Guardian Newspaper - Economy 7 could save you £200 a year...

Cardew

BG simply add both totals for me and I am charged as a normal tariff. As premier states above others charge.

If your company charges - move to one that doesn't charge(or threaten to!) on E7 and then get rid of E7 with the new company.

What many people haven't realised is just how much the cheap rate on E7 has increased over the past couple of years.

3 years ago virtually every E7 tariff had cheap rate at 2p/kWh or under - even BG standard Tariff. Now 5p is the norm.

Whilst 'normal' electricity has gone up around 50% cheap rate is more like 150%

This has the effect of raising the 'break even' point where E7 becomes viable to 50% or more use at night. Frankly I cannot see how anyone can achieve that figure without storage heating.

Magentasue

KevinG wrote: »

However, now that there is always someone home all day it almost certainly doesn't pay.

This is one of the things that would put me off even trying it again. I prefer looking at the sky and deciding how much washing to do today rather than replying on the evening forecast. I avoid a tumble drier all summer by avoiding doing the laundry in wet weather. But even if I was to use all appliances at night, our daytime units would be too high. OH and I both work part-time, son 1 works shifts, son 2 does 8-5, son 3 is at college on the days I don't work, youngest at school. So there's nearly always someone at home and very often that person is using a TV for several hours, or playing with other toys like the iron and vacuum cleaner. Isn't good for our gas bill either.

HotchPotch_2

KevinG wrote: »

This thread has got me thinking and I am going to have to do my sums again. I have been on E7 for as long as I can remember, have never had storage heaters and tried to make it pay by running immersion heater and washing machine/dishwasher during off peak periods. However, now that there is always someone home all day it almost certainly doesn't pay.

When switching supplier (currently on Scottish Power) I have entered my details on the comparison site and it has never suggested I come off E7, but maybe it wasn't that clever and just assumed I wanted E7 because I gave it separate day and night figures. I can't see why a supplier would need to change the meter and if I've got to pay for the change it probably isn't worth it.

BTW my E7 period is 2230-0030 and 0230-0730 (GMT. i.e. one hour later in the summer). I have to be careful to avoid the 2 hour gap, i.e. not put things on just before it. These are the times Seeboard gave me years ago and I checked them the other day and they haven't changed, even though the meter and supplier have been changed several times.

I'm yet to come across a comparison site that compares E7 with non-E7 tariffs. I don't really trust comparison sites, but when I've used them, I go back to the page that asks if you have an E7 meter and change my answer to check both sets of results. I would sometime fiddle with the percentages used at night to find the approx point where E7 became cheaper (think last time I tried my break-even point was around a third).

We switched to E7 many years ago when our supplier was charging the same peak time E7 rate as the standard tariff, and the electricity used durring the night tariff just by our fridge and freezers more or less covered the extra standing charge.

We use gas for hot water and heating and only ever managed to use about 25% of our electricity at night by putting stuff on a timer. The saving used to be worthwhile with our usage, but I think by about 2-3 years ago, the amount we were saving by having E7 had dropped to something like a meagre £20 a year. I recently worked out that we'd save about £200 pounds per year by switching to a single rate tariff with another supplier which is what we've just done.

jetski690

IMO it's the best thing I ever did coming off E7, with a modern day family of four with computers and t.v's in most rooms all my high use was through the day's, never looked back since coming off it.