Economy 7 don`t be fooled by cheap night rate

royb

I`ve lived in the same house since 1982, when I moved in and removed the old electric storage heaters and installed gas central heating and hot water.

To "benefit" from the cheap nightime units i`ve had timer plugs fitted to the washing machine, dishwasher and tumble dryer and every quarter looked zealously at the number of units used on low night rate and the money i`d "saved".

I recently saw an article which stated that as a rule of thumb, it was nescessary to use 40% or more of your total units on night rate to be better of than on single rate, a figure I`d never come anywhere near. The reason is the normal rate is much higher on econ 7 than single rate.

I rang Eon, my supplier, who confirmed that I was using 22% of my units on nights and transferred me onto single rate electric, still keeping on the same tarriff, using the same meter (they add normal & low usage units together and you pay the same for both) and without any charge to me.

I`ve recalculated my last bill (ending 31st March) and would have been £34 better off if i`d done this three months ago, making expected savings of about £100 over the year.

I`m amazed how many people I speak to who, like me, take as read that the normal rate units cost the same as a single rate and turn their laundry and domestic arrangements upside down to capitalize on this, only for it to be costing us more than actually putting the dishwasher etc on when you really want to use it!

I would advise anyone on econ 7 to check their usage by adding normal units and low units together, and then checking the low units as a % of the total.

If its less than 40% contact your supplier and ask, should I be on econ 7!!!

molerat

Economy 7 is usually only a viable option with storage heating, that is what is was designed for. I think 99% of people who frequent these forums knew that, the subject comes up often enough.

macman

take as read that the normal rate units cost the same as a single rate

Why would anyone think that? E7 gives you a cheap rate at night, the payback is a higher rate during the day. If everyone thought that, then every single consumer would switch to E7!

kippen_noedel

Isn't quite as bad with other suppliers, E-ON are, from what I have seen, very expensive for E7

Cardew

royb wrote: »

If its less than 40% contact your supplier and ask, should I be on econ 7!!!

Loads of threads on this subject. e.g. http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=2396163&highlight=

It isn't quite that simple as there isn't a 'one size fits all' solution.

The 'break even' percentage varies by company, tariff, area and level of consumption; and usually a new tariff means a different break even point.

In addition some companies will not add readings from both meters and insist on a new meter - for which the customer pays.

Mazio_2

If my memory serves me right when they first did E7 all it did was make the night time rate ( for 7 hours E7) lower then the daytime rate that everybody would have been on to encourage people to use more electric at night because they still had to generate electricity at night and not many people used it then.
So you would have been silly not to have it years ago. But now as people are finding out they need to use a certain percentage to recoup the higher day time rate so not for most people anymore.

A._Badger

Despite the fact that my wife and I work from home, we are still ahead of the game on an E7 tariff (with British Gas, strangely) despite having no storage radiators.

Users need to run the figures carefully. There's no 'one-size fits all' prescription, despite what people so often post here.

kippen_noedel

A._Badger wrote: »

Despite the fact that my wife and I work from home, we are still ahead of the game on an E7 tariff (with British Gas, strangely) despite having no storage radiators.

Users need to run the figures carefully. There's no 'one-size fits all' prescription, despite what people so often post here.

spot on, short and to the point.