Gas Meter Reading ... metric or imperial?

jordy32

Having recently moved to a larger house we are keeping an eye on our utility costs.

For the last two months we have used a total of 172 units according to our meter.

Today we had the heating on for about 10 hours @ 18 degrees (boiler type is a water store combi boiler)

Working all this out leads me to a cost of £5-7 a day and still being cold (house is a Westbury with good loft insulation and dble glazing throughout).

The question is... I have worked this out using the British Gas calculation on the back of the bill using a conversion factor of 2.83 to convert imperial to metric. Looking at my meter the digits are suffixed my m3. Does this mean my calcs are all out as the meter is reading metric not imperial?

If so, would BG have picked this up? or could I be paying over the odds.

Any advice would be greatfully recieved as this is driving us round the bend and the high cost is just not affordable (could be almost £50 a week)

House if a 4 bed detached, all washing machines/ dish washers run from the cold feed and electric only, so gas is used for cooking (hob only), CH and hot water.

Thanks,

jordy32

think ive answered my own question, the meter is definetely metric not imperial and therefore the conversion factor is not needed.

canny_yorkshireman_2

Yeh you are roughly 3 times out on your calcalations so bet that comes as a relief only know this because i have been battling with my supplier for 11 months with them charging me the wrong rate ie (imperial /metric)

Cardew

172 units in 2 months is very low as that equates to about £40.

1 unit = approx 11.3kWh = approx 23 pence with BG

jordy32

thanks, we'll be onto BG first thing this morning

jordy32

confirmed by BG as a daily spend of £55 or 91p per day for the last 2 months. So we go from panic to relief - who said GCSE maths wasn't useful!

Xbigman

You say the tempt is set to 18 and the house feels cold. Is the boiler running all the time or does it cut in and out? If it is cutting in and out then it is operating correctly. If the house is cold you might have an inaccurate or badly placed thermostat. Try turning the heating up to 19 or even 20. That does not mean the temperature will actually get that high in the main living rooms its just a guide.
Regards



X

jordy32

thanks for the reply,

our thermostat is right next to the front door in the hall. We find that the boiler does not run continously but will cut back in as expected when the temp drops.

We're quite happy the result over the billing but still have to find a solution to keep the house warm. With confilicting advice over whether it's cheapr to leave the heating on all the time or just when required it can be tricky to decide whats best to do.

In our last house the timer/ thermostat was seprate to the combi boiler as the boiler was in the loft space. This controller allowed us to set times and temperatures for each day of the week with boost controls etc. as well. I might try one of these (honeywell c something about £40-60 i think we were invoiced last time for the part). another pitfall is that we only have thermostatic valves upstairs and therefore have no control other than the thermostat for the downstairs rads (expect fully isolating one)

I think one of the main problems is that it is unlikely the previous owners used any insulating material under the laminate floor boards. Please correct me if I'm wrong but each room with laminate feels cold compared to those with carpet. I'm unsure whether this is simply down to perception however.

My only real suprise out of this story is that gas bills and the companies seem like a black art, with plenty of pitfalls to trap the unwary.

nailman

it actualy seems quite common for the power companies to charge in imperial when your meter is metric,
had this problem with scotish power brand new house with a new meter
and they still charged me as a imperial meter.
when i phoned them up to query my high bill they said the consumption was average
and there was nothing wrong.
only after spending half an hour working my bill out with all there formulas
i worked out what they were doing.
only after contacting energy watch, was when they finaly admited they had made a mistake
now my estate has nerly 200 new homes on it and they are supplied by scotish power to start with so just think how many people they might be over charging

i would advice every one to go through there bills