Extremely high electicity bills.

macman

This makes no sense. What sort of billing are you on-monthly DD, quarterly DD, or quarterly payment on receipt of bill?
The billing calculations are clearly shown on the bill, so please post the figures. What we need to know is how many kWh's for the billing period, and how many days? Estimated or actual readings?
How does this correspond to the actual meter readings you have taken for the same period?
You are now saying that your account is in debit by £260, not that your actual usage this month is £260?

jalexa

dchurch24 wrote: »

EDIT: Sorry, I had to laugh at the 'by phone' bit. Have you ever tried phoning BG?

I totally understand that. But sometimes solving problems -to your advantage - requires focused determination.

dchurch24

macman wrote: »

You are now saying that your account is in debit by £260, not that your actual usage this month is £260?

Yes, sorry about that. The on-line app only showed last month and this month and had the words "No arrears" in the list. I foolishly saw that and assumed 'no arrears' ;-)

"Electricity Standard with EnergySmart" is the tarrif.

24 Aug 12 - estimated 55882 Estimated
20 Sep 12 - estimated 56521 Estimated
= 639.00 kWh used over 28 days (estimated)
21 Sep 12 - estimated 56521 Estimated
23 Sep 12 - estimated 56594 Estimated
= 73.00 kWh used over 3 days (estimated)
First 61 kWh x 23.643p £14.42
Next 651 kWh x 11.031p £71.81
Cost of electricity used this period £86.23

Hmmm...ok. Just logged in and got the "detailed" view, which I didn't do this morning. It's quite misleading, their website. It says things like "no arrears" when there are, and coupled with that it suggests that the amount due is the amount used, on the front page. It's only when you go to the detailed view that you get the real story.
£86 is a bit better. Still seems very high to me, but I can live with that I suppose. I still don't know why I'm bothering to submit readings though looking at that - they seem to estimate it regardless.

I think I may have simply panicked after looking at their front page this morning. I might email them and suggest better working than 'no arrears'. Now I've had more time to look at it, it's making more sense.
Still a bit concerned about the reading being much higher than their estimated though. Time will tell I suppose.

macman

No time will not tell, you need to resolve the issue or face a bigger catch up bill. Suggestions:
1) phone your meter readings in and get an accurate billing, until you do that it's pointless debating your billing.
2) you are on Standard tariff, which is always the supplier's most expensive. Switch to their cheapest online discount tariff.
3) switch everything else off and do a meter test by use of your electric heater. A 2kW heater will use 1kWh in 30 minutes; the rating will be marked on the heater. That should establish if the meter issue requires further investigation.

dchurch24

Actually, I'm getting some very interesting readings from that website now I've drilled down a bit.

Every three months, exactly, my usage (regardless of if I'm actually there or not - i.e. on holiday or away for work), my monthly usage shoots up to around 2500kWh per month.

In June for instance, I used 7865kWh, which came to £918. The next month I used 661kWh. Month after is very similar, then the month after that it shoots up to 2500kWh again. Looking at the history, this pattern has been repeated for at least the last 2.5 years.

EDIT: Seriously, I don't have time to phone the meter readings in, hence why I submit them on their website - seemingly for no reason. I get 30 minutes for lunch and phoning BG (or most big firms these days tbh) in my experience takes longer than that. I don't get home until after their phone line closes.

macman

When I was with BG (admittedly a couple of years back) it was extremely quick to get through. Why can you not phone at the weekend-they are open 8am-6p on Saturdays/ The online system will continue to reject your readings because they are completely out of kilter with previous (estimated) ones. You are then billed accordingly on estimated readings. If you can't be bothered to sort out your meter readings then the problem will not be resolved.
Something is seriously amiss if you are being billed for 2,500kWh in a single month. Based on 24kWh per day your usage is double the average, but that month is about 500% higher than average! How can this have gone on for 2 and a half years without you raising it? If you are only paying £50-60 per month, then the billing system would show you to be massively in arrears.

victor2

As macman says, phone them and get your readings straight. They're open from 8am to 8pm and also Saturdays from 8am to 6pm. It's a freephone number so make time. They claim very short average answer times, but you'll just have to be persistent.
Figures derived from estimated readings are useless. You need to get the readings sorted out and monitor your usage from then on. No need for fancy gadgets at this point, just read your meter regularly.

dchurch24

I've never really dealt with the bills, it's only since my partner and I split that I've been doing them myself. I think the 24kWh average is only for the last month.
I'm baffled as to why it shoots up every three months though, and baffled as to why I'm still being given estimated bills when I've been submitting meter readings. I'm baffled how I could use an entire average for a year in one month as well.

Their website is extremely confusing. On the graph it says that I used 2121kWh last June. If I download the PDF it says I used 545kWh.
The PDF says I was 53 quid in credit, and that I then paid 203 quid. Leaving 149.81 in debit. Someone's maths is not quite right here.
It's seemingly impossible to know what to pay and what my usage is.

I will phone them on Saturday.

macman

The system will reject any meter readings that it believes are erroneous, and substitute it's own estimates. There is no human intervention in the billing process unless you query it and get the right readings into the system.
Do a meter test tonight and post the results. There may or may not be a meter issue, but regardless of that you still need to get your billing resolved first.
And get off Standard tariff-you are just throwing more money away by remaining on that.
I'm still unclear as to what and how you actually pay monthly.

dchurch24

The bills vary wildly monthly. They've been phoning me for payment, or I have been paying via on-line banking and making one-off payments.
When they've billed me in the region of 900 quid (in one month!) I've made lesser payments as there's no way I could afford to live if I were to pay those in full.
I'll do the test tonight.