how much gas is average??

carolwat

Having just received my latest bill for gas and electric I am again gobsmacked at the cost. Now this bill is from correct readings both at the start of the quarter and was just read again a couple of days ago.

Electric I used 1596 kwh at a cost of £234.28 which is fair I think, well im not overly concerned anyway.

Gas I used 18021 kwh at a cost of £670.92 which seems an awful lot considering im cold in the house during the day to cut down on usage as theres onl me home anyway during this time. It just seems to be an awful lot and im so pleased I sit here cold rather than giving in a putting the heating up every day as who knows what the cost would be.

Anyway im wondering how this compares to other peoples usage.

Idiophreak

Guess it depends how well insulated your home is, how big it is, how many people there are living there etc.

Personally, I pay £54/month for gas and elec combined. This is for me and my wife living in a well insulated 2 bed flat. In truth, the place is ridiculously hot most of the time and we often need to open the windows to get it cool enough to sleep in. I think we could probably halve out bill if we turned the heating off (only on for a couple of hours per day anyway) and actually turned the hallway lights out more often (8 halogen spotlamps, EAT electricity...)

carolwat

Im not sure how well insulated it is as we rent it and ive no idea if it has cavity wall insulation etc. Its a 4 bed detached and theres 3 of us here. I dont have it on constant and in fact sit in the cold during the day when my little one is at school.

HappyMJ

carolwat wrote: »

Im not sure how well insulated it is as we rent it and ive no idea if it has cavity wall insulation etc. Its a 4 bed detached and theres 3 of us here. I dont have it on constant and in fact sit in the cold during the day when my little one is at school.

Most heat is lost through the roof. Have a look in the loft and see how much insulation is there. However, a 4 bedroom detached house I would expect to use more than 20,000kWh of gas for central heating and hot water.

macman

carolwat wrote: »

Having just received my latest bill for gas and electric I am again gobsmacked at the cost. Now this bill is from correct readings both at the start of the quarter and was just read again a couple of days ago.

Electric I used 1596 kwh at a cost of £234.28 which is fair I think, well im not overly concerned anyway.

Gas I used 18021 kwh at a cost of £670.92 which seems an awful lot considering im cold in the house during the day to cut down on usage as theres onl me home anyway during this time. It just seems to be an awful lot and im so pleased I sit here cold rather than giving in a putting the heating up every day as who knows what the cost would be.

Anyway im wondering how this compares to other peoples usage.

Average annual consumption for a 3 b/r house with gas CH and DWH would be around 16,500 kWh.
Are these your annual consumption figures, or your last quarter only? If the latter, something is badly amiss, even in a winter quarter! if they are annual figures, your electricity consumption is less than half the average-which is why I'm querying it.
Since cavity wall and loft insultaion is available for free, renting is not a disincentive to get it installed if necessary.

carolwat

macman wrote: »

Average annual consumption for a 3 b/r house with gas CH and DWH would be around 16,500 kWh.
Are these your annual consumption figures, or your last quarter only? If the latter, something is badly amiss, even in a winter quarter! if they are annual figures, your electricity consumption is less than half the average-which is why I'm querying it.

Oh I wish it was my annual usage but no, its between 22 Nov 2011and 21 Feb 2012.

Happy MJ would you expect that usage for 3 months or for a year please?

macman

No-something is badly wrong. That's a whole year average usage in 3 months! Go back to your earlier bills and calculate your annual kWh gas consumption in previous years.
You also need to check your meter-is it metric or imperial (it's stamped on the front, 100 ft3 or m3)? It is possible that you are being wrongly billed due to an incorrect meter type being recorded.
How many gas units are shown as used on the recent bill that converts to 18,021kWh?
Have you checked the current meter reading to ensure that it's not a misread?

HappyMJ

carolwat wrote: »

Oh I wish it was my annual usage but no, its between 22 Nov 2011and 21 Feb 2012.

Happy MJ would you expect that usage for 3 months or for a year please?

For a year...There is something seriously wrong if that is your quarterly figure even if it is the winter quarter.

macman

Have you had a meter change recently?
18,021kWh should be billed as about 1,586 gas units on a metric meter, or 561 units on an imperial meter. If the meter was changed from imperial to metric, and you are still being billed on the imperial conversion, you are being overbilled by a factor of about 2.83.
If so, your actual consumption for the quarter would have been about 6,368kWh-perfectly normal for a winter quarter.

TAG

Hi carolwat,

Just to give you a comparison really.

I live in a rented 4 bed end terrace. We have no cavity wall insulation and about 4 inches of loft insulation. 3 of us here as well.

Central heating come on at 2.30 in the afternoon and goes off at 10.00 ish at night. No other heating in the house. Our thermostat is in the hallway and the boiler is on constantly during those times as the hallway never reaches the temperature set on the thermostat. Even if it's only set to 18 degrees.

I allow £500 for my gas AND electric bill for the Nov to Feb bill, just in case.

This years bill was £287 for gas and £140 for electric. Last years bills were £305 for gas and £120 for electric. That's with British Gas.

So your gas bill really is very high and likely to be very wrong.

Rupert_Bear

We live in a big Victorian house and pay combined £95.00 per month and we are already £420.00 in credit.