Who is responsible for this electricity bill?

candypanda

Hiya
We rent a house and have been here for 18 months. we have been with npower this whole time and have given readings every 2 months. We are leaving Npower now to move to british gas, and they have decided to send us a bill saying we are in debit of £800 because we have used 8000 kw in the last 7 months. We haven't had any new appliances.

To find out what it was that was using all the electric, we turned everything off and watched the meter as we turned things on and off. We found that the lights are causing the meter wheel thing to turn around seriously fast. It does 1 rotation in 40 seconds with nothing on, when the lights are on it does 1 rotation in 8 seconds. Even with our dryer on it does 1 rotation in 35 seconds. The lights are halogen spotlights, I know these use a lot of electric but £110 per month?? No chance!

Our roof has leaked in several times over the last year and each time the landlord himself has been up there messing about. Something is clearly not right with these lights, I don't know if the leaking in could have affected it.

I'm bringing in an electrician this week to write a report on what's going on so I can take it to the estate agents/our landlord. If there's a fault with the electrics, who has to pay this bill?? We've been giving meter readings and Npower never wrote to us to tell us we needed to increase the direct debit. But the amount of electric being used by the lights cannot be right! The meter readings are accurate though and all match up.

Where do we stand? We're getting married next month and I don't know what to do we can't afford to pay £800 and I don't really want to because someone is at fault here but i don't know who.

Thank you for any information, it is greatly appreciated.

jjlandlord

It seems strange that you never got any bill or account update from Npower in 18 months...
When getting readings you never checked the numbers?

You are clearly liable to Npower for the bill, assuming of course that readings are correct.
Now whether you could hypothetically hold your landlord liable, I don't know. You would need to prove some sort of negligence or obvious fault caused by him.
Good first step to get an independent to check the electrics.

What is the power rating of the lights (check bulbs), and how many are there?

DRP

Npower are constantly sending me emails to take readings, plus we're obviously billed regularly. you can also check your usage (live?) on their website and they have iphone/android apps for all these ....... how can you possibly be £800 behind on your payments?

Jenniefour

So your electricity consumption, according to NPower, has been 8000kw in last 7 months. What on earth can have changed so drastically in your last 7 months? Just checked the average household usage of electricity on internet - and I imagine you have too - and it says 4800 per year. Definitely something very wrong here so you're doing the right thing by getting the electrician in to take a look at this for you. Do you think someone else might have illegally tapped into your supply?

DRP

Jenniefour wrote: »

So your electricity consumption, according to NPower, has been 8000kw in last 7 months. What on earth can have changed so drastically in your last 7 months? Just checked the average household usage of electricity on internet - and I imagine you have too - and it says 4800 per year. Definitely something very wrong here so you're doing the right thing by getting the electrician in to take a look at this for you. Do you think someone else might have illegally tapped into your supply?

^^indeed.

I would also log in to your npower account and check exactly *when* this additional usage happened - the site will give you a full breakdown.

I don't understand why npower weren't on your back to increase your regular payments as soon as you went over...

alunharford

By my calculations, you have 2600 watts of lights. I guess it's possible if you have lots of 100w bulbs on at least 3 lighting circuits.

Jenniefour

I'm assuming you have an average house, or thereabouts. On the information I just got on the internet that makes your annual usage over 13000 kw per annum, astronomical.

Have you double checked that they, NPower, have recorded accurately all the readings you have given to them? And I would be then calculating what the usage was in the 11 months prior to this. Even NPower must realise something might be amiss here, if they have all your readings correctly recorded and these show that your usage prior to this period was much lower.

And I imagine it is also possible to have a faulty meter and your electrician should be able to determine that.

Pixie5740

You've said that you give regular meter readings to nPower but have they actually used them to calculate your bills or have nPower being estimating your usage until this final bill? I only ask ask as I give my energy supplier readings every month and yet I still get estimated bills. Sigh.

Jenniefour

I don't think this is to do with estimates. OP has been providing them with readings regularly as well.

OP, I'm assuming you have an average house, or thereabouts. On the information I just got on the internet that makes your annual usage over 13000 kw per annum, astronomical.

Have you double checked that they, NPower, have recorded accurately all the readings you have given to them? And I would be then calculating what the usage was in the 11 months prior to this. Even NPower must realise something might be amiss here, if they have all your readings correctly recorded and these show that your usage prior to this period was much lower.

And I imagine it is also possible to have a faulty meter and your electrician should be able to determine that.

candypanda

We have been giving regular meter readings at least every 2 months because I always wanted to prevent a problem like this. No I didn't look at the numbers and think anything was strange because I'm 21 and thought I was doing the right thing, unlike British Gas, Npower did not increase our payments.

We have 50w bulbs, about 5 per room in 3 rooms.

They were estimating our usage but there wasn't much difference in the actual readings when they came and took the reading themselves; so that isn't the cause for the massive jump.

The only thing that has changed in the last 7 months is the roof leaking in and soaking the ceiling. But that's it and is probably unrelated.

Obviously, we have been paying our direct debits it's just that they didn't increase the payments. But the usage is insane even though we have 15 50 watt bulbs.

Can faulty wiring cause this? And if it was the meter; could that still be a cause if it's only the lights that make the meter go nuts?

Thank you for your replies so far x

fishpond

I can only guess that your supply has been tapped into.
Please let us know what the electrician comes up with.