I paid my Thames Water bill when I moved - now it says I owe more and marked my credit file

A Thames Water customer was left with a black mark on his credit score after the supplier failed to close his account and said he missed payments – when in fact his account was in credit.

When Andrew – not his real name –  moved house last November, he was told to settle a £5.24 balance to close the account, which he did.

He was given a new Thames Water account for the new address, but continued to receive demands to pay his final bill for the previous account.

Thames Water failed to close a customer’s account even after he settled the balance

Each time he contacted Thames Water’s customer services team, Andrew was assured the bill would be marked as settled and the account would be closed, but six months later the bills were still coming.

Every time he phoned, he was told there was no indication that the bill had been marked as settled, leaving him at square one.

He called again earlier this month and was placed on hold twice after having already waited some time in the queue.

The customer services operative took his number earlier in the call in case they were cut off, so when he had to go away ‘for a couple of minutes’ to consult his manager, Andrew assumed he’d receive a call back. The phone call never materialised.

Andrew says that he has spent months trying to settle the issue and on top of that, there had been various issues around setting up the new account at the new address, as well as issues with his online account.

He claims the supplier’s billing and account systems seem to be ‘totally dysfunctional’ and lodged a complaint.

Since then, Andrew discovered that there was a mark on his credit file, relating to a missed Thames Water payment the previous month.

Have you had issues with Thames Water payments? 

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The bill had been paid six months prior and each time Andrew called Thames Water he was assured it had been settled.

He eventually learned that the ongoing demand to settle the bill had been pointless, as the account was around £67 in credit.

This Is Money got in touch with Thames Water to ask why it had taken so long for Andrew’s account to be settled and why it had affected his credit score.

Thankfully, Thames Water were able to quickly fix the issue and the outstanding balance from the address has now been cleared.

The firm told Andrew that, had their agent completed the transfer when he initially contacted, the late payments wouldn’t have been reported to the credit agency.

All negative impacts will be removed from his file and Thames Water have also issued Andrew with a £100 goodwill payment.

A Thames Water spokesperson said: ‘We’re very sorry for the distress and inconvenience caused to [Andrew], when trying to credit and close an account held with us at his previous address.

‘We’ve investigated and can confirm that we failed to update his account as requested resulting in late payments being incorrectly logged. We’d like to reassure [Andrew] that we have updated his credit file and no trace of this error exists.

‘This experience has fallen short of the standards we hold and in light of our poor service we have issued a goodwill payment.’