How much should I expect for Gas/Electricity

alih_2

Hi,

I am living in a shared house with 3 other guys, in Manchester. I still haven't had a bill for the gas/electricity yet but am expecting it soon as they said 12 weeks. Does anyone have any idea what I should be expecting to pay for 3 months?

The main reason I ask is because at least 1 of my housemates had a tendency to put the heating on full blast and then walk around in a t-shirt, and the heating is nearly always left on all night unless I am the last up and turn it off. I have spoken to them and tried to explain that the bill will be high and it would be better just to wear a jumper but they don't listen/care. Any tips on how I can get through to them or if I have any way of making them pay a bigger share of the bill?

Thanks
Ali

blue_ashleigh

My gas and electricty bills are £100-200 each for 3 months with 4 sharing with the heating etc being left on for about a quater of the day... so I'd reckon yours would be a bit higher than that.

Fire_Fox

My electricity bill, for two people in a two bedroom flat, is about £300 a year. We almost never have the heating on to save money - so that gives you an idea of how much the bill could be WITHOUT excessive use of the heating.

Make sure you are with the cheapest supplier by using a price comparison website. As others have said, read the meter or you may end up with an estmate which won't frighten the others.

Do you have a timer on your heating system? Programme that to go off at night without tellnig the others. They probably won't notice. Also try setting the thermostat a degree or two lower, again they probably won't notice.

alih_2

We don't have a timer which is the problem - it just gets turned on whenever people are a bit cold. It is generally on for about 5-6 hours or so during the day (depending who is in) and then from about 10-2 at night, but then I quite often get up at 8 or 9 in the morning and find someone has switched it on again and left it.

Thanks for your replies! I should get the bill this week so I will meet with them and hopefully it will be high enough to make them think (but not so high I can't pay!)

jennifernil

It seems odd that you have no timer. Could you not request that your landlord fit one?

Lokolo

I suspect they do have a timer but it is such a weird one they don't know how to use it. We had the same thing and it confused the hell out of us but I finally figured it out

House of 5:

£85.50 for gas
£37 for electric

Monthly we have overused electric over first 3 months by £39 but underspent gas by a lot, like £60 or something, but with winter here that will all change

alih_2

if there is a timer I don't know how it works - there is a dial with the time on it and an "auto" setting, but you can only set 1 time not a time to switch on and off, and auto setting does nothing

Lokolo

On our timer (I will draw a pic below in paint...) we have a circular dial with the time on it, we have 4 nobbly bits on it also, 2 red 2 blue. We can put this nobbly bits in and move them around the circle. Red means turn on, blue means turn off.

We then can either set the thing to 24 hours, which means its on. Day, which means its on at some random time we don't know. The setting which is the dial thing. And Off.

alih_2

I thought I may as well post my new question in this thread as it is kind of related...

So the first bill finally came through today and the total was £227.42 for gas from 20-sep to 8-jan (based on a reading) which doesn't seem too bad (although not great either) does this seem reasonable for 4 people on heating/water?

I am more concerned with the electricity. The estimated bill for 20-sep to 24-dec is £156.94 (which seemed ok??) which was for 1075kWh (11.32kWh/day), but when I took a reading today it came to 2911kWh for the period 20-sep to 16-jan (23.29kWh/day) which seems high to me. What do you think??? We are not massively careful about electricity (my PC and laptop are on almost 24/7 and the others have their own stuff but we have lots of energy saving bulbs etc. What is normal for daily useage?

EDIT: Also should I pay the estimated bill or send in the actual (higher) reading? If I don't tell them now will I get hit with an even bigger bill in the future?

Lokolo

When you leave you have to give them your readings and they will bill you for it. Would you rather pay now or later.

Also if you are with British Gas you can submit meter readings online, so its then worked out next bill.

alih_2

I am with npower, I believe I can pay online and submit meter readings online but I keep getting locked out of their website at the moment.

I am veering towards thinking I might pay just the estimate now and pay the extra next time when the heating bill should be lower - I have been getting people to cut down as discussed above.