Toby Atkin-Wright

I received a cheque through the post today from Utilita for £1,076.94.

Which was nice. I didn’t expect it, and I like it when I receive an unexpected grand. But also worrying, ’cos I couldn’t remember having had an account with Utilita, and there was no explanation in the covering letter.

I sent Kate off into St A to pay the cheque into the bank. Into our old RBS account, as I have no idea how to pay a cheque into my Monzo account. This is the first cheque I’ve received in years.

Then I had a good search through my emails and scanned letters. I use a service called Flipper to automatically switch to the best energy deal, so I barely know who my actual supplier is at the best of times. Turned out that we’d been with a company called Eversmart when they went bust back in 2019, and my account had been automatically transferred to Utilita under Ofgem’s “Supplier of Last Resort” process. And then Flipper had moved me on to a new supplier. I’d paid attention to the new supplier, but not the intermediate one.

Utilita sent me a letter back in May 2020 confirming my final Eversmart bill, and noting that my account was £1,076.94 in credit. It took them eleven months to get a cheque to me.