Is your heating ON or OFF?

artydoll

Its -10 outside here,brrrrrrrrrr my heating is on ,I put it on 15 and that is adequate,we've recieved our winter fuel payment,that should pay for the heating for this quarter, with luck.
My husband has Reynauds phenomenon so needs to be warm.

Sunnyday

My room is heated to 18 degrees which is just right, i also have a thermal top on and a fleece as when i`m not moving around it can still seem cold.
I`ve just walked the woofaloes so my feet are like blocks of ice, just thawing out with a cuppa and then i`m off for a hot shower then i should feel normal.

The batteries have given out in the sensor outside so i`m not too sure of the temperature out there atm but on another thread someone in the same town has just posted that its minus 8 degrees :eek:

I`m so glad that i cleared all the snow yesterday as its like sheet ice out there now, i have to get the car out later to go to work so i`m panicking a bit Once i`m home tonight i`ll feel much better. My main worry is getting home as i normally finish and get home past midnight on this shift and everywhere is frozen solid.

Dogstarheaven - my heart goes out to you, we were in a similar situation a couple of years ago and it was frightening, a few weeks ago DH ended up without work again but luckily he has just started a new job so we should be straight with the bills and things again soon. Could you ask on your local freecycle for a rug or a carpet? We have a concrete floor and floorboards in the kitchen (part of each) and there is no radiator in there so its sub zero so i know how cold indoors can be. We have the heating on in the main room and upstairs the tvrs get turned on and off as needed. I`m still expecting the gas bill to be stupid though.

For those of you in workplaces that are very cold there are actually minimum working temperatures out there, have a google and see what you find. In a place that DH worked a couple of years ago they wouldn`t put any heaters on etc and everyone was feeling ill. The health and safety executive were called in to do a spot check and the company had something like 12 days to bring the temperature up above the minimum. There were workmen installing wall mounted heaters a couple of days later. They only have a limited time to improve the working conditions or they will be fined so its worth a phone call for an inspector to call and check.

Here is a link http://www.hse.gov.uk/contact/faqs/temperature.htm

Right i`m off for that shower!

Keep warm peeps.

SD

jackieb

artydoll wrote: »

Its -10 outside here,brrrrrrrrrr my heating is on ,I put it on 15 and that is adequate,we've recieved our winter fuel payment,that should pay for the heating for this quarter, with luck.
My husband has Reynauds phenomenon so needs to be warm.

My fingers go white when out in the cold, but 2 weeks ago I was walking outside for about 15 minutes. It was bitterly cold but no snow and I didn't have gloves on. Where i'd been carrying my heavy bag, the tip of one of my fingers turned purple. They warmed up quickly once I got back inside. The following day the tip of my finger swelled up and was red and hot. I ended up with my first ever chilblain. Now I feel about 100. :rotfl:

guccigoo

got up this morning front room was 12c :eek: and my bedroom was 13 :eek: ive had the heating on since 8.30am downstairs and its 17c in the front room now. I never heat my bedroom either. The kitchen is like an ice box as theres no radiator in there and also has concrete floor with lino over it, i keep a small fan heater in there and turn it on when i need to. The heating is going off soon though as i refuse to have it on all day. Tomorrow it will be off during the day as the kids will be at school.

dogstarheaven

Sunnyday wrote: »

Dogstarheaven - my heart goes out to you, we were in a similar situation a couple of years ago and it was frightening, a few weeks ago DH ended up without work again but luckily he has just started a new job so we should be straight with the bills and things again soon. Could you ask on your local freecycle for a rug or a carpet? We have a concrete floor and floorboards in the kitchen (part of each) and there is no radiator in there so its sub zero so i know how cold indoors can be. We have the heating on in the main room and upstairs the tvrs get turned on and off as needed. I`m still expecting the gas bill to be stupid though.


Keep warm peeps.

SD

I am reconsidering getting out the old rug we once had years ago from the living room, but can't think where it could be. the store cupboard is packed to the gills with all kinds of 'stuff for the garden/camping/diy'. i've used freegle for lots of things to gift, but never any luck in being offered anything!:(

bluebag wrote: »

dogstarheaven,

Please be careful with the heating, its very, very cold just now and you both don't sound in the best of health. Try and keep as warm as you can, sometimes it's better to keep just a little low heat on.

