Excess Gas Usage In Rented Property

Sharon30

Hi

Not sure if I'm posting in correct part of the forum but looking for some advice or opinions with a problem we are having.

Moved into our rented property in Dec 11, its a 7 year old build with 4 bedrooms, 2 public rooms, kitchen, utility room, wc, bathroom so we have 13 radiators in total and a combi boiler!! As its a large house we were as careful as we could be regarding use of gas & electricity, house had been empty for a while so when moving in had to heat up the house. The landord advised it was a weekly payment using a card for the gas and a key token system for electricity. Changed details over etc over some confusion as to what meters we actually had.

Made weekly payments for both but knew we would owe more for gas when we received our first statement as provider couldn't base us on anything. Our first shock came when we received our first quartly statement advising us we had a bill of just over £1200.00 excluding what we already had paid. After picking myself up of the floor I immediately contacted our supplier, after an hour on the phone and while he spoke to various people and departments we were told something was clearly wrong and not to worry but it would be sorted out, he asked if we had a swimming pool which I thought he was joking about but told him we didn't even have a fish pond or any water feature. We were told it could take some time to resolve probably looking at around an 8 week timescale.

I will save you from every problem I encountered on this jouney but after many dispute the company said the gas meter would have to be checked which happened and no fault was found, with new meter we were told by a member of complaints to keep track of readings for a week as we had been reading meter and there still seamed to be a problem, we were advised that for 5 days readings keeping heating on for 4 hrs a day and using a small bath for our 2 babies each night it was costing us approx £38 for gas every 5 days. While this was going on with every call to complaints and customer service it would generate a letter asking us to increase our weekly amount (excluding arrears) and at one point a letter arrived asking us due to our usage to pay £83 a WEEK (excluding arrears) which in turn would result in us having to call each time. A complaints manager then advised that although they knew there was a problem it looked to be a problem internally and we would need a gas engineer.

To let u understand for all these months I have had we dad insisting that there was a definate problem (has teached gas for 30 years) and had worked things out but it was getting to technical for me but he could never touch the boiler as he's not registered to do so, I feel as if I've been piggy in the middle all this time.

I was stumped as when we first moved in we had a gas engineer from the company who is contracted by our landlord, we have a further couple of faults and an annual check carried out in June, and the last twice the engineer had visited for other issues I explained the problems we were having and asked could they see anything that would cause a problem which we were told no. Anyway I contacted our landlord to explain straight after my conversation with our supplier when they told us it must be an internal problem, my landlord advised he would get engineer out but also said he was going to contact the company he had a contract with as surely they should have picked up on something.

Engineer visited from the same company as all the other times and discovered the the settings on the boiler were set at the highest settings so he reset them back to manufacturers settings, he advised that who installed boiler had made a mess of it and looks as if the settings were set that way at install, other problems were wrong flu on boiler our should be clamped, no release pipe (which our landlord knew was missing when we moved in but this wasn't covered for in his contract) and another couple of things. The engineer issued us with a warning notice and advised he would call landlord with a price as things outwith contract.

Landlord has arranged for an engineer he knows to carry out the work but my problem is my husband and I are held financially responsible for this huge bill outstanding but feel we are in the middle of a problem that isn't our fault as we moved in to the house in good faith that boiler was the way it should be, also in my opinion my landlord would have a good clause to dispute with company, also as I have sinced found out we don't have a copy of Landlord's Gas Safety Certificate which to be honest don't think my landlord actually has this as I have mentioned this is an e-mail.

Sorry for this post being so long winded but does anyone think we have a case for asking the landlord for some sort of financial contribution towards this bill, I think he thinks I'm a bit of a soft touch as we've carried out small repairs etc and never bothered him with small or minor issues e.g. found a leak from the wc sink which had been leaking for years so we fixed that and replaced floor covering etc. I don't want to get on the wrong foot with my landlord as we are really settled here. Just looking for some opinions or maybe some other people have found themselves in this situation with a gas problem.

Thanks

rogerblack

Sharon30 wrote: »

with new meter we were told by a member of complaints to keep track of readings for a week as we had been reading meter and there still seamed to be a problem, we were advised that for 5 days readings keeping heating on for 4 hrs a day and using a small bath for our 2 babies each night it was costing us approx £38 for gas every 5 days.

It is extremely unlikely that any fault in the boiler is relevant significantly, unless it's letting gas escape in truly heroic quantities.
This would be very, very noticeable, and would be picked up by even the most incompetent boiler service person.


Some details would be good.
When was this test performed - what was the weather?

The absolute most a normal boiler could use would be about 30kW*4h*5 = 600kWh*4p = 24 pounds.
This would be an extremely unusual case, of a large boiler firing constantly.
A 7 year old house should not need this much heat, unless you habitually leave the windows open.

This raises the issue that you've read the meter wrong.
http://www.bis.gov.uk/nmo/gas-and-electricity-meters/gas-meters-introduction/Gas-bill-calculation

Getting cubic feet and meters confused would lead to an error of the 38 pounds being actually a little under 2.

Other information that would be useful - what is your actual per-unit price of gas?

What's the model of your boiler, or if you know it the heat output in kW.

chanz4

I would ask him for some, however I would ask him for the meter test fee back

Sharon30

Hi

Thanks we also had a second opinion who advised that Hotwater Kw was running at 29.1 kw when boiler max is 29 kw. We were told that the boiler should have cut off point which ours wasn't doing. Temp Lead at heat exchanger was broken off.

The gas meter was removed and replaced and tested by an independant company appointed under the Gas Act 1986 and tested which found the meter to have a maximum working capacity of 6 cubic metres per hour.

Our house isn't a cold house and we never leave windows open, there are no room stat but we have the radiator thermostats at 2 or 3.

