Claiming back electricity charges

simongregson

Hi,

We've recently had a flood from our washing machine, luckily the damage is covered by our house insurance.

We have been provided with some large fans and a dehumidifier, what I would like to know is can we claim for the electricity that these use, as it is part of the building repair (to dry out the floors). They are setting the electric meter whirring at an alarming rate and are on all day for 2 weeks!

Thanks in advance!

mattymoo

Normally the provider gives you an allowance for running the machine - or at least Munters do, the biggest provider of these machines. They know the running costs and pay you for it and then add the cost to their invoice to your insurer.

FlameCloud

They certainly do. On the final report we get sent will be a figure with the amount they use.

Note that in almost every case, they will not use as much as you think. for example, a dehumidifier that was in a property for around 45 days used 140 units. (mainly because people turn them off at night, claim for x days uninterupted, and fail to realise that the units count themselves how many they've used)

So, in the above example, its 140*0.07 (Pence per unit) * 1.05 (5% tax), giving £10.29

simongregson

Thanks - I've noted that the dehumidifier has a timer on the top and wrote down the initial hours figure. We're braving having them on almost day and night to try and get the damp sorted as quickly as possible!