Fair usage bills on student let

dizzycreak

Hi
My son is looking to sign a tenancy agreement that has all bills included but a fair usage clause of £10 a week for fuel.
I have no idea if this is a standard amount or adequate for a studio flat.
Could anyone let me know please?
Thank you 😀

missbiggles1

Having let a house to students (with bills included) who thought it normal to run the central heating 24/7, I only wish 'd known that a clause like this was possible.

It sounds perfectly reasonable to me.

HouseBuyer77

As in he has to pay £10 a week on top of rent or if his costs exceed £10 a week they will charge extra?

If the latter that seems fairly reasonable though does depend upon the heating setup, is it gas or electric?

If the heating is poor and he uses any kind of plug in electrical heater to suplement he'll probably blow through the fair usage amount but that would be an issue regardless of how utilities got paid for (electric heating is expensive).

RobMolyneux

i cant comment on the inclusion of a fee for fair usage in an 'bills included' contract, but i can offer some thoughts on the suitability of the weekly fee.

You can work out what the likely cost would be from some standard benchmarks, but you would need to know the approximate size and whether heating is gas or electric to do this.

industry guidance suggests a total energy consumption per square meter for 'general accommodation' is:

60 kWh/m2/year - elec
300 kWh/m2/year - heating

so, if electric heating, you are looking at 360 kWh/m2/year or 6.9 kWh/m2/week - an approximate cost for electric is £0.10/kWh

so, if you know the floor area, or can have a guess, mulitply it by 0.69 and that will tell you the approximate running cost for the flat.

it it has gas heating then it is 1.15kWh/m2/week @ £0.10 per kWh, plus 5.8 kWh/m2/week @ c.£0.06 per kWh for gas.

so multiply the approx floor area by 0.46 and that will give you the approx running cost for the flat.


a 'typical' studio flat is in the region of 30m2, which would equate to:

£20.70 per week if electrically heated
£13.80 per week if gas heated

these figures come from "typical" building stock, so if it is a newer building, it should typically cost less, if a very old building, it would likely cost more.

hope this helps.

HappyMJ

dizzycreak wrote: »

Hi
My son is looking to sign a tenancy agreement that has all bills included but a fair usage clause of £10 a week for fuel.
I have no idea if this is a standard amount or adequate for a studio flat.
Could anyone let me know please?
Thank you 😀

If it's a separately metered flat I'd offer to pay £40 a month less in rent and pay the bills myself.

He can then switch suppliers and get the best tariff for his usage.

The LL may be on one of the most expensive tariffs on the market and as his name isn't on the bill he can't switch.

missbiggles1

RobMolyneux wrote: »

i cant comment on the inclusion of a fee for fair usage in an 'bills included' contract, but i can offer some thoughts on the suitability of the weekly fee.

You can work out what the likely cost would be from some standard benchmarks, but you would need to know the approximate size and whether heating is gas or electric to do this.

industry guidance suggests a total energy consumption per square meter for 'general accommodation' is:

60 kWh/m2/year - elec
300 kWh/m2/year - heating

so, if electric heating, you are looking at 360 kWh/m2/year or 6.9 kWh/m2/week - an approximate cost for electric is £0.10/kWh

so, if you know the floor area, or can have a guess, mulitply it by 0.69 and that will tell you the approximate running cost for the flat.

it it has gas heating then it is 1.15kWh/m2/week @ £0.10 per kWh, plus 5.8 kWh/m2/week @ c.£0.06 per kWh for gas.

so multiply the approx floor area by 0.46 and that will give you the approx running cost for the flat.


a 'typical' studio flat is in the region of 30m2, which would equate to:

£20.70 per week if electrically heated
£13.80 per week if gas heated

these figures come from "typical" building stock, so if it is a newer building, it should typically cost less, if a very old building, it would likely cost more.

hope this helps.

Your figures don't give any indication of number of hours usage which might explain why they seem incredibly high to me.

Many of us heat 3 bed houses for that figure.

Grenage

missbiggles1 wrote: »

Your figures don't give any indication of number of hours usage which might explain why they seem incredibly high to me.

Many of us heat 3 bed houses for that figure.

Aye! I kept a 3-bed house at 18C 24/7 for £52 a month - and that included electricity usage.

dizzycreak

Thanks everyone
I was worried £10 wouldn't cover the cost of heating, I do t want him landed with a bill he can't pay,
The £10 is included in the rent

HappyMJ

RobMolyneux wrote: »

i cant comment on the inclusion of a fee for fair usage in an 'bills included' contract, but i can offer some thoughts on the suitability of the weekly fee.

You can work out what the likely cost would be from some standard benchmarks, but you would need to know the approximate size and whether heating is gas or electric to do this.

industry guidance suggests a total energy consumption per square meter for 'general accommodation' is:

60 kWh/m2/year - elec
300 kWh/m2/year - heating

so, if electric heating, you are looking at 360 kWh/m2/year or 6.9 kWh/m2/week - an approximate cost for electric is £0.10/kWh

so, if you know the floor area, or can have a guess, mulitply it by 0.69 and that will tell you the approximate running cost for the flat.

it it has gas heating then it is 1.15kWh/m2/week @ £0.10 per kWh, plus 5.8 kWh/m2/week @ c.£0.06 per kWh for gas.

so multiply the approx floor area by 0.46 and that will give you the approx running cost for the flat.


a 'typical' studio flat is in the region of 30m2, which would equate to:

£20.70 per week if electrically heated
£13.80 per week if gas heated

these figures come from "typical" building stock, so if it is a newer building, it should typically cost less, if a very old building, it would likely cost more.

hope this helps.

Electric heating tends to be E7 heating at 6p/kWh. Although the day rate on that tariff would be 15p/kWh.

Most people tend to use less electricity as gas isn't as efficient as electricity but gas is used as and when it's needed rather than pre-heating overnight storage heaters and potentially wasting the resulting heat. So using the same kWh figures for both with E7 storage heating would be fair unless the tenant was using fan heaters where a lower kWh figure should be used due to the 100% efficiency figure of electric heating.

I hope those industry averages aren't correct. I have a 58m2 2 bedroom flat and it costs just £10 a week for both electric and gas combined. The temperature of my flat swings between 19-21 degrees in late afternoon and evenings and on weekends all day and 16-18 overnight and in the mornings. It's a modern very well insulated flat and the heating rarely fires up. Most heat in the flat comes from general day to day living and the radiant heat from the sun (even in winter). The living room windows face the south east and bedrooms north east.

HappyMJ

dizzycreak wrote: »

Thanks everyone
I was worried £10 wouldn't cover the cost of heating, I do t want him landed with a bill he can't pay,
The £10 is included in the rent

It'll be close. He might go over but he's got to be really careless to exceed it by much. If he gets really cold the bill might be £20 per week in the winter. You should know him. Is he one to turn up the thermostat, forget to turn it down and waste energy.

It shouldn't be a huge bill especially when compared to the rent.

RobMolyneux

missbiggles1 wrote: »

Your figures don't give any indication of number of hours usage which might explain why they seem incredibly high to me.

Many of us heat 3 bed houses for that figure.

they are industry standard benchmarks from CIBSE TM 46:2008 "Energy Benchmarks".

I'm not saying they are necessarily right, but as benchmarks they should give an indication.

those figures are for "general accommodation" and give a typical figure across different types of properties & ages, etc.

I'd say as 'typical' a figure of £13 compares reasonably against the £10 proposed.

the 30m2 average size comes from here;

http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20110118095356/http:/www.cabe.org.uk/files/dwelling-size-survey.pdf