Best Heating for Rented Flat

arfpint

Hi all,

Can't quite find the answer in other posts so thought I would post my own.

I live in a top floor rented one-bed flat (the flat below me being unoccupied at the moment), and it's...freezing. Due to some problems with a previous tenant, the flat only has basic plug-in electric (convector) heating on E7 with pre-pay on the meter. No gas, and no central heating.

My problem is that the current heater in the lounge is terrible. It's hugely inefficient and is still cold despite being on pretty much all the time. The heater in my bedroom is much better and pretty much heats the lounge too. The bathroom and kitchen are as cold as outside (temperature difference is minimal when I've checked the thermometer). I'm currently spending £150 on heating alone - that's without cooking as I now eat at work.

Having read other posts I do realise that the heaters are the issue. As I can't have anything installed (as it's not my house!) I'm looking at small heaters to try and heat up the room/flat as much as possible without me having to pay these ridiculous amounts. A helpful lady at SP suggested a gas heater to be most cost-effective, and I see the DeLonghi SPF seems to be highly rated, and fairly cheap to run (15kg bottle lasting around 2 weeks?). I'm slightly worried about gas though as I have all the doors and windows shut so no ventilation.

Do you think gas would be the best option? I've been suggested oil-filled heaters as well but I can't see why they would be much cheaper. Any advise would be greatly appreciated - I only really need the heat in the evening/afternoon, maybe a quick burst in the morning - and I work full time. My budget is tiny, so anything costing over 3 figures will be a stretch!

Thanks.

macman

All electric heaters have exactly the same efficiency, i.e. 100%, and so cost the same to run for the same rating. Some are just quicker to produce heat than others. You cannot use portable bottled gas heaters without adequate ventilation, they also produce lots of moisture.

arfpint

I've just tested an oil-filled radiator borrowed from a friend, and I'm still looking at anything up to £200 a month (currently it's about £5 a day just for heating)...it's warm in here but not for long at that cost!

I've noticed that the two flats below mine are unoccupied and the bottom flat has a great big icicle on the water pipes...seriously, is there anything I can do to keep the cold out and be able to afford to eat at the same time?!

HappyMJ

arfpint wrote: »

I'm currently spending £150 on heating alone - that's without cooking as I now eat at work.

Righto...According to your estimate and using my rate of 14.12p/kw+VAT you are using £5 which is 33kw of energy per day solely on heating. That's about 16 hours of heat with the electric convector heater on it's max setting. As you say you are home in the morning so there's an hour and home in the evening so another 6 hours maybe? If you have it on overnight I'd suggest an electric blanket. They only use 65 watts of electric on the medium setting so only 7 pence per night.

Pincher

arfpint wrote: »

Hi all,
Due to some problems with a previous tenant, the flat only has basic plug-in electric (convector) heating on E7 with pre-pay on the meter. No gas, and no central heating.

Can't get rid of Prepay meter, but you can't change to non-Economy 7?

arfpint

I do have the heating on constantly because the flat loses heat very quickly - I'm guessing this is because I'm essentially above two ice cubes (ie the two unheated flats beneath). I've just taken some readings...taken after a week of each other:
Rate 1 - 1542.19, 1701.96 (increase of 159.77)
Rate 2 - 342.19, 405.38 (increase of 63.19)

So it looks like I'm using nearly 3 times as much during the day? I don't worry too much at night, although your blanket idea might be better - although not looking forward to getting out of bed in the morning!

Apparently I can change the prepay meter at a cost of £52 - I don't know how much this would help though, does prepay cost that much more? I'm "renting" the until for £1.06 a week so is that the only extra? I'm going to phone SP tomorrow to change the tariff, as it does seem pointless if I don't have storage heaters...

(I should probably point out that I have no clue about these things, so if you think my questions are idiotic, they probably are!)

Owain_Moneysaver

E7 electricity costs more during the daytime, so you should only be using an E7 tariff if you have storage heaters.

Prepayment meters are also more expensive than if you can set up a monthly direct debit.

It is the landlord's legal duty to make sure the flat has an adequate and safe (although not necessarily economical, or fantastic) fixed heating system. Portable electric or bottle gas heaters would not be regarded as adequate or safe.

Bottle gas heaters aren't that cheap to run, they need to be ventilated, they give off a lot of vater vapour when they're running (condensation, black mould etc), and you can't set them on timers to come on before you get home from work.

It might be worth seeing if there are any grants or deals for loft insulation which might help a lot.