Storage heaters + Economy 7 + npower = CONFUSED!

munkster

Hope someone can shed some light on this - called up npower today asking to come off Economy 7 since we only have one storage heater now that we don't use very much (1 hour a day over the winter maybe, to keep the downstairs lav above zero) and think it might be cheaper to be on a non-E7 tariff. They said this is not possible as long as we have even one storage heater in the property and that in any case the meter would have to be changed.

Does this sound dodgy to anyone? They assured me that this was standard practice (that you MUST be on an E7 tariff if you have a storage heater) for npower and sort of said it was an industry-wide policy so I believed them pending my own investigations.

In short, am I allowed to have a non-E7 meter installed and run a storage heater off it, swallowing the extra cost when it is being charged but benefitting from a cheaper day rate?

I haven't done the full sums on it (given they wouldn't even entertain the idea of me switching to a non-E7 tariffs so don't know what £/unit we're looking at) but feel that the small amount we use the storage heater surely outweighs the higher daytime tariff you have on E7...

Hope this makes sense, it's confusing me in a chicken/egg kinda way. Thanks in advance as always.

Mugget

Your perfectly entitled to a single rate meter if you only have one storage heater. Do u have gas in the rest of the house? Npower can not dictate to you what to have especially if in the end it could save u money

munkster

Yep, gas hot water and C/H throughout - to put a rad in the downstairs lav would be an extravagance too far I think!

They seemed pretty adamant that it wasn't allowed however, and obviously even if they relented I suspect they'll tell me there's some ruinous charge for changing the meter over... They may not do of course but that's my assumption of what might happen.

Mugget

My advice would be to swap supplier then! You can't be forced to keep a meter that is costing you money!

Ewatai

They can't force you to keep the eco7 meter, but you may find the storage heater may not work once the meter is changed. if its connected to the off peak tails you might need to get a private leccy out to connect it to your main consumer unit.

seafarers_wife

phone back and speak to someone else. tell them you have gas central heating and no need of the E7 meter and they will be able to book an engineer (most likely free of charge) to change the meter for you. its all down to the individual advisor and as long as you are made aware that the storage heaters you have in the property will no longer work when not on an E7 meter then there is no reason why not to change the meter.

munkster

Update here - I've just done some calculations (I do love a spreadsheet) and it turns out that it is actually marginal on whether being on a non-E7 tariff (the same one with npower but just not E7) is cheaper or not - I've been keeping meter readings religiously since January so I'm pretty certain about our consumption. We *will* be using the remaining storage heater over the very cold months (to stop the downstairs lav from freezing up) as I think I said originally but just not very much hence why I was thinking a non-E7 tariff would just be cheaper. For all the upheaval I think I'll stay put - it seems that npower are coming out very near the top on price comparison websites for us so maybe this is as good as it gets!!

Thanks all for thoughts and your time to respond!