Using too much Gas...

parsco

Hello,

I've just had my Gas bill through and over the last 5 months it says I've used 4,532 kWh (408 units) of gas costing just over £200. They quote an average of 44 kWh per day. Now some might say this isn't bad however, all I have in my house that runs off gas is the cooking hob (hob only not the oven). How on earth can my hob be using that much gas? My central heating is a Mitsubishi Electric Ecodan air source system so only uses electric.

I bought the house new and moved in back in August 2013. I didn't realise how much gas was being used until I checked online and found that something wasn't quite right.

Anybody experienced something similar? Can anybody offer some advice on what I should be doing to sort this out?

Thanks

matelodave

Start reading your meter on a daily basis to see when you are using it. That way you'll be able to identify how much the hob is using every day. An average burner is about 1.5kw so it's looking like you've got all four on for about 7 hours a day - which is patently ridiculous (unless you are in the catering business)


It sounds like your bill is based on an estimate rather than based on an actual reading. If it's an estimate, go and read the meter yourself and send it into your supplier and get the bill corrected.


It's always a good idea to read your meter yourself regularly, ideally weekly so you can monitor your consumption and do something about if it it's wrong. Waiting for a bill to come in is too late.

parsco

matelodave wrote: »

Start reading your meter on a daily basis to see when you are using it. That way you'll be able to identify how much the hob is using every day. An average burner is about 1.5kw so it's looking like you've got all four on for about 7 hours a day - which is patently ridiculous (unless you are in the catering business)


It sounds like your bill is based on an estimate rather than based on an actual reading. If it's an estimate, go and read the meter yourself and send it into your supplier and get the bill corrected.


It's always a good idea to read your meter yourself regularly, ideally weekly so you can monitor your consumption and do something about if it it's wrong. Waiting for a bill to come in is too late.

The bill is not based on an estimate it's an actual reading.

I have been reading the meter myself but I have no idea how many units of gas my hob should and shouldn't be using or the price per unit (until doing some research after receiving my bill).

Hence the reason for me posting on here to find out if anybody else has had anything like this happen? Is my meter faulty and who should I be contacting to come out and fix the meter? My current Gas supplier I presume?

Robwiz

If you look up the specification of your gas hob you will find that it gives the burner power. It's not unusual for a gas burner to be rated at 7 kW - the ones on my old cooker were. Your consumption suggests usage of four burners on full for an hour per day.

To verify this, why not do an experiment? Read your meter, including the two places of decimals. Then light the largest burner on your gas hob and run it at maximum for 10 minutes. Then switch off and note your meter reading again. From the two readings you can work out how much gas it is actually using. Subtract the two meter readings to get the volume (cubic metres) of gas used, multiply that by 6 to get the hourly rate, then multiply that figure by the coefficient given on your gas bill to convert to kWh.

If the number you get is more than the rated power of your burner then it could be that your meter is over-reading. Gas is less efficient than electricity for cooking but usually works out cheaper because electricity is more than three times the price per unit.

parsco

It appears (after doing a bit more research online) that I could have been reading my meter incorrectly . However, this surely shouldn't excuse an engineer to read it incorrectly too?

As mine is a meter that measures in cubic meters then I should be giving them only the numbers that sit in the white section of the meter (ignoring the red numbers or including a decimal point between them). Is this correct?

Otherwise how else would I have used 668 cubic meters of gas in 6 months when I only have a cooking hob that runs off gas? 6.68 cubic meters sounds much more believable, working out to be 74 kWh.

:rotfl:

macman

Yes, you read the white section only. The red numbers are decimals and should be ignored for reading purposes.
With consumption of only around 178kWh pa, I hope you are on a low user NSC tariff, Ebico being the obvious one. Otherwise you'll be paying c. £7 for gas, and c. £100pa in standing charges.