Paying Enel bills

[NickZ]

Originally Posted by Helen Warner

Do you think Enel have different bank addresses depending where they supply electricity? .

I think they do. When I go online to pay with my bank the bank bill payment website offers me a few different Enel accounts and I have to pick the one that matches my account.

I thought the law had been changed and Italians now had to use Swifts etc

[Helen Warner]

This is now quite worrying as I am reluctant to do an electronic transfer to the bank in Rome that Carole B kindly suggested as the money may never reach the Enel bank that we should be using. I have looked at our bills and there is nothing on there about alternative ways to pay, presumably because we have been doing direct debits. As Enel haven't replied to 3 emails I've sent asking for bank details I think I will write an ordinary letter and post it. The emails I sent were in English as my Italian is very poor so that may explain why they've ignored them or thrown them away. Can anyone translate into Italian for me words to the effect that - "Our bank account is now closed so we will no longer be paying by direct debit. Please can you provide your Bank name and address, IBAN No. and SWIFTBIC so that we can pay by Electronic Transfer". Thank you. Unless, of course, there is anyone on the forum who has a house near us - Tereglio (10 kms from Fornoli/Bagni di Lucca) who knows Enel's bank details. I would presume it is Lucca.
Sorry to keep banging on about this - you must all be fed up with me but I must get this problem sorted. Thanks again.

[Carole B]

Helen, you could be right not to trust sending it to the IBAN no. I provided, though it does say it's ENEL Headquarters and says to send payments there.

I think we are all very aware of how good the Italians are at 'losing/misplacing' things or directing OUR money to the wrong accounts... Bet they could do a good job if they had to rearrabge the deckchairs on the Titanic though...

[Gala Placidia]

Sorry, Helen. I could have had the information you are seeking as I am in the same area; however, we pay by direct debit and our invoices are in the hands of our geometra at Fornoli. We are going to Bagni next week and I will try to find out details, only problem.... we are not connected to Internet there, so it may take some time for me to get in touch with you.

[NickZ]

Does anybody in your commune speak English? I bet they know the account to pay to.

[Lakeside]

Hate to say it,but the best option might be to maintain a bank account in Italy and pay by direct debit.Were there specific issues that drove you to close the existing account ? ( bank charges are troublesome but not a lot money in the scheme of things )

[Noble]

Originally Posted by Helen Warner

Thank you. I had read all the posts in the thread you suggested but didn't find anything that actually helped me. We have a lady in the village who does the cleaning and washing and her husband does any maintenance. She also pays our ICI, Tarsu, Water, boiler service, etc. for us but the only way we can pay them both is by sending Euros in the post. We are reluctant to ask them to pay the electricity bills as well because it means sending even more Euros by post and we feel they do more than enough for us already. We do pay gas bills by electronic transfer and also insurance so to be able to pay the Enel bills this way as well would be icing on the cake even though it costs 20 GBP every time. I had hoped that all these people who have had difficulty on this forum paying by credit card would be able to provide Enel's bank details as they have probably had to resort to paying that way.
Everyone is so kind on this forum. I just hope that one day I will be able to help someone else but I think that day is a long way off.

Helen look at this site Poste Italiane - Postepay

Perhaps it's an answer to your problem. Worth investigating?? One of your "helpers" could be the named owner of the card and you could pay money into this post office scheme so that they pay all your bills. Think the max allowed is 2000 euros. The money can be transfered from UK. I haven't used it. Has anyone reading the Forum any experience of this system? It seems a possible solution for those only in Italy occasionally. One has to go to ones local Post Office to register taking Passport/Carta d'Identita and Codice Fiscali.

[johnsm13]

Originally Posted by Helen Warner

I'll attempt to research for a SWIFTBIC .

Hi Helen

We have a house in Bagni di Lucca, near the church of San Pietro a Corsena.

Anyway, here are the details we managed to wring out of ENEL for foreign direct debit payments, including the elusive SWIFT code:

IBAN: IT85J0300201015000001822152;
BIC/SWIFT: BROMITR1T28

As you mentioned, the catch with this is that you'll have to pay your bank a fee. A paper bankers' draft is cheaper - last time round, as a stopgap, we got our bank (FirstDirect) to post one of these direct to ENEL in Rome - Enel Distribuzione SpA, 00198 Roma, via Ombrone 2. You need to get them to quote your account number. But the payment did get credited OK.

What we've done now, though, is to register for automatic payments via credit card - ie direct debits via a credit card.

To do this:

1) Go to the ENEL site...(https://www.enel.it/sportello_online...t.asp?funz=A01)...

2) Login (or register if you haven't already)

3) Navigate to La Tua Bolletta, then Paga La Bolletta

4) Click option 3, "tramite addebito sulla tua carta di credito"

Then you print off and return (by post) the request form.

I have to say that I haven't yet discovered if this has all been set up OK - I haven't had my next bill yet. But worth a try, maybe?

Mike Johnson

[Helen Warner]

Originally Posted by Gala Placidia

Sorry, Helen. I could have had the information you are seeking as I am in the same area; however, we pay by direct debit and our invoices are in the hands of our geometra at Fornoli. We are going to Bagni next week and I will try to find out details, only problem.... we are not connected to Internet there, so it may take some time for me to get in touch with you.

Thank you so much. This could be a real breakthrough for us and I would be so grateful if you would be able to help.
Cheers - Helen

[Helen Warner]

Originally Posted by NickZ

Does anybody in your commune speak English? I bet they know the account to pay to.

Tereglio is 100 per cent Italian and being up there is like going back in time - one of the reasons we bought the house (plus the stunning views) - no English spoken which is great apart from when you come up with a problem like this.