Electricity too expensive

Premier_2

KxMx wrote: »

...When out quarterly gas & electric for the winter should come in under £150 combined :beer:

That may be more achieveable, for those that are particularly frugal

HappyMJ

Premier wrote: »

£80 total for gas & electric for the quarter over this coldest winter since anyone can remember???

I wish... :cool:

Same here I'm already up near the £250 mark (estimated). Gas heated lounge. Electrically heated bathroom/bedroom. I bet £80 is what is outstanding after the monthly direct debits of X have been taken.

teajug

Many thanks for information just had the electrict meter read last week and then received a notice that they are doubling my monthly payments.
I would like the council to check the wiring to each flat but they said that I would have to arrange and pay for this myself.

I was not aware that I could see the bill for the gas will it have each individual flat separately, or will it be a blanket bill for all of the flats.

Flats vary for bedsits to 2 bed flats and I assume we are all being billed for the same amount which is unfair becasuse some flats have more than one member living in it. So a 2 flat there can be a family of 4 or 5 but pay the same amount as a person living alone in a one bed flat.

Do you know who I should approach for sight of the gas bill and should I press for a direct supply of gas using the meter installed in my flat.

We used to have a TA but the officers turned out to self-serving and it was disbanded.

KxMx

Sorry if I wasn't clear- (and if you read my post you will see we have quarterly bills NOT direct debits HappyMJ) around £80 for the electric since Gas has come in already (estimated £55, judging by last year I think that is around £10 too low). Company reads for one bill, estimates the next, then reads again, and so on.

I wouldn't call us frugal honestly but we are not wasteful or extravagant. Appliances are switched off promptly and we don't program the heating to come on every day/twice a day- we switch on for an hour (or half an hour if it's not arctic) when it is too cold and use blankets and hot water bottles in winter. The spare room's heater is turned off and the bathroom on a lower setting since it is quite small. We use mainly energy saving bulbs and again lights are not left on.

HappyMJ

teajug wrote: »

Many thanks for information just had the electrict meter read last week and then received a notice that they are doubling my monthly payments.
I would like the council to check the wiring to each flat but they said that I would have to arrange and pay for this myself.

I was not aware that I could see the bill for the gas will it have each individual flat separately, or will it be a blanket bill for all of the flats.

Flats vary for bedsits to 2 bed flats and I assume we are all being billed for the same amount which is unfair becasuse some flats have more than one member living in it. So a 2 flat there can be a family of 4 or 5 but pay the same amount as a person living alone in a one bed flat.

Do you know who I should approach for sight of the gas bill and should I press for a direct supply of gas using the meter installed in my flat.

We used to have a TA but the officers turned out to self-serving and it was disbanded.

Doubling the payments means you were paying about £20 per month. Is that right? You need to figure out your annual usage. £20 per month is too low whilst £40 per month is on the high side but if it's offsetting the low £20 per month payments then it's right.

You need to speak to the managing agents. The ones that ask you to pay £40 per month. You can ask to see the bill which I'm assuming is all on 1 meter. Then you can ask to see how they calculate it. Maybe they are already taking into account the 2 bed flats. Getting a direct supply may not be worth doing. Do you have to pay a service charge for the common areas of the block. Maybe the gas also accounts for that usage too and then to seperate it out into each seperate flat and another bill for the common areas wouldn't be worth it. Each gas metered property would have to pay a standing charge and at the moment you are all sharing 1 standing charge.

HappyMJ

KxMx wrote: »

Sorry if I wasn't clear- (and if you read my post you will see we have quarterly bills NOT direct debits HappyMJ) around £80 for the electric since Gas has come in already (estimated £55, judging by last year I think that is around £10 too low). Company reads for one bill, estimates the next, then reads again, and so on.

I wouldn't call us frugal honestly but we are not wasteful or extravagant. Appliances are switched off promptly and we don't program the heating to come on every day/twice a day- we switch on for an hour (or half an hour if it's not arctic) when it is too cold and use blankets and hot water bottles in winter.

