for the original debt but another nearly £1k for interest and fees.
To clarify, communication ceased 6 months before the pandemic and started nearly a year or so after were all back at work. I am actually lucky I kept all the documents relating to the issue. We had in the meantime sold our old property and lived in a caravan for 18 months. UKPN have claimed that they did send communication and e-mails (to my business email that they found online) but have refused to supply copies of said correspondence.
I have dealt with the paperwork as far as I can. I have hit UKPN with a DSAR because I don’t believe they have supplied all the details they should have done. For example I have a copy of their Field Report Form which clearly indicates they took photos of the damaged cable, but they won’t even acknowledge that comment let alone supply the images.
I have other internal documents but some detail has been redacted, I understand they may take out individual names but surely comment about the job / me is relevant?
Other documents include a transcript of the comms on the night. It’s clear the Ground worker who arrived here had reservations about coming because he was tired and over two hours travelling away. This chap was the eldest of the three on site, probably close to retirement age, yet was expected to do the digging. This is the fellow who was asleep in the van, yet they are charging me in excess of £40.00 per hour for him sleeping here.
I have time sheets put in by these men, these don’t quite add up across the three men yet UKPN have charged the maximum hours for the 3 men based on the first person on site.
There are other issues with mail delivery to the wrong address, we have moved into this house in between them stopping contact in 2019 and starting up again in 2022. We redirected all amil and updated everything but this ran out after six months. Fortunately the postie handed me one of these recent letters and they have obviously done some searches because the County Court summons came here to the correct address. So they clearly know I live here.
Having responded to this summons outlining my position to the court, the UKPN response to this document was then sent to my old previous address. Again luckily the great post lady who was on that week who knows me, handed me the package, but it is just inept on the part of UKPN. Despite pointing this out to UKPN there has been no acknowledgement or apology, they just ignored it. I have made formal complaint to the ICO about this, the lack of photos that their own form indicates they have and the redacted details.
ICO have basically told me they won’t help or intervene. UKPN have hidden behind GDPR yet their legal dept sent out the transcript of the night’s calls with all the UKPN names on! They use data protection to control information to me yet don’t hide other information.
UKPN allege that I haven’t responded to some communication, yet I have a file full of correspondence and I believe they may have sent stuff to the old address. But UKPN have failed to supply copies of all letters as I requested in the DSAR.
What I can’t get (and I have looked for and asked about) is the name of the supervisor who arrived on site and explained to the Lead Jointer that he was reading the signals wrong and there was no further error, stop digging and turn off the power! That actually saved several hours more unnecessary digging and an even bigger charge.
I have also made formal complaint to the Energy Ombudsman (July 2022). They haven’t even bothered responding to acknowledge the complaint let alone deal with anything, I guess they are probably busy but some form of acknowledgement should have been received by now.
I appreciate there is a lot of background here but it has been ongoing in excess of 4 years now.
I’m self employed; I spent 3 years on this project and put everything into it. It was delayed by Covid; I managed to get back to work in May 2021 not long after we all moved in. But it is tough, lots of bills etc and I don’t have £4k for this. Court date is coming up in December 2022. I have had a second invite for mediation which I have accepted though apparently UKPN have not.
I would appreciate some guidance on this please.
Basically have UKPN operated in a reasonable and fair manner? They made clear errors at the job, established by their own supervisor, yet are still charging me for the time.
They are charging for contractors they called out and never used. They are charging for their own operatives who were sleeping in the van. If any of these charges are deemed unreasonable does this invalidate the whole invoice and then the claim? If so how can I present this to the court?
They have also avoided answering direct questions and supplying specific photos and information that supports my arguments. It is essentially corporate bullying, are they just expecting me to give in and pay at the last minute or will UKPN give it up rather than be questioned in court?
The invoice value has been in dispute from day one. It needed two men (safety reasons) for at most 3 hours to complete the job; I (and my now missing contractor) would have paid that. (Estimated £650.00 labour, vat and parts)
The reinstatement by a third party contractor was substandard; I put this right because I needed the driveway cleared urgently so the build could continue.
There seems to be a significant disconnect between the operations crew who did the work and the admin side tasked with invoicing and payments. I cannot see in any of the documents that I have obtained any attempt by the admin people to engage with the operations to establish the facts of the night.
In court documents the UKPN solicitor says the long delay in action is ‘Regrettable’ and due to staff issues / Covid. Yet communication had ceased 6 months prior to lock down and an email reveals that this same solicitor was advised of the problems at the time in 2019. They knew.
