Huge Gas Bill

Lapchien

Just gave British Gas a reading, my bill for 1 month is £225! Can that be right? The readings are correct. I have an Alpha CB28X combi boiler, the radiators have thermostatic valves. I've truned the boiler thermo right down to 3, and turned off several rads, and reduced the others to about 2/3 of their settings. Is that the best way to run my central heating system? Someone suggested I turn the thermo on the boiler right up, and then adjust the rads. All I know is I'm sat here and very cold!

espresso

Lapchien wrote: »

Just gave British Gas a reading, my bill for 1 month is £225! Can that be right? The readings are correct.

Are you sure that you have read the meter correctly?

smjxm09

I have a 4 bed detached house and that is a 6 month bill for me. How many hours a day is your heating on?

If the boiler is a condensing combi then it should be set to no higher than 69C assuming that there is a 12C temperature drop across the radiators, as the boiler won’t condense if the returning water from the radiators is above 57C.
The boiler only reaches maximum efficiency when it is condensing.

Lapchien

espresso wrote: »

Are you sure that you have read the meter correctly?

Yes, I checked it a few times

I have the heating on from about 6.30am to 8.30am, then again from 4.30pm to 10.30pm - not excessive I would have thought..?

Lapchien

smjxm09 wrote: »

I have a 4 bed detached house and that is a 6 month bill for me. How many hours a day is your heating on?

If the boiler is a condensing combi then it should be set to no higher than 69C assuming that there is a 12C temperature drop across the radiators, as the boiler won’t condense if the returning water from the radiators is above 57C.
The boiler only reaches maximum efficiency when it is condensing.

Can you help me out a bit with this - the combi boiler thermostats are set, on scale from 1 to 9 on 3, which gets the rads quite warm, but not hot. The hot water is set on 6. I'm terrified of turning up the heating thermo any further...

smjxm09

Just gave British Gas a reading, my bill for 1 month is £225

I can't see how you can run up such a large bill in just one month.
So what was the reading last month and what is it now?
Was last months reading an estimate or an actual reading?
How much gas did you actually use?
Is your gas measured in cubic metres or cubic feet?
Is this a one off increase?
Have you just moved into the property?

smjxm09

Lapchien wrote: »

Can you help me out a bit with this - the combi boiler thermostats are set, on scale from 1 to 9 on 3, which gets the rads quite warm, but not hot. The hot water is set on 6. I'm terrified of turning up the heating thermo any further...

Sorry I can’t help you with your dials as my boiler actually displays the temperature but I would have thought that 6 would have been a better setting for comfort but if you have a condensing combi it will definitely be condensing if the rads are only warm.

Don't you have a thermostat on the wall where you set a temperature?

I’m no expert but I would have thought if your radiators only ever get warm then the boiler is burning gas all the time, though at a lower rate, as the room stat never gets to the right temperature. If the radiators get hot then the boiler uses more gas but then shuts down for periods when the stat hits the target temperature.

smjxm09

Just looked up the efficiency rating of your boiler and it is 80.1 efficient so it doesn’t appear to be a condensing boiler but more importantly it is only a smallish 28kW boiler while mine is a 42kW boiler with a yearly bill of around £460. As a comparison ours normally kick out heat to the radiators for 1 hour 40 minutes in the morning and 5 hours 15 minutes at night. At the weekend it is on for 13 hours a day and is heating a 1990 built 4 bed detached house.

espresso

Lapchien wrote: »

Just gave British Gas a reading, my bill for 1 month is £225! Can that be right? The readings are correct. I have an Alpha CB28X combi boiler, the radiators have thermostatic valves. I've truned the boiler thermo right down to 3, and turned off several rads, and reduced the others to about 2/3 of their settings. Is that the best way to run my central heating system? Someone suggested I turn the thermo on the boiler right up, and then adjust the rads. All I know is I'm sat here and very cold!

Why have you turned the boiler stat right down to 3?

If you are sat there and very cold, your heating is clearly not working efficiently and you are burning gas to little effect!

Lapchien wrote: »

Yes, I checked it a few times

I have the heating on from about 6.30am to 8.30am, then again from 4.30pm to 10.30pm - not excessive I would have thought..?

I would guess that you have made the same mistake several times then!

Lapchien wrote: »

Can you help me out a bit with this - the combi boiler thermostats are set, on scale from 1 to 9 on 3, which gets the rads quite warm, but not hot. The hot water is set on 6. I'm terrified of turning up the heating thermo any further...

Your rads should get hot not warm. You boiler will be on all of the time trying to raise the temperature in the house but if the rad are only just getting warm it never will. What temperature is your lounge after the heating has been on for one hour?

Please answer the questions in post #6

Lapchien

So what was the reading last month and what is it now?
I moved in on 30th October and it read 3668 (checked with BG and previous occupiers, they gave a reading of 3667). Just checked it and it's now 3880.

Was last months reading an estimate or an actual reading?
Actual, on 30th October.

How much gas did you actually use?
Actual difference between 3880 and 3668.

Is your gas measured in cubic metres or cubic feet?
cubic feet

Is this a one off increase?
Just moved in to property...

Have you just moved into the property?
Yes, on 30th October.

Lapchien

smjxm09 wrote: »

Don't you have a thermostat on the wall where you set a temperature?

No - there is an old fashioned stat on the wall in the hallway, but adjusting it has no effect. The stat has 2 dials poking out horizontally, <edit> Just checked, it's a Satchwell stat <edit> the upper one is fixed, the lower can be moved, but as I say I don't think it's connected to anything. The only thermos I can see are the one on the boiler, and the stats on the rads...

There's on on eBay at the moment, if you search for Satchwell thermostat you will see what I mean.