Electric - £300 in 2 months !

Danny_10

I changed my tariff in june 2011 with EON, i rang them to see if they could reduce my bills

the man estimated my yearly bill would be £600 going by my previous 4 years bills which was a £150 saving on the tariff i was on at the time as i have been on economy 10 since 1993 and he was putting me on economy 7

ive got a 2 bedroom smallish bungalow and live on my own, 1 x 3.4kw storage heater in the sitting room & a 1.7kw heater in my bedroom, i have an electric shower and no bath tub as i have a wheel in shower room so my water heater is off permanently (for 5 years now), i have a 1 hour shower twice a week with my 9.7kw shower, i use my normal cooker every night for about 30 mins and thats all i use as im very efficient with leaving lights on and unplugging other things

ill round my bills up/down to nearest £10 ...

so my first bill was £200 for 4 months (1 month backdated + that quarter) i paid that

next bill sept - dec 2011 was for £200

next bill jan - mar 2012 was for £400

i rang today to ask why it was so much so she asked me to do a meter reading and then told me id used £300 worth in last 2 months and my bill is now £900

so in 10 months ive used £1,100 on this new tariff !

the woman i spoke to today said "i dont normally comment on people bills but considering your circumstances i have to say that your bill needs investigating"

so she said she will ring on friday and check my usage from today to friday as something seems wrong

so my question ... what the hell is going on with my bills?

as a rough estimate id say my years usage over the last few years was maybe £700-800 a year and that was economy 10

HappyMJ

Nothing...that's quite normal.

Would you like to post your kWh readings over the period concerned?

E7 is cheaper than E10 by a long way. It is a competitive tariff and suppliers discount the rate to win business. You have to select the right tariff paying by monthly direct debit and manage your bills online to save.

Danny_10

ive only got the £400 bill to hand which was jan - mar 2012

day 1,217kw
night 1,743kw

my bill also says "What did i use in the last 12 months" 8,508kw

im on the "eon fixed price october 2013"

first 900kwh 24.31p
next kwh 12.59p

they told me this was the best one as im up at night more than day

they just reeled off endless tariff's and i remember saying i have no idea what is best

Danny_10

it takes me a while to get in the shower and get done, id love to have two 5 mins shows a day but unfortunately thats not physically possible

HappyMJ

Danny_10 wrote: »

ive only got the £400 bill to hand which was jan - mar 2012

day 1,217kw
night 1,743kw

my bill also says "What did i use in the last 12 months" 8,508kw

im on the "eon fixed price october 2013"

first 900kwh 24.31p
next kwh 12.59p

they told me this was the best one as im up at night more than day

they just reeled off endless tariff's and i remember saying i have no idea what is best

That's very good.....and it is low usage. What is the rate charged for the night units?

Get onto a comparison website with those figures. Use 55% which is usually the default for the percentage used at night and compare and switch. You will need to take into account the cancellation fee when switching so if the cancellation fee is higher than the savings then don't switch.

In my area your tariff would cost £1,032 per year which is close to your £1,100 that you said you paid and switching to ScottishPower fixed price 2013 would save you £306 so it is well worth switching and paying the cancellation fee.

Another thing too....are you actually on an E7 rate. In my area the standard rate has a charge of about 12.67p/kWh for secondary units whilst the E7 rate has a charge of 15.41p/kWh for secondary day units.

I would still switch anyway but raise a complaint with them to get the charges backdated and refunded to you. The E7 rate is £100 per year cheaper than the standard rate.

Cardew

As said above that consumption and cost is not really high for an all electric house.

Even with gas the average bill is around £1,300 pa and electric is more expensive.

Richie-from-the-Boro

Danny, you might very well be eligible for a 'social tariff' for your energy bills, and after April OFWAT are supposed to be introducing a 'social tariff' for your water useage.

Are you paying DD and managing your bills and meter readings online ?

Terrylw1

If you had an E10 time switch meter, the only way they could convert you to E7 would be to change the meter as the time switch would still be set to 10 hours but your tariff wouldn't.

If its a radio teleswitch meter, they would ask the meter operator to change the metering data and update them (if E7 is compatible with the meter from a technology point of view) , then once received they could update the distributor with a code showing you as an E7 customer. This would alter the switch in times sent to the meter.

So, Haas any of that actually happened if you consider the timescales involved in visits or sending data between parties (the latter could be 5-7 days assuming no ba logs and system automation goes smoothly, no werkends between, etc)

Also, how many MPAN's have you got? If the answer is 2, they can't put you on E7 with changing your meter and disconnecting the redundant Heat element MPAN inline with their licence.

Danny_10

sorry for the delay in replies i had log in issues

yes they changed the meter

the new one has 2 modes and a sticker saying what they are

i looked up social tariff and im 41 so im not old enough just yet

as for what are my night and day rates i was sold this tariff on the fact that its 24.31p for the first 3 or 4 kwh then the rest were 12.59p (i think thats how it went and they are the 2 figures on my bill)

"normal first units used 222kwh at 24.31p" £53.97
"normal next units used 2,738kwh at 12.59p" £344.71

does this make sense

notbritishgas

Danny_10 wrote: »

sorry for the delay in replies i had log in issues

yes they changed the meter

the new one has 2 modes and a sticker saying what they are

i looked up social tariff and im 41 so im not old enough just yet

as for what are my night and day rates i was sold this tariff on the fact that its 24.31p for the first 3 or 4 kwh then the rest were 12.59p (i think thats how it went and they are the 2 figures on my bill)

"normal first units used 222kwh at 24.31p" £53.97
"normal next units used 2,738kwh at 12.59p" £344.71

does this make sense

No does not make sense.

You said in an earlier post that you had a day reading and a night reading. However it looks as if you are not on an E7 tariff because they have added the 2 rates together and charged at the normal tariff rate.

If you are on E7 you should have a seperate night amount on your bill and that would be charged at about 5p per kwh.

HappyMJ

It makes sense to me. You are on a standard rate which is a teribble tariff if you actually do have storage heating and heat water at night. It would be cheaper to use on demand electric heating as the same rate is charged at any time and you won't be wasting any heat whenever it is not required such as the early morning and during the day.

I'd switch as a matter of urgency. Today... then complain.