Help with HIGH lecky bills

fairyelephant1977

I live alone in a 1 bedroomed flat. I have an Economy 7 meter so day rate & night rate. I pay anything from £80 - £150 PER MONTH on Direct Debit. I am on Discounted Energy March 2012 (No standing charge)

I have battled with high electric bills since I moved in. Since then I have rehomed my 3 snakes as they had ceramic heating in their tanks, changed all of my storage heaters to energy efficiant ones, changed lecky supplier & got 'OCD' with turning everything off when not in use etc etc. It seems no matter what I do, my bills are just as high.

I do not know any other person that pays that much money living in a 1 bed flat on their own...

I recently discovered that my meter was runnng 2hrs ahead & really thought that this would be the cause of my high bills so sighed a sigh of relief. On 26th April 2011 Scottish Power came out & changed my meter & said they would wipe my £400 debit (debt) off of my account & reduce my DD's to £58 per month from June 2011. Finally I thought I'd sorted it.

I submitted new meter readings on Tues 17th May 2011.

Looking at my usage from 26th April 2011 up untill Tues 17th may Scottish Power have now contacted me & stated that my new DD will be £80 per month.

It seems I use 60% of my usage during the day & only 40% at night.

Come winter time I will be looking to probably pay the £150 a month again.

My average day usage is as follows -

Hairdryer - 5 mins per day
Straighteners - 5 mins per day
Portable Radio - on from 8:00 - 17:30
BT internet router - on from 17:30 - 11pm
Laptop - on from 17:30 - 11pm

Home phone station (that phone sits in) on 24/7
Mobile phone charger - on from 11pm - 7am
Hoover - use once every 2 days for 10 mins
Electric oven - on 30 mins in evening (Max)
Kettle - boil a small amount of water (enough for 1 cup) up to twice in evening
Microwave - use a max of 15 mins a week
Electric shower - 1 a day
Fridge/Freezer - on 24/7
Lamp - on from 21:00 - 22:30
TV - on from 17:30 - 11pm
Other Lighting - max of 10 mins per day



Does this justify my high bills?

I need to do something about this as its driving me nuts..

Any info at all I would be grateful for

Thanks in advance

grahamc2003

fairyelephant1977 wrote: »

I live alone in a 1 bedroomed flat. I have an Economy 7 meter so day rate & night rate. I pay anything from £80 - £150 PER MONTH on Direct Debit. I am on Discounted Energy March 2012 (No standing charge)

I have battled with high electric bills since I moved in. Since then I have rehomed my 3 snakes as they had ceramic heating in their tanks, changed all of my storage heaters to energy efficiant ones, changed lecky supplier & got 'OCD' with turning everything off when not in use etc etc. It seems no matter what I do, my bills are just as high.

I do not know any other person that pays that much money living in a 1 bed flat on their own...

I recently discovered that my meter was runnng 2hrs ahead & really thought that this would be the cause of my high bills so sighed a sigh of relief. On 26th April 2011 Scottish Power came out & changed my meter & said they would wipe my £400 debit (debt) off of my account & reduce my DD's to £58 per month from June 2011. Finally I thought I'd sorted it.

I submitted new meter readings on Tues 17th May 2011.

Looking at my usage from 26th April 2011 up untill Tues 17th may Scottish Power have now contacted me & stated that my new DD will be £80 per month.

It seems I use 60% of my usage during the day & only 40% at night.

Come winter time I will be looking to probably pay the £150 a month again.

My average day usage is as follows -

Hairdryer - 5 mins per day
Straighteners - 5 mins per day
Portable Radio - on from 8:00 - 17:30
BT internet router - on from 17:30 - 11pm
Laptop - on from 17:30 - 11pm

Home phone station (that phone sits in) on 24/7
Mobile phone charger - on from 11pm - 7am
Hoover - use once every 2 days for 10 mins
Electric oven - on 30 mins in evening (Max)
Kettle - boil a small amount of water (enough for 1 cup) up to twice in evening
Microwave - use a max of 15 mins a week
Electric shower - 1 a day
Fridge/Freezer - on 24/7
Lamp - on from 21:00 - 22:30
TV - on from 17:30 - 11pm
Other Lighting - max of 10 mins per day



Does this justify my high bills?

I need to do something about this as its driving me nuts..

Any info at all I would be grateful for

Thanks in advance

Can you post some meter readings? You don't use anything to cause higher than average bills.

The £80pm sp have calculated is based on their estimate for a full year and divided by 12. So your payments shouldn't go up in the winter, even though you'll use much more electricity then. (That's the whole idea of these dd payments, build up a surplus in the summer, and use the surplus in the winter, evenually ending back at zero.

Their calculations will be based on last years usage. If you had snakes in a hot environment lasa year, then you probably used lots of electricity fo that, and sp may be assuming you'll use the same amount this year. So they may have calculated your dd higher than it will actually work out.

What are you new efficient storage heaters? Do you mean you've replaced old ones with new ones - in which case they have the potential to lower your bill a little. they should only come on when your meter thinks it's cheap rate - is that the case?

fairyelephant1977

Many thanks for responding.