I now have a significant amount of time (some costs) and no small amount of stress and worry involved in dealing with this whilst their solicitor is supplying misleading info to the court.
There is a process called ‘Striking Out’. I believe I have lots of information to dispute the claim, would this be the correct process to follow? Would the court understand enough about the circumstances?
We have been advised to get advice through the CAB. Emailed several days ago and no response yet, I guess they are also busy.
Should I be looking for a local solicitor to help with this? I’m prepared to go to attend court but it has been suggested that a legal person would present the case better and with potentially less emotion involved!
Any advice would be welcome please and if you need more detail please ask.
I would greatly appreciate some guidance and advice please regarding an ongoing dispute with UK Power Networks that is in a County Court process.
Back in April 2018 a contractor working at my ‘self build’ house refurb caused sparking on the main power cable from the street supply into my property (about 10.00). We were digging (safely) looking for the water main connection to the water meter. We find out later that the water meter that had been installed previously (prior to my ownership of the property) had likely damaged the cable and an unofficial repair of some kind had been made. I reported the matter to UK Power Networks as you should do and later that evening (18.00) a team arrived.
Eschewing a simple and straightforward repair on the basis that they didn’t want to disrupt the neighbours power supply they then commenced a long winded and ultimately costly repair when in fact a simpler and easier repair could have been done. The first man (lead jointer) on site decided to dig a hole in the footpath rather than further excavate the hole where the damage was.
He was also later misreading his testing equipment and thought there were additional faults on the cable, these results were in fact caused by the houses having a three phase supply. This was pointed out to him by a supervisor who arrived on site several hours later but by this time there was a large hole dug in the footpath and another team of subcontractors called in with a digger ready for further excavations. Only one man ever got out of the van and they did not work and then left after an hour so. UKPN had 3 men on site, one a labourer who spent some while asleep in his van when not needed.
The repair was completed; they did no backfilling of the hole (left to other contractors) and departed the site around 03.30. Within 48 hours another surfacing contractor arrived and carried out what they considered was a suitable repair. This was extremely shoddy work which I had to put right so I could access the driveway.
After about 8 weeks I was contacted by UKPN and advised that they will be invoicing me for the work. I half expected this but not the size of the invoice, close on £3k which included all the hours 3 UKPN men spent on site (one asleep in the van!) some bits and pieces, nearly £500.00 for a contractor they called out but didn’t need and poor / substandard road repairs that I put right.
My contractor who had by this time finished and been paid wouldn’t accept fault and refused to engage with me further. I have then got involved in lots of correspondence with UKPN regarding the costs. They did offer a few hundred pounds of reduction but refused to investigate or accept my arguments about the work being unnecessary. I do work in the building industry and I spent the entire time on site watching these works until the repairs had been complete around 03.00.
I had questioned the job process even before they got started and said that they were going the long way round for the fix. Really all they needed to do was go to the substation, about 300m away, turn of the power, fix the damage and turn it back on again two – three hours work at best.
Correspondence was ongoing until 2019 when after receiving continuous demands and threats of court action (I responded to all letters) I advised UKPN to crack on with Court action or stop pestering me. They couldn’t or wouldn’t engage in proper discussion and failed to review all the facts as I presented them (they declined to come and meet at the site) nor would they supply copies of the pictures they took of the damage which would have supported my case of prior damage that led to our cable strike.
At this point I stopped hearing from UKPN and assumed they had reviewed the matter and decided to cease action. I heard nothing for some while. Six months later Covid hit, I recall at some point a computer generated letter arrived, but then nothing.
In the past few months it has all kicked off again and I now find myself with a County Court summons, not only for the original debt but another nearly £1k for interest and fees.
To clarify, communication ceased 6 months before the pandemic and started nearly a year or so after were all back at work. I am actually lucky I kept all the documents relating to the issue. We had in the meantime sold our old property and lived in a caravan for 18 months. UKPN have claimed that they did send communication and e-mails (to my business email that they found online) but have refused to supply copies of said correspondence.
I have dealt with the paperwork as far as I can. I have hit UKPN with a DSAR because I don’t believe they have supplied all the details they should have done. For example I have a copy of their Field Report Form which clearly indicates they took photos of the damaged cable, but they won’t even acknowledge that comment let alone supply the images.
