British Gas mistakenly paid a customer over £38,000, taking weeks to recover it

DT, a British Gas customer in Sale, submitted a standard quarterly feed-in tariff claim for £300 after reporting her solar panel output. An employee entered the wrong meter reading, prompting the utility to email her a payment of £38,611.59, which was deposited the next day. Over the following seven weeks, DT contacted customer service repeatedly, but staff lacked a script or clear process for reversing such a large overpayment, leaving the funds in her account for nearly two months.

The money was finally withdrawn on 14 July, after which British Gas provided a £500 compensation payment and the originally intended £300 credit. The incident highlights broader systemic issues, as a comparable mistake at Yorkshire Water saw a £6,800 overpayment also take weeks to recover. Both cases suggest that major utilities may have robust debt-collection systems but insufficient safeguards for unusually large credits.