Utility Meters Costing A Fortune!!!

Angel_Rachie

Please help I am on SSP (statutory sick pay) atm and its costing me £10pw in both my meters...thats £80 pcm which feels like an aweful lot for a single person in a small one bed flat.

I often cannot afford to put the heating on just put layers on and lots of blankets...im sick of being freezing cold and getting coughs/colds ect.

I have heard you can have the meters removed but companies charge for this - I am with Npower. I am also concerned that if my benefits get messed up I wouldnt be able to commit to a direct debit....any suggestions?

Consumerist

If you're on SSP then I assume you are at home during the day so keeping warm is bound to be more expensive than if you're at work. I am also assuming you're using pre-payment meters too which doesn't help - you need to get onto standard credit meters as soon as possible but this will require you to pay by direct debit for the cheapest rates.

You're between a rock and a hard place at the moment so I suggest you get in touch with Citizens Advice to see what options are available to you.

macman

There is an abiding myth that PPM's cost much more-they don't. You are paying the same as the supplier's Standard tariff rate.
Fitting credit meters will allow you to access the online discount tariffs, that will save you maybe 6% at most, and you may have to pay about £50 per meter for the change-and possibly put down a deposit for the first 12m.
£80pm in the winter is not unusual, remember that once the heating goes off in spring, your usage will plummet.

NittyGritty

an example of a winter bill, £290 odd,(billed every 3 months) summer bill, £123 (3 months)

[Deleted User]

I see Brit Gas and EDf have been doing a lot advertising about the lowering of standard tariff by 5% but dont seem to have lowered any of the other discounted rates, the online,dual fuel,direct debit etc.Looks like standard tariff is now about the same as all the other tariffs for these two companys.

chanz4

If you are struggling it will be worse on credit meters, as you use more than you think . pre-pays you see what your are spending and adjust your ways. People are right also about the charges been the same as a none dd tariff

jalexa

Angel_Rachie wrote: »

.thats £80 pcm which feels like an aweful lot for a single person in a small one bed flat.

£80/month should be enough not to be cold in a one bed flat. What type of heating system do you have? Are the meters set to recover debt?

chris1973

£80/month should be enough not to be cold in a one bed flat

Maybe, Maybe Not

Example

1 Bedroom Flat, 3x storage heaters consisting of, (1x) 3.4kw & (2x) 2.55kw types

The Heaters are set to an input of either 7 or 8, damper output is closed ('0') during overnight charge period and left closed whilst i'm at work, then turned up to fully open when I get back home from work.

Depending on outside temperature, all 3 heaters running consume a COMBINED average 48 - 57 units PER NIGHT. That is excluding hot water - (Immersion heaters cost far too much to run and are a luxury enjoyed by the higher paid)

I pay 5.33p on Off Peak Electricity with Npowers' standard E7 tariff.

From those winter usage nightly consumption figures, Taking an 'average' consumption of 50 units per night = £2.65 per night just for the Storage heaters.

£2.65 x 30 nights = £79.50 per month solely for running the 3 storage heaters and no hot water, or Electric Oven, Cooker, Kettle, Lighting, TV, Computer and general usage appliances taken into account on that particular equation.

In addition, the flat has no storage heating provision in the bathroom just a 2.4kw downflow style fan heater mounted on the wall, this can easily guzzle an extra couple of units per day during showering and whilst sat on the throne during freezing weather. Inevitably the use of this heater tends to occur outside of E7 rates - I pay 18.86p per KW/H from Npower for daytime Electricity. I did attempt to change both my showering and bowel movements to coincide with Npowers' E7 periods, unfortunately my body clock hasn't been programmed by the same genius who came up with the E7 concept, and i'm sure i'm not the only one not eager to rise at 4AM or 5AM just to shower, iron and put some washing in.

I also notice some E7 tariff's are also now well over 6p per KW/H so that would increase overnight cost even further, and increase beyond my example figures for people in a similar set up, but on a higher rate E7 tariff.

Often by late evening on a cold night, the E7 heating is played out, and the room temp is back down to 14c or 15c. On the nights this happened, I used to turn on a 3kw convector heater, 3 units per hour at 18.86p in addition to the night time storage heating. There goes another quid or two.

During mid-winter, with the Storage Heating running and topped up during colder periods with additional electric heating at peak rate rates, I can easily push £100 a month in December to February whilst still being 'careful'. If I was at home all day, or sick or ill and feeling the cold, I hate to think what my bills would be. I'm just glad I can manage to live without the immersion heater.