I have other internal documents but some detail has been redacted, I understand they may take out individual names but surely comment about the job / me is relevant?
Other documents include a transcript of the comms on the night. It’s clear the Ground worker who arrived here had reservations about coming because he was tired and over two hours travelling away. This chap was the eldest of the three on site, probably close to retirement age, yet was expected to do the digging. This is the fellow who was asleep in the van, yet they are charging me in excess of £40.00 per hour for him sleeping here.
I have time sheets put in by these men, these don’t quite add up across the three men yet UKPN have charged the maximum hours for the 3 men based on the first person on site.
There are other issues with mail delivery to the wrong address, we have moved into this house in between them stopping contact in 2019 and starting up again in 2022. We redirected all amil and updated everything but this ran out after six months. Fortunately the postie handed me one of these recent letters and they have obviously done some searches because the County Court summons came here to the correct address. So they clearly know I live here.
Having responded to this summons outlining my position to the court, the UKPN response to this document was then sent to my old previous address. Again luckily the great post lady who was on that week who knows me, handed me the package, but it is just inept on the part of UKPN. Despite pointing this out to UKPN there has been no acknowledgement or apology, they just ignored it. I have made formal complaint to the ICO about this, the lack of photos that their own form indicates they have and the redacted details.
ICO have basically told me they won’t help or intervene. UKPN have hidden behind GDPR yet their legal dept sent out the transcript of the night’s calls with all the UKPN names on! They use data protection to control information to me yet don’t hide other information.
UKPN allege that I haven’t responded to some communication, yet I have a file full of correspondence and I believe they may have sent stuff to the old address. But UKPN have failed to supply copies of all letters as I requested in the DSAR.
What I can’t get (and I have looked for and asked about) is the name of the supervisor who arrived on site and explained to the Lead Jointer that he was reading the signals wrong and there was no further error, stop digging and turn off the power! That actually saved several hours more unnecessary digging and an even bigger charge.
I have also made formal complaint to the Energy Ombudsman (July 2022). They haven’t even bothered responding to acknowledge the complaint let alone deal with anything, I guess they are probably busy but some form of acknowledgement should have been received by now.
I appreciate there is a lot of background here but it has been ongoing in excess of 4 years now.
I’m self employed; I spent 3 years on this project and put everything into it. It was delayed by Covid; I managed to get back to work in May 2021 not long after we all moved in. But it is tough, lots of bills etc and I don’t have £4k for this. Court date is coming up in December 2022. I have had a second invite for mediation which I have accepted though apparently UKPN have not.
I would appreciate some guidance on this please.
Basically have UKPN operated in a reasonable and fair manner? They made clear errors at the job, established by their own supervisor, yet are still charging me for the time.
They are charging for contractors they called out and never used. They are charging for their own operatives who were sleeping in the van. If any of these charges are deemed unreasonable does this invalidate the whole invoice and then the claim? If so how can I present this to the court?
They have also avoided answering direct questions and supplying specific photos and information that supports my arguments. It is essentially corporate bullying, are they just expecting me to give in and pay at the last minute or will UKPN give it up rather than be questioned in court?
The invoice value has been in dispute from day one. It needed two men (safety reasons) for at most 3 hours to complete the job; I (and my now missing contractor) would have paid that. (Estimated £650.00 labour, vat and parts)
The reinstatement by a third party contractor was substandard; I put this right because I needed the driveway cleared urgently so the build could continue.
There seems to be a significant disconnect between the operations crew who did the work and the admin side tasked with invoicing and payments. I cannot see in any of the documents that I have obtained any attempt by the admin people to engage with the operations to establish the facts of the night.
In court documents the UKPN solicitor says the long delay in action is ‘Regrettable’ and due to staff issues / Covid. Yet communication had ceased 6 months prior to lock down and an email reveals that this same solicitor was advised of the problems at the time in 2019. They knew.
I now have a significant amount of time (some costs) and no small amount of stress and worry involved in dealing with this whilst their solicitor is supplying misleading info to the court.
There is a process called ‘Striking Out’. I believe I have lots of information to dispute the claim, would this be the correct process to follow? Would the court understand enough about the circumstances?
We have been advised to get advice through the CAB. Emailed several days ago and no response yet, I guess they are also busy.
Should I be looking for a local solicitor to help with this? I’m prepared to go to attend court but it has been suggested that a legal person would present the case better and with potentially less emotion involved!
Any advice would be welcome please and if you need more detail please ask.
