A PENSIONER is toasting the Tele — after red-faced power bosses apologised over a bill blunder and sent her wine to say sorry.

Carolyn Livingstone, 72, contacted us following a lengthy wrangle with Scottish Power.

The Kilmacolm woman was fed up getting estimated bills for thousands more units then she had used, despite supplying accurate meter readings.

Carolyn moved into the Glebe Court sheltered housing complex in April, and called in with readings straight away and made several follow-up calls after that.

She said: “The readings were right but the estimated bills were totally wrong.

“They wanted me to pay £59.51 a month direct debit for electricity — £700 a year for electricity.

“It’s a bedsit I’m staying in, not a mansion.” But after the Tele stepped in and highlighted the grandmother’s plight she was offered £50 compensation — and two bottles of wine as a gesture of goodwill.

She said: “The meter was checked and they realised they were the readings I’d been giving them all along and they didn’t correspond with what they had on their system.” The grandmother has been paying £10 a month until the problem was sorted and she has now been told that she is £30 in credit.

She said: “I’m so pleased that it’s been resolved, I don’t want anyone else to have the same problems as me. I was totally taken aback getting compensation — it came as quite a shock.

“It was only after the paper got in touch with them that stirred it up — it wouldn’t have happened without the Telegraph’s intervention.

“If I can do it with the help of the Telegraph, I hope other people are brave enough.” A Scottish Power spokesman said: “We sincerely apologise to Mrs Livingstone for any inconvenience caused.

“The property had been vacant for around five years, and when Mrs Livingstone moved in, the meter readings did not correlate with the details we had on our system.

“We carried out a site visit last week to inspect the meter and ensure everything was in order, and the account has now been fully updated. We have also offered Mrs Livingstone a payment of £50 in compensation to apologise for the issues experienced.”