Its got to the point where I run a paraffin inverter heater now for top up heat during colder nights when the storage heaters are no longer able to keep the room at a liveable temperature - and its far cheaper than peak rate Electricity from Npower - I actually save around 10p / KWH when running a 3.2KW invertor heater over the 3kw Delonghi convector during peak rates. Either that or go to bed at 8pm........ like my 90 year old Grandmother.

Unfortunately, £80 / month is a reality in mid-winter, for some people living in older properties, especially those which don't form blocks of flats or are detached buildings without the benefit of clusters of other heated properties around them.

I imagine the reality of the cost of All electric properties would only hit home, if Gas prices also changed to a two tier system, and those with GCH were charged 5p Kw/H for overnight gas, and nearly 19p / Kwh for Gas used during the day and when they get home in the Evenings.

HappyMJ

@chris1973 -- Why have 3 storage heaters for a 1 bedroom flat then. I heat one room at a time. The room I occupy. That's it and my bills are much less than £100 a month in winter. I use a convector heater in the morning for 15 minutes or so in the bedroom just before E7 finishes and a mini oil filled radiator in the bedroom overnight and a convector heater in the lounge all day when I am in...only in the evening for a maximum of 4 hours or so on average per day. The water is also heated at night by E7 cheap night rate electricity.

And...you need to sort out Npower. I am with Npower and pay 4.49p at night and 15.15p during the day.

jalexa

chris1973 wrote: »

Maybe, Maybe Not

Unfortunately, £80 / month is a reality in mid-winter,

If your argument is that achieving a good standard of warmth with all-electric heating is not cheap then I won't disagree.

I used the phrase "not cold" rather than warm very deliberately. I also assumed that "£10pw in both my meters" indicated a gas supply. The OP complained of being "freeezing cold" and stated "I cannot afford to put the heating on". Something there doesn't fit with £80/month.

The OP asked for help but unless returning with clarification can't get meaningful help about how best to use total energy of £80 per month in winter, or less if there is undisclosed or unknown debt recovery on the meters. Which seems to me a possible explanation for the situation described.

grahamc2003

chris1973 wrote: »

Maybe, Maybe Not

Example

1 Bedroom Flat, 3x storage heaters consisting of, (1x) 3.4kw & (2x) 2.55kw types

The Heaters are set to an input of either 7 or 8, damper output is closed ('0') during overnight charge period and left closed whilst i'm at work, then turned up to fully open when I get back home from work.

Depending on outside temperature, all 3 heaters running consume a COMBINED average 48 - 57 units PER NIGHT. That is excluding hot water - (Immersion heaters cost far too much to run and are a luxury enjoyed by the higher paid)

.

That's a very high usage imo. Maybe when it's -10 outside, or maybe if your flat is massive or incredibly badly insulated, or maybe just expecting too much from the limitations storage heaters entail (i.e. wanting temps of 23C late into the night).
Your temperature profile I would guess is quite warm 24/7 (apart from late at night when the SH run out of steam). Must be very warm in the morning, even with the output set to zero, if the heaters are on max input (or near). 20 years ago, nobody thought twice about setting all storage heaters to the max since the relative price to do so was low, but these days I arrange it so I very rarely have any of my 8 storage heaters on max.

Like you, I have alternative heating in the main room (essential these days if minimising heating costs is a consideration) with storage heaters. So the main room is off all the time for me, and I light a woodburner to heat that when I'm there, and it gets cold when I'm not if no one else is in there - I don't see the point of having a nice warm room for many hours when there's no one in it, and I don't mind 15/30 minutes of a coldish room sometimes while i light the woodburner. Bedrooms get no heating apart from residual heat from everything else. (As an aside, I'm a recent convert to electric blankets - cool room, get into a warm bed, great) That leaves 3 storage heaters on medium, just to keep the chill off. Those rooms get too cold for lounging around in at night on cold winter nights, but by that time, everyone's in the very warm main room.

So you pays your money. If you want to walk into a warm flat after work (and that's a reasonable thing to want), then with storage heaters, you effectively have to heat it for the previous 16 or 18 hours, and even then, on the coldest nights, it will only be warm enough for 3/4 or 5 hours before you have to light your paraffin heater. If you're prepared to walk into a sometimes cold flat, and tolerate the cold for 15/20 minutes you could save much of your storage heater costs. Remember you're likely to be on-the-go generating your own heat during that time anyhow, so wouldn't feel the cold so much as later when you're possibly flopped in front of the telly or reading, not doing much physical.