Astronomical energy bills - why?

giraffe88

Hi,

I live in a student house - two flats of 4 and 5 in a large terraced house. We just received our gas and electricity bills for Jan-April and I'm a bit shocked by them! We split bills from both flats 9-ways as we operate mostly as a large house (though have two separate kitchens, bathrooms and sitting rooms). Over the winter period, upstairs had the heating on for longer as it is more open, colder space; downstairs we agreed to have it on between 2 and 4 hours a day. The upstairs gas bill came to £170, but downstairs has just come in at £245. Normally downstairs is significantly cheaper in terms of energy than the upstairs flat, and has one fewer person. Any ideas why? I've checked the estimated reading and it is more or less correct (only about £20 out). Electricity is also high. I'm really tight for cash this term and this is stressing me out! We still have one more quarter to pay before we move out and I really can't afford another bill like this!

Any advice/pointers appreciated. Think we have a hidden immersion heater somewhere or something? I notice that our boiler seems to switch itself on at strange times of day, when it is supposedly switched to off at the main box and have mentioned this to the landlady.

Giraffe

spiro

Guessing at the size of property, level of insulation etc £415 for the quarter of the year that has the highest comsumption especially given cold weather doesnt seem too bad. Typically gas bill for that quarter is something like 3/4 times larger than any other quarter.