“My advance payment rose from 400 to 1,289 euros”
Energy prices are on the rise and power companies are increasing the amount of advance payment bills. Kris Van Eeckhout had quite a surprise when she looked at her proposed bill from power company Mega. The advance payment bill rose from 400 to 1,289 euros.
This week VRT News calculated that in comparison with last month the average price rise for plans on the Belgian market was 36%.
Kris Van Eeckhout contacted VRT to share her story. She’s a Mega customer: “I know this supplier is drastically increasing advance payments, but now they are exaggerating!” she told VRT Radio.
“In six months, my advance payment has risen sixfold. In June I paid 201 euros a month. I did have to pay more than 450 euros extra when I got my annual bill. In the autumn Mega increased the advance payment to 400 euros. That’s a lot of money, but nothing compared to what they are now charging. In their last letter my advance payment went up to 1,289 euros”.
Kris uses a storage heater: “The heating is 30 years old. We installed it when we built the house in 1992”.
Storage heaters can be costly to run, but Kris no longer heats the entire house.
“We only run heaters in the living room. Elsewhere they are off. We haven’t got any heating on in the bedroom”.
The letter from Mega says she can respond till 21 January.
“One thing’s for cert” she told VRT. “I’m not agreeing to this proposal. I can’t be using more than 1,000 euros’ worth a month with only three heaters!”
Kris has until 2 January to respond: “I don’t want to pay that amount. I don’t know what Mega’s reaction will be. I can only hope I will have to pay less than the supplier is now requesting”.