Huge Electricity Bill - Npower

fed_up_and_stressed

Johannac wrote: »

Sorry Fed Up And Stressed but what worries me even more being just a member of the public who does not and has not worked for an utility company, that npower specifically told me they could not charge me the standard electric rate on the e7 meter. Do you not think I would have asked them 1st before having to book wasted annual leave for someone to come out & change my meter?

Your right should not gave said ONLY but personally if you do not have E7 heaters I cannot see how it would benefit anyone to be paying E7 rates? Of course there are still people who have those meters who do not have storage heaters, but then you will probably find it's those people who can't understand why their electric bills are so high (me being one of them)

Sorry if I have offended anyone by simply trying to help as I have been in exactly this situation and now my bills are no where near what they were.

I shall re-phrase to prevent any annoyance. Ask youselves some questions, when do you need and use your heating? What time if day do you normally wash your clothes? When time does your water heater timer come on? What times do you normally put your dishwasher on? Blow-dry your hair? If most of the answers would be during the day & before 11pm the economy 7 meter is not cost effective for you

Im not offended its just I needed to explain its not ONLY people who have storage heaters who can benefit from e7 rates. I suggest to all people that they have a good old natter with their sppliers energy efficiency teams to see how THEY can reduce energy usage -their is no one size fits all answer. I wish their were otherwise energy company profits wouldnt be so hi and my bill would be a lot smaller !!

...and as I stated in my last post Johannac .. they can support single rate billing on e7 meters in SOME scenerios ..not all however I strongly suggest people wanting to be billed on single rate DO get their meters changed to single rate (in fact my friend had this done a few weeks ago) as it makes meter reading errors much less likely as trying to work out single rate reads on e7 meters means you have to work out cumulative reads.

Johannac

You are correct, I worded that too strongly, but I remember the stress it caused me & felt that when I had spoken with Npower they should have asked if I had an e7 meter when I asked to be put on standard tariff, especially as the people who we bought from were also with Npower, they would have known the type of meter we had - It was my 1st home and had just moved out from my parents who had gas central heating, so all electric was very new to me.

I would also like to add when I mentioned 'expertise' I did not mean an expert in electricity, but I know a lot about wet electric central heating now, and there are always lots of posts in here asking whether they should use wet electric or storage and all too quickly people seem to rubbish the idea of getting wet electric - but that's a different post.

Back to original subject, I believe this person should get the meter changed and change their tariff.

fed_up_and_stressed

Johannac wrote: »

Back to original subject, I believe this person should get the meter changed and change their tariff.

So do I actually from what they have posted however definately suggest they contact npowers energy efficiency team first to figure out a) based on much more indepth info to double check its the best move based on their consumption history (as obviously they will have the history of reads and b)they can help give efficiency advice advice to reduce consumption ..and its freephone !

Npower's energy efficiency team
0800 022 220

hacienda99

Hi,

Sorry for the delay in responding to this thread.

So basically, Npower complaints team are looking into my billing as apparently the readings taken (by them) when our account set up were incorrect. I've been told that this should reduce the bill, but I'm fairly sure this isn't where the problem lies, as this doesn't account for the astronomical usage since then that the bills indicate. I have a feeling the reduction in the bill mentioned will not make much of a difference.

I've taken a look at the meter with the building electrician, the meter is not moving when no electricity is being used. However I haven't been able to see if it's recording more electricity than I'm using. The electrician did advise that a calibration meter should be fitted, he said it didn't seem right at all whilst looking at the usage with me.

I've mentioned the concerns about the meter with npower, but they can't progress the compliant any further until they complete the billing checks.

Regarding the E7 in the posts mentioned above, I never asked or requested to be on an E7 meter, this was in place when I moved in. Does this mean I can ask to be moved to standard rate and be billed at a normal rate for the period in question? We don't have storage heaters, so there is no reason for me to be on E7.

Thanks all

hacienda99

utility_csa wrote: »

When you say the meter doesn't move when no electric is being used, have you actually isolated you supply at you consumer unit?

Top line of your mpan / account number - 1 means residential unrestricted, So you are being billed for a total of the two readings not as E7.

If it was 2 that would relate to residential E7.

Well the electrician used a tool to check whether it was drawing any power - everything was off in the flat and there was no charge being picked up through the meter.

My account number begins with 1 - so I'm being told I'm on E7 by npower, but this isn't the case?

Looking at the bill I'm being charged at:

Day - "first 129 at 26.730 P, next 1422 at 16.420 P"
Night - "299 AT 4.870 P"

hacienda99

utility_csa wrote: »

I have no idea what tool the sparky has used, sounds like a clip on ammeter you have no idea how accurate or when that was last calibrated. ( not saying hes wrong just an idea ). Only true way to check if nothing is being draw is to switch everything off at your consumer unit.

In regards to your usage, i see nothing in regards to showering ect. The last two reads alone show 690 kWh used over the night period so lets assume you are on standard E7 ( 24:00 - 07:00 ). So just wondering what you are using at this time.

Between midnight and 7 AM, all that is used is:

Hallway light
Fridge/Freezer
Water heater comes on at 6AM for an hour (timer controlled)
Sometimes a phone charger may be used

hacienda99

utility_csa wrote: »

So again going on the final two reads..
Night
113 days - 690 kWh - 6.1 kWh/d
Day
113 days - 3337 kWh - 29 kWh/d

If going on what you believe is all you use, i would suggest you check if this meter is even for you flat.

Yeah, I really have no idea - the meter serial matches the one on the bill, it does seem to be linked to my flat from a load test I did one afternoon (mentioned further back in this thread).

Npower originally said the engineer booked out for the 25th would test the meter, look into it in detail - it now turns out that it's just going to be a standard meter read, which obviously will solve nothing. However, they failed to mention this to me until after I had booked the day off work - something I'll be complaining about.

Npower have said that a meter engineer can't come out until the billing side has been looked into (this may take another 15 working days) - and even then they have to go through energy efficiency with me in detail before they even send out someone to take a real look at the meter.

hacienda99

Hi,

So an update on this issue - Npower rebilled my account going back to January 2012 - Present on a standard rate - we were not using enough electricity during the E7 hours to justify the billing method, so this has now changed. However, I received a new online bill today, which still seems very large. I've tried speaking to npower on the phone to explain this but keep getting mixed messages - one person I spoke with explained this was all based on estimates, another said it was based on actual readings.

I've uploaded part of the bill to this post - some questions I have are:

Image here

Why would they have estimated that is use 51kWh in one day (23-24 June?)

Also, the bill seems largely based on estimates - I cannot see where they are getting these figures from? Apologies if I'm missing something.

Thanks