StayWarm Special Briefing 2006/7 Discussion Area

KimYeovil

I agee, Dodo. I have no idea why Bernard repeatedly posts the same old nonsense and won't let things lie.

As to checking rates, what is the problem? Do you not keep track of your useage with your meter? All you have to do is plunk your annual useage figures into any of the online calculators (I recommend 'Uswitch'. Other brands (including Martin's preferred 'Energyhelpline' ) are available.)

Grab an annual estimate from one of them, divide by twelve and see what you think.

The main complicating caveat is how much would you save if you also reduced your useage due to no longer paying a flat payment and whether that's worth your loss in comfort.

dodo

Yes I do keep meter readings every month but have difficulty converting the gas ones to KWH. The elect. ones are already in those units.
Ive been told that the calculation is: units x 2.83 to cu.mtr
x 1.02264 conver. factor
x 39.12955 calorif. value
-:- 3.6 to Kwh hrs

Seems complicated, is there an easier way?

(got this from an old gas bill from years ago.)

KimYeovil

Just work out the sum once. It doesn't vary that much season to season or barometer reading to barometer reading*. About 11.2 for a metric meter or 31.9 for an imperial one.

And on the comparison sites, don't worry about choosing your Staywarm tariff - just select British Gas and Whatever Electricity and ignore what they say your savings will be - just compare the calculated annual cost with twelve times your new Staywarm payment.

*Well, I don't think it does. Anyone know the actual variance?

deltatango

Hi new here

I have been with stay warm since they began, I have a 3 bedroom detached house two people living there, at present my monthly payment is
£126.50. I am completely on electric only day/normal and Low/night IE economy 7 I am on the high rate yes i use alot of electricity thats the
idea of the stay warm, well it was when it started, use as much as you like at a fixed monthly payment. how do I convert my reading that i
have been taking for the last 12 months to input them into a comparison site.


Thanks

KimYeovil

As you are electricity only those meters are already measured in kWhs. You have to add your day useage and your night useage together to find your total annual consumption. You are then able to go to the comparison calculators.

You can then enter this total in the comparison sites to see how much a standard tariff will cost. You also use the separate totals to compare Economy 7 prices. Compare those two groups of results with your StayWarm price.

(To compare the E7 prices you may have to work out the proportion of night to total use. Your percentage of night electricity is: ((night use) / (day use + night use)) x 100)

deltatango

I checked the uswitch website and because I have used alot of units this
year the monthly payments are working out over £300 a month.

What will staywarm do when they see these large readings

pukunui

My mum recieved her new staywarm price for the year - it had gone up from £59 to £105 per month.

My mum, my sister and I have all contacted Staywarm to get the band usage infrormation. We want to see how much gas and electric my mum can use before the rate will go up. At the moment my mum is not having the heating on when she needs to because she is worried about the price increase next year.

Stay warm told me that there weren't any bands. You can use as much gas and electricity as you like, but if you use too much, you have to pay that amount back over the subsequent year. I asked them how much is too much - they said there wasn't a set amount.

This is very frustrating and surely not too much to ask for information that is used to calculate customer bills.

Does anyone know the high/medium/low bands - or know how to get this information?

Thanks

BernardM

You need accurate figures dodo for the calculation here.
http://www.ukpower.co.uk/default.asp?gclid=

An increase to £146 pound per month. That is the highest tariff quoted on here that someone is paying. What is the max tariff per month compared to useage they would allow, before, as Kim Yeovil put it in post 58, they think you are abusing tariffs.

dodo

My usage over the last twelve months according to Staywarm is:-

Electricity................7261Kwh

Gas.......................19238Kwh

They say I am a high user but by using some power saving measures I have cut usage from 2006 readings of

Elect.9348Kwh & gas 26561Kwh

so they dont seem to take much notice of the actuals. I'm sure that they want to get rid of Staywarm altogether and this is their way to do it.
When I queried the huge increase in monthly payments, they said the rates would be reduced in January and I should wait to see if I could find a cheaper supplier after that! Its now nearly March and E-on still haven't come out with a reduction:mad:
On the existing rates I can find a reduction of up to £354 a year by using a standard rate from NPower and lesser savings from others. Is it worth waiting for the comfort of Staywarm if their rates do come down? or do I switch now?

BernardM

Do you trust their figures dodo. You know your own business, but they claim I am using exactly the same as quoted by Gal (page 1) with two completely different kWh figures for both. That was to much of a coincidence for me.
They have done this twice. One of those calculations is always over a threshold so they can claim you are over the thresh-hold and put your bill up accordingly and then they send you a booklet on how to reduce your usage.
I would make sure you know exactly what you are using or you won't know if you are truly saving