You won't but I will. You are frugal.... £80 electric and £55 gas actual bills for the winter quarter. Wow!!! Annualized what's that. £520? Only £10 per week.

I use Imeasure.org.uk to track my usage and compare with others and only the electric is counted on that. So far I am the lowest of the 1 person households on the MSE graph and my bills are much higher than yours. I am frugal.

KxMx

Well I suppose I have been brought up not to see daily/twice daily heating etc so to me quarterly bills and careful useage are a way of life, because sadly we have always been low-income (and my plan to work myself out of that trap had the kibosh put on it by the Hospital which got a diagnosis wrong, through laziness and not a genuine mistake, so no wonder the treatment didn't work! They are on the right track now though so here's hoping I can get out there and earn some money!)

teajug

HappyMJ wrote: »

Doubling the payments means you were paying about £20 per month. Is that right? You need to figure out your annual usage. £20 per month is too low whilst £40 per month is on the high side but if it's offsetting the low £20 per month payments then it's right.

You need to speak to the managing agents. The ones that ask you to pay £40 per month. You can ask to see the bill which I'm assuming is all on 1 meter. Then you can ask to see how they calculate it. Maybe they are already taking into account the 2 bed flats. Getting a direct supply may not be worth doing. Do you have to pay a service charge for the common areas of the block. Maybe the gas also accounts for that usage too and then to seperate it out into each seperate flat and another bill for the common areas wouldn't be worth it. Each gas metered property would have to pay a standing charge and at the moment you are all sharing 1 standing charge.

Thanks HappyJM, the gas is with Council and Electricity is my choice, I have asked for both to be my choice as it would be more of a saving for me. The council refused to do this becasue they want to keep control of the gas despite gas menters in each tenants flat. Also, I feel that it would be better for the environment as tenants leave the heating on becasue they will not be charged any more for it other then than the blanket charge that the council send out each April. I see you point regarding standing charge for the gas, but if I was to use the same supplier would that not be just one standard charge for gas and electricty.

We do pay a service charge seprate to the rent and gas but we get very little by way of cleaning in the block for it. On my standard service charge I have estimated the whole block of 62 flats the council is getting 24K a year.

Many thanks for information regarding seeing the bill for the block but I think they council will refuse to let me see it. I will speak to the housing office and see what they say.

Electricity with Southern Electric and I was paying £20 a month which I thought was correct for what I used but they have sent me a bill saying that I own £149.60 and is why they have put it up to £41 a month. Just look at bill again it has give me a breakdown saying that my Electric usage is £7.69 daily this is high for one person using very little electric duing the day, kettle. TV and laptop, got saving bulbs and use a microwave and fridge as well as using the washing machine on average every 3 weeks.

victor2

teajug wrote: »

The electricy is independent and we can use any company we like but I am wondering if there is a problem with the wiring up to everyone flat. Is there a gismo that would let me know how much electricity that I am using that would at least give me something to go on and probably get the council to check wiring up to people flats. :eek:

Some electricity supply companies offer a free monitor, just look on the website for yours and see if they offer anything. If you are not within easy reach of the meter though, it'll be no use.
Another free way to check is to read your meter daily at the same time and see what you are using under different circumstances.
If neither of those are practical, you could consider a monitor to use in a single socket, something like this. You could probably get one a bit cheaper off fleabay. They can only tell you about the device plugged into them though, where something like the Owl monitor does the entire draw on the metered supply.
To quickly check if any other flat is drawing on your meter, switch everything off in your flat and check the meter - it should not be registering anything at all, even if left for 30 minutes or longer.

Mrs_Arcanum

Gas is definitely too high. We only have gas heating/water in a 3 bed semi. and ours is £35 pcm. I would check your readings for both gas & electric once a week for a couple of weeks to get an average. Then see if you can check prices accordingly.