Trustpilot Review Verdict on Shell Energy: Utterly incompetent

Extracts from Shell Energy customer reviews posted during the past few days on Trustpilot: “Shell are quite possibly the worst energy provider out there…”: “Utterly incompetent”

Visit the Shell Energy page on Trustpilot to view all reviews in their entirety, positive and negative (and Shell Energy responses). Watch out for any fake reviews. Note the reoccurring themes in the negative reviews, including difficulty in communicating with the company. This article was posted on 12 July 2021.

Shell Energy not Honouring Contract

As previous emails You offered and booked and confirmed for the 1st June 2021 a Free gas safety check at my property then had I had a call a few days before you do not cover my area North London I was asked to find my own gas engineer and Shell would pay for it I am not prepared to pay up front for this as previous correspondence and then have to claim back which I am not prepared to do

Despite having cancelled 3 times in…

Despite having cancelled 3 times in the cooling-off period by phone calls and email it seems to be falling on deaf ears I am very disappointed with this company

Utterly incompetent

I maintained an account with First Utility Limited (the company originally behind this brand) for my 93-year-old mother-in-law until she died in 2019, around the time Shell Energy Retail Limited took over the business. The take-over process was a disaster and after giving due notice the account was closed. I discovered recently that Shell Energy Retail Limited placed derogatory and inaccurate data on my credit file despite knowing that an alleged debt was disputed and the company has been duly served with County Court proceedings. The company now (wrongly) claims to be Shell Energy Limited, a company that was dissolved on 20 April 2010.

Update after response from provider: There is no such company as Shell New Energies Limited on Companies House records. There is a Shell New Energies Holding Limited, but as it was only incorporated on 20 January this year, it didn’t exist in 2019 when the takeover occurred. The Web site identifies the company operating the brand to be Shell Energy Retail Limited, which has been served with the Notice of Claim by Northampton CCBC on 3 July. The relevant account number is included with the Particulars of Claim on the documentation served by the Court on Shell Energy Retail Limited.

Shell Energy not Honouring Contract

As previous emails You offered and booked and confirmed for the 1st June 2021 a Free gas safety check at my property then had I had a call a few days before you do not cover my area North London I was asked to find my own gas engineer and Shell would pay for it I am not prepared to pay up front for this as previous correspondence and then have to claim back which I am not prepared to do

Customer Complaint 8694775

Dear Scott

I am in receipt of your email as I explained at great detail Shell Energy offered me a free Gas Safety check back in April 2021 as email below

This is a clear breach of Contract on Shell Energy as advised by Citizens Advice

I cannot believe how a Company like Shell Energy can be so disorganised with a complete lack of care and incompetence
this is the latest in a blunder of beyond a joke how a company
can appoint a gas safety inspection to confirm an appointment
for the 1st June 2021 at my property with a Plumbing Company
called SMS plc
I was offered a date in April for the 1st June 2021 for a gas safety check which I accepted
on the 23th May I had a phone call from
SMS plc saying they do not have a gas engineer in my area I asked when they could arrange one was told do not cover my area (North London) I asked why I have been waiting 2 months for a engineer
who does not exist to visit me was told only noticed it on the 23th May after arguing for over a month was advised to get my own and Shell Energy would pay for it after phoning round and arranging
a Gas Engineer at my time and trouble found one at a cost of £200 Plus Vat
was told by Shell Energy I must pay for it myself and claim it back from
Shell Energy which I am not prepared to do as
I have lost all faith in this Company
I asked for them to appoint a Gas Safety Engineer but they refused

As Shell Energy is not prepared to honour the contract they offered me in supplying a Gas Safety Engineer at my premises I have no other alternative to put this into the regulator ofgem for their directions

Please send me your final response so this incident so I can move forward to a satisfactory
conclusion

Await a very Early Response

—–Original Message—–
From: Customer Solution

Sent: Fri, 9 Jul 2021 10:13
Subject: Re: Your Enquiry [8694775]

Shell Energy Logo

Your request (8694775) has been updated. To add additional comments, reply to this email.
Shell Energy (Shell Energy)
Jul 9, 2021, 10:13 GMT+1

Thank you for calling in this morning.

I am sorry that our call disconnected due to poor connectivity, I am working had been working on our inbound complaints line and not permitted to return calls.

During our conversation, I explained that with regards to your request for a free gas safety check we could not provide this directly because we do not have any available engineers to perform this work in the London area at the moment and that we are seeking to reimburse the cost of this work being carried out for you.

As with other energy suppliers and businesses across the UK, our work has been greatly impacted by the global pandemic which continues to affect our engineer availability in the short to medium term. I am sorry for any inconvenience this may cause to you as we seek to resolve this matter with you.

We need to see an invoice from the gas safety engineer or company used, confirming full payment has been made and the work that has been completed for the safety check. Once received, we will arrange for the full costs including VAT to be made to you – based on the quote you have provided to us. Any additional works will not be included in our reimbursement of costs.

You have stated that you do not trust Shell Energy to reimburse the costs to you and that you are not prepared to pay for the work in advance for this reason.

I am sorry that you feel this way. I have provided you with confirmation on the telephone that we will cover the costs as you have stated them, this being £200.00+VAT. Should you not wish to proceed on this basis this is your decision but as a business and energy supplier, we cannot cover the cost of services in advance without confirmation that the services have been provided to our customer.

Should we not be able to reach agreement with regards to this matter, please let your case handler know and we will issue a letter to you to outline our final position. To do so, you can reply directly to this email or you can call the Resolution Team on 0330 094 5808, lines are available Monday-Friday 9am-6pm.

Our document, Listening To Your Concerns – Our Complaints Handling Procedure, outlines in more detail the steps you can take to share and escalate any issues. And more importantly for you, it explains what we’ll do and how we will keep you informed as we work to sort it out.

Yours Sincerely,

Scott
Shell Energy: Customer Resolution Advisor

Quite possibly the worst energy provider out there

I don’t say this lightly but Shell are quite possibly the worst energy provider out there. I signed up with Shell at two of my properties. Around 7 months into the contracts I decided to move home so sold one of the properties mentioned and rented out the other. Shell informed me that they would charge me a total of £90 in leaving fees to do this even though the rented one would carry on being supplied by them and the other mentioned was sold… In the end they agreed that if I moved the tariffs to new properties they would refund the fees. This I did with reluctance as I wasn’t impressed at all with the service I had received up until then. When I moved to the new property I asked for a smart meter to be installed. Unfortunately unbeknownst to me the meter I had was a U16 high flow meter which required a special engineer to remove it. This I discovered when the first attempt to replace the meter didn’t happen because of it. To cut a long story short I paid for a local engineer to test my gas usage to make sure I could down grade to a U6 smart meter and booked another engineer appointment to change the meter. I made sure to point out that I had a U16 meter and even sent photos of it. The engineer turned up and you guessed it, wasn’t trained for it… I then spent a week on calls between SMS (meter fitting firm) and Shell trying to arrange an exchange quickly. In the end I gave up as my contract with them was running out and I switched to another provider…. I will never use shell again and would recommend others do the same

This website and sisters royaldutchshellgroup.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.