Excessive Electricity Bill

jesuslovesme

Dear Forum,
We have been using British Gas for both our elec & Gas since Dec2012 but changed to EDF last month (May2013). Our monthly average use of units each month for electricity has been 230. But in April just as we were changing supplier, our units used in one month became 2574!! It has gone back to normal this following month - it was as EDF sent our first bill that this was noticed. We live in a rented 2 bed bungalow (2 adults and 2 young children). Can anyone advise? Could the meter go wrong for one month? The gas meter is ok. We have turned off the mains to test it but all looks normal. Help please.:j

molerat

Have you got actual readings for previous months, that figure is out by a factor of 10 which could be a decimal place error. Who takes the readings ?

Pineapple88

Double check the meter readings as Molerate says. Make sure the decimal point is in the correct place. Also check that the meter serial number that EDF are billing matches the one on your meter and check that the reading that EDF is billing you to follows on from the last reading you gave British Gas, it is possible they have got your opening meter reading wrong.

Wywth

jesuslovesme wrote: »

Dear Forum,
We have been using British Gas for both our elec & Gas since Dec2012 but changed to EDF last month (May2013). Our monthly average use of units each month for electricity has been 230. But in April just as we were changing supplier, our units used in one month became 2574!! It has gone back to normal this following month - it was as EDF sent our first bill that this was noticed. We live in a rented 2 bed bungalow (2 adults and 2 young children). Can anyone advise? Could the meter go wrong for one month? The gas meter is ok. We have turned off the mains to test it but all looks normal. Help please.:j

Ignore what you used, refer to the meter readings used to generate the various bills ... and compare to current meter reading.

Perhaps this was a catch-up bill in April if the supplier has been using estimated meter readings for a lot of the bills?

jesuslovesme

I have all the meter readings for each and every month - I have taken them and one set done by EDF. I pay monthly and submit my readings automatically each month when prompted. All the readings are consistent until you get to April when we changed supplier!

victor2

Read the meter now and see if it makes sense in relation to the figure used by EDF for your high bill.
Also look at the final reading used by British Gas. BG should have produced a final bill based on that reading, and EDF should have started from there. If the first EDF bill used an erroneous reading, then your current reading could be lower than the one used.
If that is the case, call EDF and they should sort it out for you.

jesuslovesme

Thank you all for your kind advice. I have read the meter again after I saw the problem. I gave Brit Gas the last readings for both my gas and electricity. They used my reading for the gas but not the electricity. This electricity reading would have been consistent with previous meter readings but the problem lies with this jump in one month only. I have worked out that we use normally 230 units but in one month we appear to use over 2500 units - is this even possible? This follow months reading is back to normal with 230 units being used! Has anyone had anything happen like this before?

victor2

If you list your electricity meter readings before and after the switch, that might cast some light on how the high reading came to be used. You don't have Economy 7 do you? It is possible for day and night readings to get interchanged and cause a problem.
Is the meter one with moving hands, rotating dials, or digital? It is easy to get a digit wrong on the older type mechanical meters.

It could have been a meter fault, but that is highly unlikely - especially for it to go wrong one month and then "fix" itself.

Wywth

jesuslovesme wrote: »

Thank you all for your kind advice. I have read the meter again after I saw the problem. I gave Brit Gas the last readings for both my gas and electricity. They used my reading for the gas but not the electricity. This electricity reading would have been consistent with previous meter readings but the problem lies with this jump in one month only. I have worked out that we use normally 230 units but in one month we appear to use over 2500 units - is this even possible? This follow months reading is back to normal with 230 units being used! Has anyone had anything happen like this before?

If your bill was based on an estimated meter reading, the bill should reflect this!

(Sometimes it doesn't on the final bill, but your start reading with the new supplier, which should use the same meter reading, would)

Any extsimated meter reading should spur you onto checking that meter reading yourself, especially if it's 10x higher trhan you would otherwise expect.

Even if you didn't check last month, it would be obvious today that such an estimated meter reading was wrong.

Therefore I don't understand what you are posting here. It sounds like you are getting into the realms of fantasy here.

As victor2 quite rightly says:

victor2 wrote:

It could have been a meter fault, but that is highly unlikely - especially for it to go wrong one month and then "fix" itself.