Has anyone else had problems with paying Ecotricity? I’ve tried to pay my bill and the charge has appeared on my CA as pending. However when submitting my payment I immediately got an ‘unsuccessful payment’ error flash up on my screen and disappear! Therefore no comeback direct with Monzo. I was then the cost of my electric bill down for a week until it failed and refunded. I’ve just tried it for a second time (a week later) and exactly the same thing happened again! Resorted to Barclays CA and straight through, a few seconds to authorise, a ‘processing’ message and then success!
Contacted Ecotricity and no response yet.
They probably require 3D Secure which Monzo (thankfully) doesn’t support yet, and their system is awful enough not to bother releasing the authorization after the payment fails (so that’s why you had the transaction on your Monzo for a week before it automatically expired).
Have a look at Bulb, they seem to be a no-bullshit modern alternative for energy - also if you search around for referral links you could get 50£ off your first bill!
Thanks but I don’t need to change electric company, only just joined them and apart from this I’m happy with them. There’s no 3D secure when paying with Barclays with them. Not the only ‘pending’ problems at the moment, may not jump in with both feet to Monzo yet.
There’s no 3D secure when paying with Barclays with them
Are you sure? A lot of 3D secure implementations are “seamless” where they just fingerprint your browser in a few seconds and (hopefully) confirm the payment so it could be that 3DS is happening, you just don’t notice it.
Would be curious to know what your other problems with are, but yeah keep your legacy bank account open just in case until you are able to move all your services to Monzo!
When this happens you should message COps and get them to have a look at what exactly is going wrong
Keep it open? Ha, I’m thinking of jumping back at the moment!
I’m with Iresa Energy and had no problems updating my Direct Debit with them, using my Monzo current account details.
I’ve never tried making an ad-hoc card payment to them though.
They’re very cheap. The electricity unit rate and standing charge is cheaper than Bulb.
The only hassle I’ve had with them is keeping their billing on track. I’ve had to check everything they’ve billed me for and got no gas bill at all between March and October. It’s been a bit of work but worth it for the price.
Thanks for this link - just got a top line quote and savings could cover multiple commute lattes per month. Hardly lifestyle shifting change but coffee is a major food group after all.
I’m with Bristol Energy and extremely happy with them, amazing customer service, no issue changing Direct Debit, etc.
That said, changing suppliers to fit your bank isn’t really ideal. I’d try to engage with them and find out what failed!
As for the pending - this is unlikely to be a Monzo issue. I say unlikely, as I had a stuck authorisation for 12 days their customer service had to put a ‘refund’ for on my account (odd solution that looks bad vs simply cancelling the stuck authorisation - interface needs work here!). Now, I didn’t give it the full 30 days an authorisation can last, so I don’t know, but usually they should expire in about a week. Odd, certainly.
Personally, I don’t like how Monzo mixes pending and posted transactions in the feed. I think the legacy bank approach of separating them is better. It’s clearer what charges are on your account and what are pending. That said, I really like Monzo and given their mixing of pending and posted charges together is one of their big selling points, I see this as unlikely to change.
It is one of my 5 a day
Hi!
This happened to me as well when trying to pay my Ecotricity bill on their website. I signed up for accurate direct debits; for me this means submitting a meter reading around the 10th of each month, then the bill is paid automatically with direct debit on the 26th. You can request which day of the month you want the card to be charged, and because of sending meter readings in, I know I’m paying the right amount.