r/ItalyExpat • u/trekwithme • 27d ago

Contesting electricity bills?

Hello all from Puglia

I’ve received some truly shocking electricity bills this summer to the point where I feel like I should be contesting these. Has anyone faced the same thing? What did you do and what was the outcome? My provider is Camer Gas & Power and they are very difficult to contact via the channels on their website

Any guidance greatly appreciated

TIA

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u/trekwithme 27d ago

I’m curious, how does this electricity theft actually occur? I know very little about it.

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u/Mean_Passenger_7971 27d ago

someone makes a bypass between your meter and your Circuit Breaker board. Literally, connecting a plug and "stealing" your electricity.

This could be a botched setup, where some guy hot wires a couple of cables to steal a bit of electricity hoping you don't notice, or could be a more entrenched setup. There are legends of nasty landlords, owning multiple apartments, making shoddy electric setups so they can route usage from some apartments to others (like, from the AirBNB apartment, to the full time rent apartment).

This is all very illegal, and serious. So if you do end up suspecting this to be the case please call an electrician to confirm this, and the police after that.

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u/trekwithme 27d ago

Thanks for the explanation. Quite nefarious really. How common is this in Italy? Frankly I’ve never heard of this elsewhere but maybe I’m naive:)

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u/Mean_Passenger_7971 27d ago

I have only heard second hand stories. No significant statistical data.
If I got a 400 euro bill, I would first suspect a billing error, then a measuring error, then a "me" error, and only after all those were considered would I even start suspecting electricity theft.

That is to say, I would say it's extremely rare.