Nottingham energy supplier enters administration
Nottingham-based Better Energy Company has entered administration after failing to meet with Ofgem rules around smart meters.
The firm, which is based on Castle Boulevard, has called in administrators from Leonard Curtis.
The move follows on from Ofgem consulting in January on whether to issue the company with a final order to comply with rules due to it being one of nine companies in breach of the requirement to be Data Communications Company (DCC) users.
If issued, the final orders would require each supplier to be a DCC user by 31 March and would ban each supplier from taking on new customers from the date of the final orders. Each final order would remain in place until the supplier becomes a DCC user.
The particular behaviour of concern giving rise to the proposal to make a Final Order was that Better Energy failed to become a DCC User by the deadline of 25 November 2017.
A statement from Ofgem said: “By failing to be a DCC User in accordance with the licence condition, the firm’s existing customers with smart meters would suffer harm because they would not have smart meter functionality. There would also be harm to customers who would lose their smart functionality upon switching to Better Energy.”
In a letter dated 27 January 2020 addressed to the Authority, Better Energy requested the revocation of its electricity and gas licences. On 19 February 2020 the Authority issued a notice of revocation of an electricity supply licence and a notice of revocation of a gas supply licence giving notice that with effect from 20 March the electricity supply licence and the gas supply licence held by Better Energy would be revoked
The firm entered administration on 13 March. Its website is down, but it had described itself as a company which “offers the lowest gas prices available and to make all aspects of [our] service simple and transparent”.
In its last accounts, the firm employed 12 people.
