Electric Direct Debit £108 Per Month

Daisymac_2

Ok dont shout at me if I have placed this in the wrong forum or something, but my electricty Direct Debit is now £108 per month, we have no arrears and our bills are coming out about £300 per quarter so I have no moans about the level the direct debit is set at, but how can we be using that much electric ?, we live in a two bed house, we have oil fired central heating and hot water and we have an open fire, so electric is only ever used for lighting and appliances and that is £108 per month !. My oil is also £100 per month but that is a different issue. I want to query it but am not sure how to go about it, reason is that our house is basically in the middle of nowhere with only one neighbour and there are stables etc out the back and workshops which are owned by the landowner and nothing to do with us, but how do I know I am not paying for the electric in the out buildings as well or even my nextdoor neighbour (the house was a detached house many many years ago and was split into a semi in the early 1960's) just to me £108 seems high for a 2 bed house with Oil as well, what do you think ? Many thanks.

1carminestocky

I'm sure I'm going to get hammered by some on here for suggesting this, but I would be VERY tempted to get a wireless usage monitor, 2 of the more popular models are The Owl and efergy. This basically shows you the current usage being used by your household at any particular time. Unplug all the appliances you can, then have a look at the monitor and see what it's showing. Of course, there are things that can't be unplugged (alarms systems etc) but if the usgae monitor is still showing a high figure (IME anything over 0.4kwh is 'high' in this sort of scenario) then further invaestigations should be made. £300 a quarter in leccy seems like a monstrous amount of usage to me (and we are what I would call high users, btw!), so I would suggest something like The Owl or efergy at approx £35 could prove to be very useful in showing you why you are paying so much...and hopefully helping you reduce your usage. HTH.

www.theowl.com

http://www.efergy.com/en/

sara1880

Are the lekky company using Actual meter readings or estimated? might be worth checking. I think your usage is way way way way too high. me my girl and my other half who is a massive mod con guy and has every lekky gadget going, our bill isnt even half of yours.

good luck with it

notbritishgas

Daisymac wrote: »

Ok dont shout at me if I have placed this in the wrong forum or something, but my electricty Direct Debit is now £108 per month, we have no arrears and our bills are coming out about £300 per quarter so I have no moans about the level the direct debit is set at, but how can we be using that much electric ?, we live in a two bed house, we have oil fired central heating and hot water and we have an open fire, so electric is only ever used for lighting and appliances and that is £108 per month !. My oil is also £100 per month but that is a different issue. I want to query it but am not sure how to go about it, reason is that our house is basically in the middle of nowhere with only one neighbour and there are stables etc out the back and workshops which are owned by the landowner and nothing to do with us, but how do I know I am not paying for the electric in the out buildings as well or even my nextdoor neighbour (the house was a detached house many many years ago and was split into a semi in the early 1960's) just to me £108 seems high for a 2 bed house with Oil as well, what do you think ? Many thanks.

If you are an average user, and from what you say you definitely are! You should be using about £30 of electric a month, so your £100 is way over the top.
If you really do think you may be supplying other buildings why not switch everything off in your house and see if the meter still goes round. Another way is to turn off your electric at the main switch and see if the lights go off in the other buildings! Or wait for them to complain.

bryanb

Turn off the main switch and see if the lights go out in the other buildings.

Edit - snap!

Daisymac_2

I se a tumble dryer once or twice a week, would that make such a huge difference ?,

The readings are estimated but I was so shocked by the price I phoned them and asked them what the estmated reading was and looked at the meter when I got home and we had actually used more than they had estimated so there was no way I was phoning them back to tell them, I will just have to lock the meter reading bloke out or hide behind the sofa when he comes every quarter or my bills will be even more !!.

Magentasue

We have been paying about £60 a month in a large family with six adult/teen gadget users. Loadsa washing, tumble drying, dishwashing, two fridges, large freezer ... I have made cutbacks and we're in a smaller house but I know how easy it is to use a lot of electricity and think of it as normal.

Assuming you are using the electricity (and not half the street), it would be helpful if you took daily meter readings and worked out a weekly average.

We have an energy monitor and it's amazing how the reading drops when I send one of the kids round turning off all the lights that have been left on. Multiply that by three hours a day, thirty days a month ... It all adds up especially if you have light fittings with lots of bulbs. Aging energy guzzling freezer? Washing machine and dishwasher running on high-energy programmes half full? Plasma screen TV(s) left on? You don't need an energy monitor to work out where the waste is but it helps convince the unbelievers!