The Road is Long.......

jimmybrid

Quiet a productive weekend on the money saving (and spending) front. Finally splashed out on new crockery (exciting I know), but with either 30% or 50% off every item, plus two Foursquare/Amex check-ins to save £25 each time, and the use of some Say Shopping vouchers bought with a 20% discount the total saving was almost £200 on a lovely 40 piece (8-setting) collection from House of Fraser.
Also reduced a £60 Gap spend to just over £26 thanks to a 15% discount for signing up to a GAP newsletter and then another Amex/Foursquare check-in.
Plus my £15 Amex/Foursquare saving on a £50 Shell fuel spend.
Now waiting for the cashback to start rolling in from the Casino sites joined via TopCashBack - hope they work out ok!?!?!?

jimmybrid

Water company coming tomorrow to look at fitting a meter. Should save £300+ a year with the switch, even with the impending arrival of the 4th member of the family.

jimmybrid

Water company must have had a special offer on - they installed two meters instead of one. Was half hoping they might not spot that the garage had a separate water supply

Hurdler

I might actually have to take a look at installing a water meter... how disruptive is it in terms of positioning and installation?

jimmybrid

Hurdler wrote: »

I might actually have to take a look at installing a water meter... how disruptive is it in terms of positioning and installation?

Our main water meter for the supply to the house was fitted under the sink in the kitchen (this is where the main supply comes in). The installer replaced the old lead pipe with shiny new copper, fitted the new meter and the additional meter in the garage all in less than two hours. From a disruption standpoint, minimal. From a cost saving standpoint, should be excellent - had a water meter at previous address and were paying about £27/month, water rates at new (older) house are £61/month, so even with new baby due soon and extra washing etc to do, should still save us plenty. And if it doesn't save, then we can revert to paying based on the rated value any time within the next 12 months.

jimmybrid

Got 2 letters from water company today; First one says they are sending me the £92 I was in credit from my rateable value payments. Second one says they are setting my direct debits at £40 based on info provided. £21/month saving if their estimate is correct, I think it's a bit high.

jimmybrid

DD at grandma's tonight, so out for dinner with OH. Will pay for it from prepaid Visa card got as cashback for buying a Siemens tumble dryer. Thank you Siemens :-)

Secret_Saving_Squirrel

Hello,

I think £41 might be about right. Ours is about £25 and we are just two adults, out at work all day and we use a water butt for the garden. We also shower instead of bathing and are very wAter conscious and dont waste any. So for a family tours seems fine. Better to ay a bit more than be hit with a big bill later.

Good luck!

Squirrel:j

jimmybrid

Not quite so impressed with Yorkshire Water now. Original letter stated direct debit for £40/month based on using 150m3 per year water (based on information provided by me using the online application form). Now that they have fitted two meters instead of one they have revised the usage estimate up to 200m3 and dd's of £15 and £35 (one for each meter). Obviously the fact that we have more meters means that we will inevitably use more water!!!!!!
At our previous address (same size house, same number of occupants, exactly the same bath, dishwasher etc) we actually used about 100m3 per year so think they are massively overestimating but they won't change anything until they have some actual usage data.
Thanks Yorkshire Water.

sweetdaisy

We have a water meter and pay £37.50 a month. There are 4 of us in the house, so we use the bath, shower and washing machine quite a lot - but we don't waste water and are conscious of reducing water usage.

I once ended up 'owing' the water company over £200 because the water meter had a leak - despite me telling the water board that the meter readings weren't moving and they kept on telling me that my monthly payments were reducing. Luckily I had kept all of these payments aside as I knew they would finally realise that they made a mistake.