Adversities of life in the 21st Century

Hi, sorry it's been such a long time since my last entry, but nothing much has happened. I've been writing to various sections of the media as well as to Scottish Power themselves. We just received word today that our monthly payments are now set at £90.00 for the next year. Now this may not sound like much, but when you consider at one point around 5 years ago Scottish Power wished us to pay around £300.00 per month - it sort of puts it into perspective. Since that time all that has changed is the fitting of the digital meter in 2007.

Through exhaustive research we have contacted many professional electrician forums and the generally held view, based on our 'symptoms' is an earth leak. An earth leak is a pre-meter leakage of power which feeds back into the meter generating abnormally high false readings.

I received a letter the other day from Colin Pensom - Chief Moron at Scottish Fuck-ups. Basically he is re-iterating Scottish Fuck-ups long standing argument that the Ombudsmans decision states.....blah, blah, blah. He also states that Scottish Fuck-ups have exhausted their investigation proceedure and found no fault. I expect no less from them, however following exhaustive research, my wife and I have found several expert electricians via the internet who all give the same answer to our electrical problem. An answer which contradicts Scottish Fuck-ups inactive approach. The general consensus of opinion is that we have an earth leak, however Scottish Fuck-ups say they have no reason to dig up the street to see if indeed there is a fault. We are just high users and should be grateful they continue to provide our energy needs.

I have no idea whether or not anyone from Scottish Fuck-ups bothers to read this. They have certainly been told about the existence of this blog, its purpose and indeed a link to it. If however one of the morons does, I would like to extend a heartfelt welcome to the putrescent bag of festering pustules.

My wife received an email today from the halfwits at Scottish Fuck-ups. This was aparently their response to "Raw Deal". Unsurprisingly they state they have fully exhausted their investigation and find no fault. This however is because exhausting their investigation translates as they have done nothing and intend doing nothing. As far as they are concerned we are paying the money and nothing else interests them.

However on a positive note for us - our house is now up for sale. We will rid ourselves of Scottish Fuck-ups one way or another. Again for the benfit of new readers. The electricity supply to my house was fixed when Scottish Fuck-ups changed the meter on 10/04/07, so I am not dumping my problem on anyone else. I want justice for the 8 previous years.

Received a reply today from "Raw Deal". They are apparently making enquiries on my behalf. They will probably get the same bullshit as myself and the CAB got, but hey, at least more people get to hear my story. Maybe I can stop someone else from having the 10+ years of hell I've suffered, just by changing their mind about switching to Scottish Fuck-ups. At least people can make informed decisions.

You may think that I am trying to offload my problem to someone else, however the electrical fault was fixed when they changed me to a digital meter. They just don't recognise that I no-longer use the huge amounts of electricity as before - not because I'm using less appliances - but as a direct result of a change of meter, or whatever wiring changes were made at the time the meter was changed.

I have just finish a spell of night duty, which turned out to be unusually beneficial from an energy consumption point of view. During one of the quiet spells I was reading "The Sunday Post" and came across "Raw Deal" - a consumer help section. I remembered that "Raw Deal" had helped me sort out a problem I had 20 years ago with British Telecom. So I decide - nothing ventured nothing gained. I have therefore written to them detailing what has transpired over the past decade. I have nothing to lose.

Sorry I haven't written much lately, however nothing much has been happening lately.

Anyway I was reading in one of the papers the other day that the average household electricity bill had breached £1300.00, and I'm thinking to myself - Is that all? God, I was paying £4121.00 some 5 years ago, but apparently didn't have a problematic electricity supply. I'm currently only paying £1500.00 and all that has changed is the meter. If anything I use more appliances than previous years, but don't use the same high level of electricity. How do you explain that? One thing for certain is that Scottish Fuck-ups can't and indeed won't. As long as they get "their" money they don't give a rat's arse.

A couple of months ago we decided that we'd had enough of Scottish Power's theft. I took 2 weeks off work as annual leave and spent the entire 2 weeks decorating and taking care of all those minor jobs around the home that never seem to get any attention. We painted the front extension - inside and out. Did the hand rails just inside the front gate. I repaired the leaky toilet and re-decorated the bathroom. We re-arranged the kitchen extension and hung new curtains. Shampooed carpets, redecorated the hall, hung new curtains in the living room. Removed my gym equipment and re-instated the third Bedroom. Generally tidied our 2 attic rooms, and re-felted the roof of the Garage and garden shed. Tidied the gardens front and rear. Generally spruced the place up in keeping with other properties in the area.

He then said he would be happy to put my house on the market for £70,000.00 - £80,000.00 which is around £40,000.00 - £50,000.00 less than the average price of similar 3 bed roomed unextended properties for sale in the same area. You may be thinking that the other properties on the market may be overpriced, however several of them are already under offer.

Today I received a letter from another incompetent at Scottish Fuck-ups. This lastest waste of Oxygen tells me that as I pay quarterly on receipt of bills I am missing out on great savings from Scottish Fuck-ups. This is too good an opportunity to miss so a letter is merited.

So I'll have to content myself with writing to Mr Moron at Scottish Fuck-ups and, following a few pages of derogatory prose, suggest he actually read my file and then crawl back under whichever rock he came from.

Just to let everyone know that the man from Power Systems(Scottish Power) has been to check the Shared Cable Head. The outcome was, as you've probably guessed already, the least surprising in the history of surprising outcomes - "there is no problem evident". This is however a little strange as there have been 2 burned fuses in as many years at the main cable head just over a year ago. Furthermore, despite knowing that all four properties are connected, he only checked ours and our neighbour at 108. Once again no-one has bothered to check 112 or 106.

I have contacted "The Judge" at "The Sunday Mail" again just to update him on how things have progressed since my last contact. Again I don't expect any assistance from anyone, people nowadays are far too apathetic to get involved in anyone elses contretemps. As I've previously said if this were Hollywood, then just about now some insignificant character would find the solution, the entire situation would be turned on its head, we would be vindicated, and everyone would live happily ever after.....except Scottish Power, who would then be left to pay out to all the customers they've cheated over the years. Sadly though, this is real life, most people today would read this in the papers, at best shake their heads knowingly and say "that's terrible", and then move on to the sports section.

Filled out form supplied by Power Systems to allow investigation/upgrading of the shared cable head. Posted today. Need to speak to next door neighbour to see if he has completed his form yet. It seems he has had as many problems as I have had, trying to find power ratings of things like water heaters and Power Showers even cookers. I'm not quite sure why this information is required prior to an inspection visit, but can see the need for it as an indicator of the necessity for fuse upgrade.

At this juncture in time I would advise anyone with any complaint against a utility company - don't use the Ombudsman Service - its a waste of time and resources. Instead I would recommend the Citizens Advice Bureau. At least they genuinely try to help.