£99 pm elec, 1 bed flat!??! Help!

lsatdown

Hi,
I am with scottish power, economy 7, online tariff. According to my readings, I have used 2221 day units, and 352 night units in 3 months!??!
Its a 1 bed modern flat, wall panel heaters (i think similar to this:
http://dimplex-heaters.com/dimplex-evs075-skirting-panel-convector-heater.htm) that are only turned on from 6-9ish, most of the time only 1 in the front room.
Water tank heater is turned on all the time, it doesn't have a timer, just two switches. one for boost, and the other just normal on/off.
At night, everything is turned off at the plug, including appliances. Some nights we leave the heater on low over night (352 units).
How can this right, this works out at 2221@13.472p = £299!!
Have they got the readings the wrong way around? Should I be on a different tariff?

Cardew

You shouldn't be on Economy 7 if you have only used 352 night units in 3 months and and 2221 day units.

You should be an a 'Normal' 24/7 tariff.

Your heaters are not storage heaters so it is not surprising you use little at night - mainly your water tank heater.

That said, 2,573kWh in 3 months is not high consumption in an all electric house.

neas

giving a comparison to gass it costs £50-55 for gas and eleccy bills per month... and thats more efficeint than electric heating.

i'd estimate if you on a normal tarrif you'd still pay 80 quid a month... as electricity heating is so damn expensive still.

I'd get gas central heating if i were u, or move house.

lsatdown

That said, 2,573kWh in 3 months is not high consumption in an all electric house.

Its a 1 bed flat? £100 per month for two wall heaters (2 hrs per night), tv, washing machine, dishwasher and boiler?

KimYeovil

lsatdown wrote: »

Its a 1 bed flat? £100 per month for two wall heaters (2 hrs per night), tv, washing machine, dishwasher and boiler?

Yes.

800 kWhs to account for.

two people having two ten minute showers per day - that's 140 kWh to start.
fish tank heater 24 hours per day 100W? 200W? - 144 per month (okay, that's flat out, not sure how often the thermostat would cut in). Call it just 70
one heater for three hours (your original claim) 67 if 0.75 or 135 if 1.5. (and it will be on flat out if just 1.5 bars or less) But how often is it on for half an hour earlier? How often is it on an hour later? And that's just the one heater. That 135 can easily be doubled to 270

So that's 500kWh so far per month and that's even before cooking, computers, televsion, lighting, washing machine, hot water, kettle...

modern flat - major alarm bells - what sort of lighting do you have? - if you have fancy highlighters or uplighters or a dozen 50W halogen bulbs...

lsatdown

KimYeovil wrote: »

Yes.

800 kWhs to account for.

two people having two ten minute showers per day - that's 140 kWh to start.
fish tank heater 24 hours per day 100W? 200W? - 144 per month (okay, that's flat out, not sure how often the thermostat would cut in). Call it just 70
one heater for three hours (your original claim) 67 if 0.75 or 135 if 1.5. (and it will be on flat out if just 1.5 bars or less) But how often is it on for half an hour earlier? How often is it on an hour later? And that's just the one heater. That 135 can easily be doubled to 270

So that's 500kWh so far per month and that's even before cooking, computers, televsion, lighting, washing machine, hot water, kettle...

modern flat - major alarm bells - what sort of lighting do you have? - if you have fancy highlighters or uplighters or a dozen 50W halogen bulbs...

Yeah your probably right, I think im going to turn off the water heater throughout the day, and put the heating on a timer.
We don't have engery saving bulbs, and have two ceiling hanging lights which have three halgeon bulbs each! What engery saving halgeon bulbs should i get?

Greenr

lsatdown wrote: »

Hi,
I am with scottish power, economy 7, online tariff. According to my readings, I have used 2221 day units, and 352 night units in 3 months!??!
Its a 1 bed modern flat, wall panel heaters (i think similar to this:
http://dimplex-heaters.com/dimplex-evs075-skirting-panel-convector-heater.htm) that are only turned on from 6-9ish, most of the time only 1 in the front room.
Water tank heater is turned on all the time, it doesn't have a timer, just two switches. one for boost, and the other just normal on/off.
At night, everything is turned off at the plug, including appliances. Some nights we leave the heater on low over night (352 units).
How can this right, this works out at 2221@13.472p = £299!!
Have they got the readings the wrong way around? Should I be on a different tariff?

I live in a one bed flat with my boyfriend and we're on economy 7 with night storage heaters. we are out at work Monday to Friday day times and are very careful when we're home i.e:

We installed an electric shower so we don't turn the immersion heater on at all (we boil the kettle to do the dishes!), we turn electrics off at the wall, we never have baths and i set my washing machine to come on during cheap rate.our bill is currently £65 per month

does anyone know how I can find out whether it would be cheaper to have a normal meter (not economy 7) installed and then not use the night storage heaters but plug oil filled radiators in and put them on a timer?? our cheap electricity is between midnight and 7am but we're asleep at this time so it's pointless really. the only good thing about it is that the storage heaters are on during cheap rate but I'd just as happily set up oil filled radiators and have them on a timer....

Cardew

lsatdown wrote: »

Yeah your probably right, I think im going to turn off the water heater throughout the day, and put the heating on a timer.
We don't have engery saving bulbs, and have two ceiling hanging lights which have three halgeon bulbs each! What engery saving halgeon bulbs should i get?

Your water heating MAY only come on during off-peak timing. That is what they are designed to do on E7 and that is probably what the boost switch is for. You need to check that before you put it on a timer.

Cardew

Greenr wrote: »

does anyone know how I can find out whether it would be cheaper to have a normal meter (not economy 7) installed and then not use the night storage heaters but plug oil filled radiators in and put them on a timer?? our cheap electricity is between midnight and 7am but we're asleep at this time so it's pointless really. the only good thing about it is that the storage heaters are on during cheap rate but I'd just as happily set up oil filled radiators and have them on a timer....

It really is just a matter of working it out from your consumption at both rates and comparing - you really need your annual consumption.

Take xxkWh at day rate + xxkWh at E7 night rate and compare that with the cost of the total at the best 'normal' tariff.

The rates for Economy 7 have soared lately - more than 'normal' rates.

The 'break even' point for Economy use was generally considered to be between 20% to 30% of the total being at cheap rate; now it is often over 50%.

Fire_Fox

lsatdown wrote: »

Hi,
I am with scottish power, economy 7, online tariff. According to my readings, I have used 2221 day units, and 352 night units in 3 months!??!
Its a 1 bed modern flat, wall panel heaters (i think similar to this:
http://dimplex-heaters.com/dimplex-evs075-skirting-panel-convector-heater.htm) that are only turned on from 6-9ish, most of the time only 1 in the front room.
Water tank heater is turned on all the time, it doesn't have a timer, just two switches. one for boost, and the other just normal on/off.
At night, everything is turned off at the plug, including appliances. Some nights we leave the heater on low over night (352 units).
How can this right, this works out at 2221@13.472p = £299!!
Have they got the readings the wrong way around? Should I be on a different tariff?

You are in a very similar position to me and you will find my figures a very helpful comparison
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=1397217

When I moved in (flat only two years old then) I had some very high night readings which I discovered was due to both thermostats on my immersion being broken.

I was advised that I needed a new meter to be put on a different tariff.

Masonga

I got one of these for my water heater and found out my E7 timings from the energy company. i have set it to come on for those times only. If I would ever need to get more water (which I never have as I live alone) then you hit the boost button and it heats up on standard rate for either two hours or one hour preset times.

http://www.maplin.co.uk/searchtemplate.asp?criteria=ELECTRONIC%20WATER%20HEATER%20TIMER