Confused by Eon - What Am I Really Using?!

Elle00

Can anyone help me make sense of this please?

I was paying £45pm for an all electric flat by DD to Eon for the last two years. I found I was in credit a couple of times so decided to "treat myself" to some heating the winter just gone which used this up. Without this, my average usage was around £35 - £40pm.

I'm now in an all electric 3 bed house and £21 in debit (I've been here three months). I had problems with the hot water when I first moved in and kept having to hit the boost button on the hot water five or six times every other day to get enough for a bath. This was fixed a couple of weeks ago now and I've been hardwired in to a new emersion heater so I can just have it on for a few hours every other day for our baths and leave it off the rest of the time.

Eon wrote to me saying they were changing my DD to £60pm last week. I nearly had heart failure! That's a considerable rise for me to cope with. I know the house is bigger, but I don't use heating and there's only myself and a 2yr old to cater for.

After arguing for about fifteen minutes, the girl put me hold then came back and said she'd manually calculated my usage as I wasn't happy and could change my DD to £50pm instead. I'm still a bit confused about how she can do this?

What's the difference between the computer working it out and the girl doing it? Am I using £60pm worth of electricity or £50pm worth?!

According to my statement, I've used £35 worth of electricity in the last two weeks!!! On what?!

I can't work this out at all.

notbritishgas

Rather than quoting your costs in £££ its better to say how many Kwh you have used.
If you truly do not use any form of heating at all (fire, radiators,fan heater etc) then I would say you should use about 10 kwh per day which is the national average.
What tariff are you on, if you are on E7 (and do not use much at night) then your day rates are more expensive.

Premier_2

For 2 years you were paying £45 per month in a 2 bed flat. During that time you believe you were probably actually consuming about £40 per month - save for the times you "treated yourself"

Since that time you've moved to a 3 bed house which usually costs more to run than a 2 bed flat. Also energy prices have increased by about 15% this year alone with more rises expected.

The company now says you need to pay £50 pm. Given the above circumstances, is that so unreasonable?

Regular payments are initially calculated by computer. Sometimes they are right, sometimes they are wrong. When they are disputed, manual intervention takes place. In this case the company has offered to reduce the computer generated figure by £10 pm. This could be for a number of reasons including agreeing with you that the computer figure generated seems too high or simply to appease you as a customer.

Ultimately you will be charged for the amount you consume and any balance between that and what you have already paid be accounted for accordingly.

If you consume £60 x12 =£720 in a year and have only paid £50 x 12 = £600 you will owe the company £120

If you consume £50 x 12 =£600 in a year and pay £60 x 12 = £720, the company will owe you £120

If you want to know how much electricity you are consuming, take a meter reading and another after a specific time period, that is how much electricity you have consumed during that period.

Elle00

Premier wrote: »

For 2 years you were paying £45 per month in a 2 bed flat. During that time you believe you were probably actually consuming about £40 per month - save for the times you "treated yourself"

Since that time you've moved to a 3 bed house which usually costs more to run than a 2 bed flat. Also energy prices have increased by about 15% this year alone with more rises expected.

The company now says you need to pay £50 pm. Given the above circumstances, is that so unreasonable?

My post does not dispute the £50pm but asks how it jumps from £40 to £60 to £50 all the while my meter readings indicate usage of £35 in the last two weeks alone.

As I don't use heating, no it isn't natural that my energy bills would increase just because I've moved. I don't run appliances in rooms I'm not using, in fact I don't even use the third bedroom as I have no need to. I doubt it costs £20pm to run an extra lightbulb even if I did start using it.

15% of £40 is £6 anyway - not £20.

I know how to work out energy consumption.

Can anyone less patronising offer any kind of explanation as to why these figures have jumped around so drastically? And possibly suggest why my energy useage for the last two weeks has suddenly shot up by so much?

monoxideuk

As far as im aware, eon have introduced a direct debit system that works out the usage over the full year which includes winter cost so it take that into account - the system would work out a % increase over the winter month and adjust the direct debit accordingly, which as i found in my case is not 100% accurate,

I know you propabably alreay check this but it happened to me with a home move, have you been put on the orignal tariff as with your old property such as the electric guarentee and not striaght onto the standard?

as this would also indiacte an increase on your usage

hope that helps

Elle00

monoxideuk wrote: »

As far as im aware, eon have introduced a direct debit system that works out the usage over the full year which includes winter cost so it take that into account - the system would work out a % increase over the winter month and adjust the direct debit accordingly, which as i found in my case is not 100% accurate,

I know you propabably alreay check this but it happened to me with a home move, have you been put on the orignal tariff as with your old property such as the electric guarentee and not striaght onto the standard?

as this would also indiacte an increase on your usage

hope that helps

That would make sense wouldn't it. And also explain why the girl was able to come up with such a drastically different figure! Thanks for that.

I'm still not sure where the extra ££ has come from for this fortnight but guess I'll just have to wait and see how it pans out next month.

I've just rung again to ask about tarrif options and been told I can save nearly £50pa by changing to their online paperless billing too. They couldn't possibly have told me that this morning.

Premier_2

Elle83 wrote: »

My post does not dispute the £50pm but asks how it jumps from £40 to £60 to £50 all the while my meter readings indicate usage of £35 in the last two weeks alone.

I explained the reason for the variation between £60 & £50. As regards the £35, you said this was from a statement which could have been based on estimated readings. If, as you now say, it was based on actual usage then perhaps the reason you are only being charged £50 rather than £70+ pm is due to customer appeasement which you carefully chopped off my post.

Elle83 wrote:

As I don't use heating, no it isn't natural that my energy bills would increase just because I've moved. I don't run appliances in rooms I'm not using, in fact I don't even use the third bedroom as I have no need to. I doubt it costs £20pm to run an extra lightbulb even if I did start using it.

You said both properties were all electric. Most people have heating in their houses. How was I to know you live in such extraodinary house that uses no heating whatsoever. It would be reasonable for EON to think you use electric heating too, if they were aware you have no other form of heating.

Elle83 wrote:

15% of £40 is £6 anyway - not £20.

I was comparing the £40 previous to the £50 now agreed. That's £10 difference.
You said you'd been using £40 of electric in a 2 bed flat 2 years ago. The 15% increase was this year only. There were increases previously as well. There are increases likely to come, as I mentioned. And that's ignoring the bigger and differeent style property.

Elle83 wrote:

I know how to work out energy consumption.

So what can't you work out at all?

Elle83 wrote:

Can anyone less patronising offer any kind of explanation as to why these figures have jumped around so drastically? And possibly suggest why my energy useage for the last two weeks has suddenly shot up by so much?

If you post on a public forum, expect a response based on the information you supplied.
If you don't want to read my response, add me to your ignore list.

If your actual consumption is recorded as having increased significantly this is generally because you have used more electricity. (How's that for patronising? )If your house is so hot in winter, is it very hot in summer? Has your fridge or freezer been working overtime in this hot weather? Have you got air conditioning since you appear to live in such a hot property?
The other alternative is that the meter has developed a fault, but this is less likely especially as it would mean it's reading fast rather than slow.

Finally, please be nice to other moneysavers

Monkey1984

Maybe she spread the debt over a longer period of time as well. Have you been with them a year in your current property as this is another reason for an inaccurate figure as they don't have a years worth of usage to base your DD on so may factor in that in the winter you will be using more for heating.