The heaters I switched to are Dimplex Electric Panel Radiators. Got them as they got good reviews & one of the selling points was low cost to run. Small one in bedroom & hallway and 1 larger one in lounge. Never use the one in the hallway so just bedroom & lounge. Have these set to come on on setting 1 (lowest) for 1 1/2 from 5am. & then come on at 5pm at night for 1 1/2.

Meter reading just taken now. This is total usage since they changed the meter on 26th April

Rate 1: 00063.16 (Night Rate)
Rate 2: 00079.66 (Day rate)

I put some letters throught neighbours doors inmy block earlier.

One just knocked on my door. She is in a 2 bed flat. With Scottish Power, lives alone like me & pays £60 a month & has done since she moved in a year and a half ago. Be interesting to know what some of the others say so hopefully they will get back to me.

mattcanary

Which part of the country do you live in fairyelephant, and who is your supplier?

fairyelephant1977

Live buckinghamshire & with Scottish Power.

Thanks

kibblerok

Your usage only equates to about £20 quids worth (using rough prices) in a little under a month. Have you asked Scottish Power why they were able to just wipe off £400 of debt from your account after the meter change? Sounds like something could have been up with that meter.

Also are your new heaters storage or just electric radiators? If not storage - come the winter you could find an E7 tariff may be costing you more.... and also pretty much wasting that energy used at 5am when you're tucked up in bed, and a premium at 5pm when they are on - although it was several years ago I used them, those type of heaters didn't keep the heat around long after being switched off.

grizzly1911

The big users in your list will potentially be the shower (depends how long you are in i probably £1 per hour.

Panel heaters, even the slim line ones will be a big drain. Do you need them on at this time of year?

Background 24/7 usage will probably be around £8/10 per month. such as fridge freezer, odd chargers and such like.

Scottish_Power

Hi fairyelephant1977,

I am sorry to hear that you are having such difficulty.

From what you have said you have removed your Economy 7 storage heaters and fitted instant heat Panel heaters. These heaters are effective but you will only receive half price heating during the off peak times for exampe when you arrive home at 5.30pm and switch you heaters on you are being charged at the day rate. These heaters may be more energy efficient compared to plug in heaters but unfortunatly not compared to storage heaters.

If you require energy efficiency advice please call our Energy efficiency free phone number on 0800332233 who will discuss with you ways of reducing your usage.

If you would like to discuss you account history in more depth please PM me with account number and i would be please to have a look at this for you.

Kind regards

Marie @ scottishpower

fairyelephant1977

Hi Guys thanks for responding..

I use my shower once a day for a max of about 7 mins! (to be exact!)

Heaters are only used from about Nov through to feb the times i listed. They were adverstised at 2p per hour to run & as I say I only use 2. They are not like the old storage heaters that were far from useless as by the time i got home all the heat had been immersed so it was cold again!

No Offence Marie but I have spokent ot the energy efficiency line lots of times previously.. and I didn't find them very useful.

I am borrowing an energy monitor at the weekend so I can pin point exactly what appliane cost what to run.

I cant believe the lady downstairs from me who is in a 2 bed (I am in a 1 bed) has paid allot less than me since she has been there, is with the same comany Scottish Power, has very simular heaters, and has her family come to stay regularly also!

Am I able to change to a tarrif that maybe charges lss during daytime hours?

Surely SP would of ran through my options considering i have called them sooooooooo many times before about my high bills?

Everyone I speak to about my lecky bills say exactly the same.. 'That is NOT right, there MUST be a problem somewhere...!'

so its not just me!

Fed up of paying so much!

grahamc2003

fairyelephant1977 wrote: »

Hi Guys thanks for responding..


Heaters are only used from about Nov through to feb the times i listed. They were adverstised at 2p per hour to run & as I say I only use 2. They are not like the old storage heaters that were far from useless as by the time i got home all the heat had been immersed so it was cold again!

!

I think you may have received some bad advice regarding your heaters. If they only cost 2p/hr to run, then you are only getting about 200w of heat from them, which is the same as from a couple of olf style light bulbs. Surely the panel heaters must be at least 1kw (which would cost about 10/11p/hr depeding on your tarif) and probably 2kw(20/22p/hr) to give out meaningful heat. The costs would be about 1/2 those rates for times during e7 cheap hours (which is probably between 01:30 and 08:30 each day atm.

For the last 4 weeks,your bills should be something like 63x5p = £3.15 for night use, and 80x10p = £8 mfor day use plus the standing chage equivalent of about £8, so about £20 (depending on your tarif). That is probably to be expected at this time of the year, especially with your heating on (heating is the only really big user of electricity). In the winter, ifyou use day time electricity with your panel heaters and you ike it warm, your bills will go up quite a bit - for indstance 10hours at 3kw average (2x2kw plus cycling on and off) will add on £3/£4 per day (and you place may not even be that warm, depedning on insulation, windows etc).

crunchynuts

Size of TV is important. My 47" uses 280W, that's more than an outside 200W security light being on all evening!:eek: