A POOLE pensioner got the shock of his life when he received a gas bill for nearly £10,000 for his three-bed semi-detached home.

Dave Guest, 66, and his 65-year-old wife Daphne got the online bill for from Powergen last week covering the months of August and September.

The retired Royal Mail workers of Cribb Close, Canford Heath, had expected to pay less than their usual £57 after spending all of August in Stockholm with their son and grandson.

But they were staggered to see they owed' £9,811.73 - or £7,758.99 with their saver discount.

"My wife and I got a bit upset and shaky when we saw that," said Mr Guest. "Fortunately we are a fairly robust couple and we could laugh at it, but if it had gone to someone frail and elderly the shock could have killed them."

The grandfather claims he was told the error was generated when a member of staff saw their last metre reading was much lower than the estimate, and assumed the dial had gone right to the end and started again.

Mr Guest added: "They should have some sort of fail-safe so they don't send out bills for thousands of pounds to domestic residence.

"It's absolutely ridiculous. I should never have received that bill."

A spokesman for Powergen said: "This was clearly a mistake and was simply down to human error. We apologise for the distress caused to Mr and Mrs Guest.

"This is a rare case which is not in line with our usual high standards of customer service."

After a few choice words Mr Guest has received an amended bill. He is £118.50 in credit.