... They didn't carry out the usual account verification checks, so I told them I'd ring British Gas back and check.

I've just done so and the call wasn't from them, my smart meter is working fine.

It's simple - don't use Word. LibreOffice is fine for most things, Pages on Mac is like Word back when it was reasonably good (v6.0 / 95). Away from word processors, Scrivener is an excellent tool for all sorts of writing. I use it to work on lyrics as well as my book (if I ever finish the latter).

And yes, the card held against my account was fine. I used it to settle the outstanding bill.

Also their online complaint page doesn't work in WebKit. I wonder if they've outsourced their IT to the cheapest (and nastiest) bidder?

The rest of that article is very telling. It’s becoming very clear that when she says “economy” that what that means to her is “public sector spending”.

All the things she wants to “invest” in (a euphemism for “spend more on”) are public sector. She has no clue about how to fix the wider economy.