Paying too much?? Dual 5 bed

andy888

My gas /electric supplier atlantic live in 5 bedroom 2 bath victorian house....pay 160 per month gas 113 electric... Can anyone compare are we paying too much????

savemoney

To compare things you need how many units or kWh you use

Paying DD per month may be meaningless as sometime it may be paying to much and in credit or worse in debt

I pay around £52 for electric and £50 for gas for 3 bedroom semi

smjxm09

andy888 wrote: »

My gas /electric supplier atlantic live in 5 bedroom 2 bath victorian house....pay 160 per month gas 113 electric... Can anyone compare are we paying too much????

You might not be if you have the heating on high for 24/7 and have never bothered to insulate your home. Also you might leave all your electrical appliances switched on and never turn off all those halogen ceiling lights when you leave the room.

So what have you done to save energy?

andy888

we have insulated as much as we possibly can. heating has been on more than usual this last month only..it is normally set to come on at 4a.m go off at 8a.m back on at 4pm till 8pm. never leave things on standby and very conscious of turning appliances/lights off, so yes, i am quite careful .thankyou.

MrChips

I've just moved from a 1 bed flat to a 1930s built 3 bed semi. Not sure how much to budget for gas and elec, but when I phoned up the legacy supplier (EDF) they told me the previous owners had an annual consumption of 40,000 kWh of gas and 6,000 kWh of electricity!

This seems a huge jump from my previous use of 16,000 and 3,600 respectively.

Does this sound reasonable or were the previous owners just very heavy users? Obviously none of you know about levels of insulation etc but I'm hoping someone can tell me if those numbers are within realms of reasonableness or off the scale!!

dogshome

Hi Mr Chips - Wow ! 40,000 Kwh Gas & 6000 Kwh Electricity !
The gas is twice as much as average with the Elec not far behind, but you are not the previous occupiers and will lead a different life to them

Assuming you have already contacted EDF to get onto a better tariff than the expensive STANDARD one they will have put you on when you moved in - Firstly get onto EDF and get them to give you the recorded usage on each of the last 4 bill they issued to the previous occupiers - Start recording your meter readings weekly so you compare your use with the previous owners use Qtr by Qtr

Look hard at the levels of insulation in this house and if need be, improve them as soon as quickly as possible

It's a long shot, but the high Gas use combined with high Elec use just might point to a Gas meter type mix up - The gas bills are so high the occupier decides to burn electric instead - Where a metric meter marked M3 is being charged as an Imperial meter marked Ft3
Ask EDF what type of meter they are chargeing for - M3 or Ft3 ? Then look at your gas meter to see if it's face plate is marked the same - If it's not, get back onto EDF immediately

MrChips

Thanks - that seems very helpful.

EDF did put me on their standard tariff, but as I am intending to move straight away I didn't mind too much sitting on this in the short term. I've already applied to switch to Scottish Power Online Saver 12 which should save a great deal.

rabbitmumu

OP hasn't mentioned how many people there are in the house. Having 1 radiator on vs 10 radiators on in the same house will make a difference.

[Deleted User]

andy888 wrote: »

My gas /electric supplier atlantic live in 5 bedroom 2 bath victorian house....pay 160 per month gas 113 electric... Can anyone compare are we paying too much????

If you join imeasure then you can input readings and get an energy rating to compare like with like. You can also join the MSE carbon club

http://www.imeasure.org.uk/home

andy888

Thanks Kittie, i will take a look at that.

MrChips

Me again. Switch is about to take place from EdF to Scottish Power and I have been asked for initial meter readings.

Looking at the electricity, we have used about 600kWh since we moved in at the beginning of January. Seems about right and consistent with about 4000 kWh per year (if you assume some of this is weighted towards the winter months).

Looking at gas, the meter (in cubic feet) has increased by 230 units, which I estimate is around 7000 kWh. Further to the query above, I have checked that both the meter and EdF are basing calculations on cubic feet. Now, one would expect a lot more gas usage in winter. We bought the house on 20 December, but didn't move in until around 6 January, but we kept the heating on for 3 hours a day before we moved in to stop pipes freezing. Does 7000 kWh over this time sounds "about right"?