New house - first week high useage

andrewr22

Hi
I moved into my first owned house a week ago. I took an electricity reading when I moved in and took another a week later. I've used 261 units (kw/h) in 7 days. This seems a lot! Must be approx £50-55.

It's a 2 bed end of terrace house with 1 person living it. Gas central heating. Elec oven used once. No microwave. No computers being used. Small fridge and freezer been on most the time. Washing machine used 4 times. Tv used a couple of hours each evening. Just the living room light used in the evening. Sky+ box on when tv is on.

What are your thoughts? I can't think what's using so much power.

space_rider

Has the immersion heater been left on. For that amount of units you must be using something that heats something.

andrewr22

Immersion switch is off in the cupboard. I could turn it off at the fuse box as well? but pretty sure it's been off all week. Boiler heats the hot water.

Anything else it could be? I've been out for 12 hours today and used 14 units. Only Fridge and freezer have been on. Freezer is a new A rated, using 201kwh per year. Fridge is older but can't see it using too much. Both are small under counter appliances.

space_rider

Fridge and freezer shouldn`t use that much. Can you turn absolutely everything off apart from the fridge and see how many units it uses. Do you have a conservatory with electric heating or a pond with a pump or greenhouse with heating?

andrewr22

I'll have to check things one by one as I don't have any of those that could be using loads.

cally6008

No computers ? How are you getting online then ?

What wattage light bulbs ? Change them all to energy saving ones

What energy company supplies electric ? Key/Prepayment Meter or DD or quarterly bill ? Any debt left on meter that you paying off for previous tennant ?
Outside light switched on ?

Do a search of every single room, even look behind furniture and make sure everything off and that you know what is plugged into which socket

andrewr22

Useing iPhone to get online at the moment. The readings are mine so not paying off other debt. I do have some 100w light bulbs that I do need to change. Eon supply the elec and gas.
Outside light is on a sensor and only been turned on at the switch for a couple of days. Ill try not leaving the TV on standby as well

notbritishgas

Hi Andrew
From how you describe your usage there should be no way you are using 261kwh in one week, I consider we are quite wasteful and only use about 75 in a week.
So there are two possibilities, one that the meter is faulty (quite unlikely) and secondly you are reading it incorrectly. You are not reading the "tenths" digit are you, if so that would give an apparently high reading.
If this is not the case then switch everything off and see if the meter moves, if not then switch things back on one at a time and see if anything makes the meter register quickly.

andrewr22

notbritishgas wrote: »

Hi Andrew
From how you describe your usage there should be no way you are using 261kwh in one week, I consider we are quite wasteful and only use about 75 in a week.
So there are two possibilities, one that the meter is faulty (quite unlikely) and secondly you are reading it incorrectly. You are not reading the "tenths" digit are you, if so that would give an apparently high reading.
If this is not the case then switch everything off and see if the meter moves, if not then switch things back on one at a time and see if anything makes the meter register quickly.

Hi
maybe I am reading the meter incorrectly, I assumed I just read all the digits displayed which does include the tenths digit I think. Can you let me know how I should be reading it so I can check?
Thanks

notbritishgas

andrewr22 wrote: »

Hi
maybe I am reading the meter incorrectly, I assumed I just read all the digits displayed which does include the tenths digit I think. Can you let me know how I should be reading it so I can check?
Thanks

Hopefully this is the case.
Either ignore the tenths digit which can be coloured red or separated from the other digits by a space or a dot or something similar. Or if you want to be really accurate then subtract the two readings using the tenths digit as a tenth.
If you are reading it wrongly this would bring your weekly usage down to 26kwh which is quite low:T.

andrewr22

I have been reading the red tenths digit! Well that's lucky I was getting quite worried! So my use is 26.1 which sounds much better.
Lucky I asked on here now, thanks for your help.