The meter readings have been checked and checked as we started to think we have been losing the plot!!

Our boiler is a Vokera Compact 28 model. Last engineer was here on 12th October and it was him who said operating pressure was set too high. Just looked at his report and said he adjusted it to 10.2 & 1.9 (not sure how relevant) when the report from a previous engineer has it recorded at 20.

There are also other things noted on the report like gas pipework not bonded or sealed.

A lot of our paperwork is at my parents at the moment, but looking at another bill our consumption charge is 3.794p and this one is saying 898 = 10000 Kwh used.

We have spoken to every relevant body who keep telling us the same, if the meter has been tested then its ok. Replacement meter and when we take meter readings everyone keeps telling us its unusually high but that we are billed for what is actually getting used. This has been going on for so long now.

Don't know if this makes any sense to you.

Also although provider insisting that we would pay for meter test as a goodwill they didn't charge us.

rogerblack

Sharon30 wrote: »

A lot of our paperwork is at my parents at the moment, but looking at another bill our consumption charge is 3.794p and this one is saying 898 = 10000 Kwh used.

We have spoken to every relevant body who keep telling us the same, if the meter has been tested then its ok. Replacement meter and when we take meter readings everyone keeps telling us its unusually high but that we are billed for what is actually getting used. This has been going on for so long now.

All of the gas maintaince stuff isn't relevant to your bill, as suspected.
3.7 isn't an unreasonable amount per kWh.
The above calculation changes to 5 days * 4 hours/day * 30kWh/hour * 3.7p/kWh = 22 pounds 20. Your boiler physically can't use more gas than this in a 4 hour period every day for 5 days.

Can you confirm if your meter reads cubic feet, or cubic meters.
Take the reading, - see the above page I linked, and another one tomorrow.
If unsure, a couple of pictures will work.

It's possible that it's been read on the basis that it's ft^3, when it's m^3.
This will boost the bill by about three times.

What was the outside temperature when the test was done?

Sharon30

Hi

Our old meter was a metric meter measuring cubic meters (same as pic 1 in your link) and I'm positive the replacement that we have now is the exact same, our back security light isn't working at the moment but I will check first thing. I have put this forward to the company numerous times and they keep saying no that the bill is correct but my dad had worked it out completely from when we moved in until now and even explained this to them and they keep saying the bill is correct, my dad has been saying its impossible to be correct but we are getting nowhere! I have lost count of the amount of phone calls trying to sort this.

Thanks its just good to hear the opinion of someone else as my dad and I are now at logger heads with each other.

Thanks

chanz4

If the meter test has said its correct, you dont have a leg to stand on in not paying it. The meter would of been sent to an ofgem approved centre for the testing where they flow gas through them.

Your supplier has saved you £60 for the test, so good on them but now is the time to think about how to settle there bill as soon they will just start recoevery action if not as the complaint is 3rd party

daveyjp

No room stat? The house could have been heating up to silly levels and you would never know. Radiator stats aren't a reliable way of assessing temperature.

First job would be a room stat install.

molerat

rogerblack wrote: »

Can you confirm if your meter reads cubic feet, or cubic meters.

It's possible that it's been read on the basis that it's ft^3, when it's m^3.
This will boost the bill by about three times.

Sharon30 wrote: »

A lot of our paperwork is at my parents at the moment, but looking at another bill our consumption charge is 3.794p and this one is saying 898 = 10000 Kwh used.

10000/898 = 11.13 so metric conversion being used.

OP please give us some daily meter readings.

Sharon30

Hi

Thanks for your replies, yes we are financially responsible for paying the bill and we have been given a couple of options to clear the bill and we are in contact with them, yeah it was a relief that the charge was free as we were getting quoted £120.

The problem is moving forward as there seems to be something wrong somewhere and everyone is telling us the same thing including the provider we need to get to the bottom of it as its an ongoing problem whilst in the meantime the bills are still really high and there seems to be an issue to rectify urgently, we just want it sorted out so we can move forward but although every organisation is telling us there is a problem but we feel we are going around in circles.

Yeah no room stats anywhere in the house at all when we moved in so we will need to purchase one for ourselves........we have a room temperature thing on a baby monitors and when we place these in different rooms of the house it ranges between 19 and 21 oc.

People have actually laughed at us when we've told them how much our bills are but its really no laughing matter as I'm at my wits end, just want to move forward with it all.

I know you can't compare other people's circumstances but comparing it to people we know in much bigger properties with heating on a lot more our bills are still really high.

We have done checks to record an accurate account of weekly usage, taking meter readings daily before using heating or hot water then taking them after and the provider asked us for these and they still maintain there is something not right!! This is where they worked out that for roughly a small bath each night for the babies, hot water for dishes etc and heating on for approx 4 hrs would work out at approx £40 per week and if heating was used more then average cost per week would increase.

Example is from 26/4/12 to 26/7/12 our actual gas charge is £411.43 using 10000 KWh now this includes us being on holiday for 2 weeks!!!

jalexa

Sharon30 wrote: »

Example is from 26/4/12 to 26/7/12 our actual gas charge is £411.43 using 10000 KWh now this includes us being on holiday for 2 weeks!!!

That is certainly well above average consumption, however it is within the capability of a combi boiler heating 13 radiators.

Given that 2 different meters are giving similar results, statistically it is virtually impossible to be a meter problem. The few details you have provided suggest neither is it a bill calculation problem.

Unless you are happy paying for the amount of heat, you should go round the house and turn down radiators in rooms where the heat has less value. Examples might be bedrooms during the day baby room excepted, kitchen during the evening, utility room and perhaps hallway at all times. Up to you really.

Which hours of the day does your "4 hours" cover?

You will get the best help here if you post daily meter readings.