An open letter to Phil Bentley, managing director of British Gas
Dear Mr Bentley;
Thank you so much for your email informing me that, as of the end of September, my utilities prices will be increasing by the tune of 42% for gas and 21% for electricity. Your considerate action in passing me this information has already given me a warm glow that will doubtless keep me cozy through the coming winter months, and it is on behalf of the elderly I would like to express particular gratitude, for they will surely benefit even more than myself.
I look forward to the follow-up email at the end of the present financial year which will inform me that your salary and bonuses have been decreased by a similar percentage; a mean value of the two should be about 30%, I would estimate. Please be forewarned that should I not receive such an email, or should I hear that, once again, your company has posted record profits for the year, you should look forward to a gift from me in the post in the form of a large packet of fresh Caribbean sea urchins. To derive full enjoyment from these, be sure to grasp the packet in both hands and squeeze as hard as possible.
Yours sincerely
Paul Graham Raven
October 15th, 2008 at 12:05 am
Did you post it?
October 15th, 2008 at 9:43 am
No, here will do – someone that powerful is sure to have a Google alert set up on his own name, so I expect he
October 15th, 2008 at 1:43 pm
Superb.
July 8th, 2011 at 12:46 pm
The poor get colder, the rich get greedier
Today I await the arrival and installation of a pre-payment gas meter as British Gas are anxious that I clear my £1,167 fuel debt. Like many others I will manage without fuel during the summer months – happily I have an electric shower and microwave until the electricity supplier gets greedy – but in the winter will have to choose between food and heating.
I am applying for a grant from the British Gas Energy Trust, a charitable trust established to assist people with utility debts. Important sections of the form enquire how customers initially accrued the debts, and what steps they intend to take to avoid them in the future. The questions assume fecklessness of the debtor, rather than avarice of the creditors’ directors and shareholders.
This is how I would like to reply to these sections:-
SECTION 10
Please tell us why you cannot pay your gas/electricity debt (if you are applying for a grant from other funds managed by Charis Grants in addition to the British Gas Energy Trust you must complete section 10 to cover all Trusts for which you are applying. See guidance notes at Section 13). Continue on a blank page if necessary.
Unlike Phil Bentley, managing director of British Gas, who saw his annual income rise to £1.249 million after being awarded a 15% pay rise last year, my own income has failed to rise in line with prices. Despite suffering the coldest winter on record, the government neglected to increase benefits. In addition, British Gas took the opportunity to increase fuel prices by 25% while announcing that its profits had doubled.
Please tell us how a payment from us would help you budget better in the future
A payment would prevent me from dying of hypothermia this year should the winter be as cold as last. It would enable me to survive to pay over my meagre income for exorbitant gas, so that Mr Bentley can spend the winter on his yacht in the Caribbean. I can do this by cutting my food supply. At present I am eating once a day, but if I budget to eat only every other day I will be able to afford the prices charged by British Gas. This will also mean that I will only need to clean my teeth three times a week, thus saving money on toothpaste which I will set aside for the next price rises.
SECTION 11
Please see guidance notes at Section 14
Please tell us how the need has come about
The present ConDem coalition has decided that the budget deficit caused by the avarice of the bankers should be paid for by the poorest sections of society. Policy dictates that ‘we are all in it together’, which means that the rich and powerful should not have to suffer a decline in living standards just because the poor are cold and hungry.
Please tell us how a payment would help you
See Section 10. The alternative is that I do not survive, which means that British Gas will not get any money because dead people don’t get any income. We must not let that happen. When people die of hypothermia or starvation it is the directors and shareholders of the creditors who lose out. This is what happened when my disabled mother’s only source of heating was expropriated by one of Mrs Thatcher’s newly privatised utility companies in the 1980s. After she died I was visited by a representative of this company who asked me to pay the outstanding sum. I refused, as so my son will do if this happens to his mother.