Excessive monthly electricity usage

webster_2

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bulchy

A rep from Meter plus came to read the meters today, and he could only take a reading from one meter as the serial number for the other one didnt match the number he had on his HHT (not the first time they've said this). I rang Energywatch and have been advised to write to Npower and inform them of this, am also including meter readings from past few weeks and informing them of the loose wire we had repaired last week, so hopefully we might get some answers, but I wont be holding my breath waiting :rotfl:
Sue

bellybabe_2

Hi Bulchy,
We had a similar situation with Scottish Gas for our electricity this time last year. they put our DD up from £72 to £115 (not as high as yours, but still a huge amount a month!) as they said our other DD didn't cover it. We spent a lot of time on the phone disputing it, and one woman told us we should be on economy seven but weren't,a dn when we complained aout that, the manager said we weren't because we'd spend even more money on economy seven. she reckned the washing machine, dishwasher and fridge were doing for most of it. Otherwise we had storage heaters (nightmare - can't believe the energy saving folks reckon we could save hundreds if we still had them!), and gas for the hob and fire in the living room. Everything else is electric.

We didn't have your patience - we just ripped out the storage heaters and replaced them with panel heaters (which i firmly believe has in fact reduced our energy consuption and the bill too, since we only put them on when we're cold, and not overnight when we think we might be cold the next day but then aren't...), and also switched companies using U-switch (having been directed here by my brother!). We hardly ever use the water heater (less than once a month), preferring to boil a kettle or use the shower for hot water. These steps have brough the direct debit back down to £75 or so. And Scottish gas owed us £250 when we left, in the winter, when you're normally owing.

I hope you get it sorted - it sounds really stressful.

BB

bulchy

Hi BB, we intend switching suppliers as soon as this is sorted out. As for taking out the heaters,we couldnt afford it at the moment, but if we decide to stay in this house we will be doing so. I've stopped heating the water up as often as I used to, we all have showers and I boil the kettle for the dishes, bit of a pain, but I just get on with it.
Thanks for the advice and support.
Sue

clothahump

I have a similar problem with Atlantic, they are putting our DD up to £175 a month which I find incredible as there are only 2 of us in the house.
The costs started going up about 3 years ago after the Landladies son in law bypassed a faulty inlet thermostat on a night storage heater, would this be the cause of the increase in use?
I have checked it over the last few days and we are using an average of 15 units on day rate and 6.5 on economy 7, the 6.5 is washing machine and immersion heater.

Cardew

It is virtually impossible to consume electricity worth £175 a month with 2 people in the house. For instance the average of 15 units on day rate and 6.5 on economy 7 you are using will cost less than £2 a day.

You DD has gone up almost certainly because you have build up a large debit balance, by paying too little, and you are now having to pay it back.

Get copies on your old bills and check the readings.

clothahump

Get copies on your old bills and check the readings.

I will do that immediately, thanks for your reply.
I have worked it out that a bypassed storage heater of 3.4Kw will consume £2.10 a night on its own, add the other 2 good heaters and that I reckon is where the problem lies.

espresso

clothahump wrote:

I have worked it out that a bypassed storage heater of 3.4Kw will consume £2.10 a night on its own, add the other 2 good heaters and that I reckon is where the problem lies.

I don't know how much you pay for night units but your £2.10 per night calculation works out at approx 8.4p per unit when I only pay 3.58p

:eek:

clothahump

Sorry, I meant all 3 heaters would use £2.10 a night.
Bills are en route from current supplier and previous supplier, also getting date the heater was bypassed from Landladies agents, put it all together and I should be able to see what is going on.

cpjackso

Here are a few ideas;

* Make sure you don't have your immersion heater turned on all day

* Make sure your storage heaters are not storing heat during the day (ie. they only come on over night)

* Try and change your water heater so that it only comes on between 6:30 and 7:30 (not from 2am). Your water only needs to come on approx 1 hour before you get up.

* ... How come you've got your storage heaters turned on now anyway - it's summer?

You might find it handy to buy one of these and then audit your usage;

http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?TabID=1&ModuleNo=38343&doy=11m5

(You might be able to find one cheaper! I got mine for £8 from tchibo.co.uk)

Then go through each room in your house and measure the usage of EACH item, and record the info in a spreadsheet with columns Description, Not in use (W), In use (W), Estimate use in minutes (per day)

So;
Lounge
TV 0.01W 150W 120mins
Lamp 0 25W 60mins
Fire 0 2000W 60mins

Kitchen
Kettle 0W 3000W 15mins

etc.

Then from this you can calculate how much each room costs you, and see where you can make savings. If you need more info - or want me to send you my spreadsheet - just drop me a message.

HTH.