Sir Grayson Perry says energy firm EDF raised electricity bill from £300 to £39k

Turner Prize-winning artist and broadcaster Sir Grayson Perry has said energy firm EDF raised his monthly electric bill from £300 to £39,000.

Sir Grayson, 63, wrote on social media that the company tried to take the amount as a direct debit from his account on Monday.

He said: “Hi @edfenergy I’ve been trying to speak to someone to explain how my electricity bill went from £300 a month to £39,000.

“Your call centre has been no help but you tried to direct debit this amount today from my account.”

Former BBC journalist Jon Sopel, who now presents The News Agents podcast, also said he was notified that his bill was increasing from £152 a month to £18,000.

He wrote: “Ridiculous. We’ve now sorted.”

EDF said it could not discuss specifics of either case, confirming they are “not related in any way”.

The company added: “Customers do not need to worry – these are not related to a wider issue with our billing system and we’ve not made any changes to how we process direct debit changes for customers.

“Unusual changes to direct debit amounts can sometimes occur when there is an erroneous meter reading recorded on the system.

“We have robust interventions in place to ensure that any large increases in customers’ direct debits are verified through a human check and in almost all such cases, system errors are rectified and prevented, without customers being impacted.”