Are you sure you are claiming all the benefits you are entitled to? With a single low wage I'm sure you must be entitled to something.
Good luck with the job hunting, it's very tough at the moment.

we're currently sorting out tax credits but they're taking their time in processing our new claim. OH is still claiming JSA but not received a penny since i started my new job 3mths ago. he's not had anyone there to confirm what we're entitled to or when payments should start despite interviews and signing-on appts. he's had.

if it's not too impertinent to ask, how much do you pay for a gas fire to be run on for about 5hrs a day? i don't have the mindset atm to think about conversion charts on kilowatts whatever..:cool: our gas fire is a bog-standard old-fashioned type (it's checked annually), so i'm not sure if it's energy-efficient or not.

previously, in this thread i wrote about draughts in my house because on the ground-floor it's just floorboards and lino. the living room has a large rug next to the front door and a door curtain with a snake at the bottom. as the room's small, it doesn't require too much heating to be left on for too long (within 40mins it gets cold again).

Sunnyday it's quite warm at work so i'm always in my polo top. the other night, i was on 3rd floor and the home dept. was over-heated and i nearly fainted! so i guess, work's the only place other than my nightly baths and my bed, where i'm totally warm. :j

penelopedee i know you mean well and all the other ppl who've i've spoken to about this (on here and my family!) who think i'm mad, but i'm only doing this to save myself a whopping £200+ gas bill this winter. the tumble dryer isn't used either, as i've decided to air-dry the clothes in the spare bedroom (DD's who's left home for uni).

hmc

thankyou for the replys

Confuzzled

Doom_and_Gloom wrote: »

16C fair enough that sounds fine however 21C as ideal room temperature :eek:. At that kind of temperature we wouldn't even need our jumpers on and it would cost us a fortune in gas! As it is we can't have our heating too high because of the chinchillas. I can't imagine having the heating at 21C, even my parents never have it higher than 18C. Growing up if you complained that it was cold and the heating was on you got told to put a jumper/dressing gown etc on.

i quite agree with you there, i've had my heating up higher than i'd like because i'm worried the electricity will go out with all the ice around here (lost electric briefly a few days ago BEFORE the storm) and i have storage heaters... but it's now 21 in here and i don't feel comfortable anymore

i don't ever have the heat on in my bedroom either, can't sleep in a warm room, if it's really cold i just open the door for an hour before bed and the hall heater takes teh chill off (right next to my bedroom) i had 2 duvets on last night but kicked the top one off after a few hours and by morning i had half my body sticking out of the other one yet if you walk in th eroom now it feels cool...

too warm and you're actually asking to make yourself ill as the germies love the heat, too cold though and you'll make yourself ill so i guess everyone has to find their own happy medium. i find 18 is quite comfortable most of the time but i will go to 16 occasionally but i wouldn't dare do that now, like i said i have to warm up the house in case we lose electric as no electric, no heat! once the storms have passed and the weight of ice on the lines is past i may slide back down to 16-17 degrees as my 9 year old happily layers clothing and i enjoy sitting with a blankie over my lap...

Rummer

Still no blooming heating and I am frozen! At least we have the electric fire in the livingroom and some oil heaters in the animal room or we would all be frozen solid!

shegar

dogstarheaven wrote: »

I'm still hanging in there, tho' my OH thinks that it's getting a bit too much for him altho' I mentioned to him that we'll have it when it's minus 5 but having so far w/o the heating, and we're in minus 5 now, I want to make us last till we're really suffering. Am wearing polo work shirt with Berghaus fleece jacket and fleece dressing gown (also woolly tights and knee high socks and soft fleecy-type ankle slippers). It's ok by me to feel this way as my core temp. is fine but for OH he's just not wearing as many layers as I am, but I can't make him tho'. Any solutions?

Yea why suffer.?poor man, nothing worse than being cold....

Hippeechiq

I too never heat my bedroom, and I always have the window at least slightly ajar - I can't stand a stuffy bedroom.

However, it's It's bitterly, bitterly cold here (although we have no snow), and I desperately don't want a huge gas bill.

Last year, when we had two wages coming in, we used to have it on at 20ºC from 6:30am-9am & 4:45pm-9:45pm. My daughter, who isn't working at the moment because of her illness, had a Halogen Heater for during the day when it became to cold for her, but that accidentally got broken.

I'm now looking after her, and we both really feel the cold. We've been managing so far having it on for the odd 30 minutes here, and an hour there - until yesterday, when I had it on for 3 x 45 minute periods during the day, and then 2 x 1 hour periods in the evening.

I'd like to have it on more if I could, but I don't know which way of running the heating is the most cost effective.

So I was wondering if any of you knows which uses less gas:-

a) Putting heating on at 20ºC for an hour at a time 4 times a day
OR
b) Putting heating on at 20ºC, and then keep it running at that for for two 2 hour periods a day
OR
c) Have it set to continuous at 16-18ºC, so that it kicks in as and when it drops below that temperature?

Or if none of the above 3 what the most cost effective way of having your heating on is please?