Npower-econ7-huge bill

dollydolittle_2

I'd like some guidance before I go into battle with Npower.

We've been in our new house for a bit over 6 months and just had our first electricty bill from N power. It is huge. We've been paying by dd and they say we owe them over £240 on top!!!! Some of that is because our usage was high when we first moved in, but I'm wondering if it is also because we've discovered from this bill that they have us on an economy 7 tariff. We do have an economy 7 meter in the house BUT it is disconnected and was like that when we moved in. We did not request an economy 7 account when we moved here and did not have one when we were at our old house and were also with Npower.

They have said they are going to send an engineer to 'mend' the meter and they will estimate what our bill would have been if it was working, but I'm not sure that will help much. In the first few months twe were here there was an old inefficient chest freezer here (that we no longer have) and the gas ch was crap (boiler now replaced) and the house uninsulated (cavity wall and loft now done) so we had to use oil heaters in two rooms and had them on overnight sometimes when it was very cold. Our overnight usage in future will be low so if they mend the meter and look at what we use after that to estimate what our overnight usage would have been, it won't be close to accurate.

Questions:

• Am I right that if you are on Econ 7 then they charge higher rates for the daytime usage than if you are not? Amazing how dificult it is to find this info.

• Should I tell them to rework our bill to date based on a normal tariff rather than an Econ 7 tariff as we never asked for it in the first place (I have looked at the info they sent us when we moved in and it doesn't mention the Econ 7 tariff as far as I can see) or should we stick with their offer to re-estimate our night-time usage as if the Econ 7 meter was working?

• Do I even want them to fix the econ 7 meter for the future? I tend to hang washing out as soon as it is done because I have a very bad back and don't iron, and so the only usage overnight is the fridge, the small amount used by the gas ch, and tiny things like the phone and digital radio display. Dishwasher only in use once a week or so as an attempt to economise. I do get up very early (bad back again) so I could do washing in the morning first thing I suppose, is Econ 7 sensible in these circs?

I'm really quite upset by this bill, it was such a shock. Our income has dropped significantly in the past few months and we have been doing everything we can to reduce our costs (we have an electricity monitor and have been very careful) Dreading the gas bill, due in a week and would really appreciate some help with this.

Cardew

Firstly, on E7 they do indeed charge about 10% to 20% more for the 17 hours of 'daytime' electricity than a normal 24/7 tariff. It is not difficult to find out the exact amount, ring NPower or look on any comparison website.

If the E7 meter is disconnected, does that mean all electricity(24/7) is being recorded on the daytime meter? It sounds as if NPower think you are getting 7 hours free electricity and will estimate the additional cost?

With gas CH and cooker it is very difficult to make E7 a worthwhile proposition and you should be on a normal 24/7 tariff.

It is not a question of 'asking for Economy 7'. When you move in you are put on an E7 tariff if that is what the previous occupants used. It is up to you to request a change

spiro

You say "We do have an economy 7 meter in the house BUT it is disconnected ", do you mean the complete meter is disconnected or just the 'night' curcuit? I assume you just mean the night curcuit in which case they will estimate the night based on previous useage.

If its the whole meter, is there a different meter installed and the old one has just been left behind. If this is the case they will need to determine when and who swapped the meter.

Premier_2

Howcome you have a disconnected meter? Usually they are taken out at the time they are disconnected (or at least when another meter is installed).

If you only have a single rate meter recording your consumption, how can the supplier charge you a dual rate tariff?

If you do actually have a dual rate meter, nPower may not agree to bill you on a single rate tariff
(based on the responses posted on MSE by others, such requests have received mixed responses)

The supplier should be able to provide you with details of any od their tariffs if you can't find them online. Bottom line will be that if you have a huge bill now based on E7, it will probably still be huge if they do agree to recalculate on the equivilent single rate. (With the tariff details, you can do the calculation yourself). The way to reduce it in future is to reduce consumption (and use a comparison site to ensure you are getting the best deal)

Premier_2

spiro wrote: »

You say "We do have an economy 7 meter in the house BUT it is disconnected ", do you mean the complete meter is disconnected or just the 'night' curcuit? I assume you just mean the night curcuit in which case they will estimate the night based on previous useage....

If the night circuit were disconnected, it wouldn't have used any electricity.

But the meter would still be connected and still record the amount of units consumed on the other circuits during the night time.
(On E7, all units consumed during the low rate are measured as such, irrespective as to what circuit they are supplied via)

Cardew

meter disconnected = not working????

dollydolittle_2

OK sorry

There is one meter with a low readiing and a normal reading. The low reading has never moved so we assumed it was part of some old system that had been disconnected. We have had no experience of economy 7 and I thought it was only ever used for houses with storage heaters (we don't have any). I had no idea that this meter meant that we had economy 7.

