How can you decide if economy 7 is best for you?

Lady_K

How do you work out if its really worth being on economy 7 for electric? I think I was once told by a supplier that if I had a freezer its best to stay on economy 7.

This is really for my daughter and her housemates in the new student house the have moved into. They are changing suppliers and arent sure if to have economy 7 or not.

They have 2 fridge freezers and at the moment theres 3 of them living in a 4 bedroomed house (4th bedroom is in attic) they may get another student later on if possible. Heating is by gas and they have a tumble dryer and washer, not sure about the cooker if its elec or gas.

Its difficult to judge as they have no past bills to go on as they have only just moved in

irnbru_2

Lady_K wrote:

Heating is by gas and they have a tumble dryer and washer, not sure about the cooker if its elec or gas.

That means they have two items which they can use timers on should the appliances be suitable i.e. can be set-up and work straight from mains on/off switch.

Lady_K wrote:

Its difficult to judge as they have no past bills to go on as they have only just moved in

Certainly, without storage heaters it'll be very hard to work out and they would have to work very hard at it. For instance, if they did their washing and drying on E7 they'ld have to stay up late or get up early to get one complete cycle of
washing done. Not practical with 4 people.

Lady_K

Well by the looks of it its probably better to have ordinary tarrif because even though some students stay up late I think most of the higher cost things will be done in the day like washing and tumble drying. Apparently things get stolen from the washing line so I guess there will be a fair bit of tumble drying and I doubt they will be doing all that at night. Two of them are student nurses and they cant be up too late as they have placement shifts to do. They could be up late studying but I guess that wont take up much electricity really. I'll tell them to get some energy saving lightbulbs too

I may even re-think my own economy 7 meter myself now, either that or get some timers

tawnyowls

irnbru wrote:

Certainly, without storage heaters it'll be very hard to work out and they would have to work very hard at it. For instance, if they did their washing and drying on E7 they'ld have to stay up late or get up early to get one complete cycle of
washing done. Not practical with 4 people.

You could use a timer, and most washing machines etc have a delay button built in. The noise problem would be another thing.

I checked with my supplier today, because of an answer I got to another query on this board, and they say at my current percentage (~18%), I'm just breaking even with having E7 - if I discipline myself a bit more and run the big appliances at night I'll start saving money.

Lady_K

Thanx I'm going to call my supplier and ask them about mine then

Cardew

tawnyowls wrote:

You could use a timer, and most washing machines etc have a delay button built in. The noise problem would be another thing.

I checked with my supplier today, because of an answer I got to another query on this board, and they say at my current percentage (~18%), I'm just breaking even with having E7 - if I discipline myself a bit more and run the big appliances at night I'll start saving money.

There have been a number of threads about the 'break even' point and it varies in different parts of the UK and of course the company you are with. As students they probably could't(or wouldn't) change company.
For instance with BG where I live the break even point for me is about 34%.

Apart from the noise aspect of running appliances in the middle of the night, I found another problem. The dishwasher was often not full, and washing machine didn't have a full load, last thing at night; yet they were put on to 'save' electricity - a false economy.

As was stated above if you don't have storage heating it is hard work to make savings on E7.