We were previously with Npower on their Juice thingamabob. When we moved we asked to have our account transferred to the new house. No one mentioned economy 7 and we had no idea that that was what the meter meant until this week. There have been no changes to the meter or the electricity supply since we moved in so presumably the previous occupants were not using it either. Surely Npower should have made this clear to usthat they wer changing our account to an Econ 7 one?

Sounds like I need to ask them to come and change the meter completely for a 24/7 one rather than 'repair' the economy 7 one? And all I can do is let them recalculate the previous bill however they want and swallow hard and pay it.

btw the cooker is all electric and we have reduced our usage to the bare minimum by getting rid of the freezer etc.

davidgmmafan

If the night reading is not moving then all usage is being billed at the (much higher) day rate. As you state you use very little at night there are two reasonable alternatives I can see for re-billing. They will usually split the billing 70% on night and 30% on the day. This would work in your favour.

However if you want to get an accurate idea of what your bill will be going forward you need it billed just on the standard rate. There is absolutely no point having E7 unless you use more than 30% of your total electricity usage at night. From the info given this in unlikely to be the case.

Regards to the meter people say all the time but I'm not on economy 7, and yes in an ideal world the company would spot this. The fact is that addres has an economy seven meter. Any company you had gone with would have charged it as E7. In the circumstances I agree some re-billing is a reasonable compromize. If they've put in a new E7 meter or fixed the existing one you need to get a single rate meter fitted IMO.

Cardew

dollydolittle wrote: »

OK sorry

There is one meter with a low readiing and a normal reading. The low reading has never moved so we assumed it was part of some old system that had been disconnected. We have had no experience of economy 7 and I thought it was only ever used for houses with storage heaters (we don't have any). I had no idea that this meter meant that we had economy 7.

We were previously with Npower on their Juice thingamabob. When we moved we asked to have our account transferred to the new house. No one mentioned economy 7 and we had no idea that that was what the meter meant until this week. There have been no changes to the meter or the electricity supply since we moved in so presumably the previous occupants were not using it either. Surely Npower should have made this clear to usthat they wer changing our account to an Econ 7 one?

Sounds like I need to ask them to come and change the meter completely for a 24/7 one rather than 'repair' the economy 7 one? And all I can do is let them recalculate the previous bill however they want and swallow hard and pay it.

btw the cooker is all electric and we have reduced our usage to the bare minimum by getting rid of the freezer etc.

Firstly you cannot transfer your account from one house to another. It is purely a coincidence that Npower were supplying your new house. So they were not changing you to an E7 tariff, the extant tariff was E7.

It sounds very much like your meter is faulty and you have been getting 'free' electricity for 7 hours a night. However if you have a mechanical clock mechanism(with operating 'cams) it could be that this mechanism is faulty and the clock is 'stuck' and hence all electricity is being recorded on your day meter.(the clock and cams mechanism switches the supply from one meter to the other during E7 times)

You can easily check this by seeing if your main meter moves during the 7 hour E7 period.

Most companies don't change the meter when you switch from E7 to a normal tariff. They just add the two totals e.g. 1000 units(kWh) on the main meter and 200 units on the E7 meter is treated as 1,200 units for billing .

That said don't let NPower try to charge you a lot of money; you could try and push to have your 24/7 tariff backdated to when you moved in.

JimmyTheWig

Surely having an E7 meter doesn't mean you _have_ to have an E7 tarrif, does it? Don't you get the choice?

If you can get them to agree to the 70%/30% split and recalculate your bill then that sounds ideal for you. If they don't agree this then you need to address the question of having your "account transfered to the ne house" and whether this means you would keep the same tariff.

Then, either way, you need to get off E7. You can do this either by switching to a different Npower tariff or switching companies. I believe, however, that to switch companies you will need to pay off your arrears with Npower.

Incidentally, how much have you paid in total since moving in there?

davidgmmafan

"Most companies don't change the meter when you switch from E7 to a normal tariff."

And

"Surely having an E7 meter doesn't mean you _have_ to have an E7 tarrif, does it? Don't you get the choice?"

Its true to say you CAN bill on a standard rate with an economy 7 meter, its just a case of adding the two readings together and billing the total. However this is not ideal for two reasons. If the meter is ever replaced, either as a regular thing or an emergency, they will fit an E7 meter so you'll have to explain the whole thing again.

Also if you ever to a tariff change for example to an online tariff a click of the mouse at the wrong time and ur back on E7 in error.

As Cardew said if its an E7 meter than any supplier taking over, as NPower did, would take it over as E7. If the customer says I don't have storage heaters this might get picked up on, but sadly it seems they don't bust a gut to think hmm this person has gas why ar they on E7.

I would also echo the view the staying with the supplier is somewhat of a fiction. There WILL be a bill from the whomever the property was supplied by. Its a new account number and direct debit, nobody will look at the old account and meter because its a totally seperate account.