misleading sale to pensioners

MONFRITE

84yr old Father replaced Economy 7 night storage heaters in January and, on completion, was persuaded to switch energy provider to the same company (Feb 2017) to save money. Brill you might think !
But by this Nov 2017 he'd used £1800 in electricity compared to £1000 for same period last year. Current usage = 80% on day rate with less than 20% on Economy 7 He has one less heater now, the kitchen is therefore freezing and they sit with fleece blankets wrapped around their legs and feet because they are cold during the day and afraid to increase energy use. It's not even the worst of the cold weather yet !
Any suggestions?I have raised a call to technical surveyors to request a site visit and look at energy efficiency/consumption. The website boasts a good value product but I think my parents have been mis-led. (leaving the kitchen door open so that it will heat up from the hall is plain ridiculous!)

Robin9

Monfrite - can you have a close look at your fathers actual bills - is the £1800 being charged on actual consumption or estimates. Similarly the £1000 for last year

The breakeven for E7 is about 35% night consumption.

Are the new heaters set up properly ? They may have different controls to the old ones.

EachPenny

MONFRITE wrote: »

84yr old Father replaced Economy 7 night storage heaters in January and, on completion, was persuaded to switch energy provider to the same company (Feb 2017) to save money. Brill you might think !

Does the name of the company start with "F" by any chance?

Raxiel

Just to clarify, were the E7 storage heaters replaced with new storage heaters, or with instant heaters?

House_Martin

Check that your father is not getting the day and night reads transposed. It happens a lot when switching suppliers.
Check the timer switch to make sure he is not using high usage appliances a lot in the day rate. Find out yourself exactly when the night rate starts.Do not rely on published times unless he has a radio teleswitch timer.
The cheap 7 hours can be out of synch and it could easily be in the daytime sometime.
If all is well and he actually is only using 20% of total at night rate then maybe its better to go single rate for the 24 hrs

EachPenny

House_Martin wrote: »

Check that your father is not getting the day and night reads transposed. It happens a lot when switching suppliers.
Check the timer switch to make sure he is not using high usage appliances a lot in the day rate. Find out yourself exactly when the night rate starts.Do not rely on published times unless he has a radio teleswitch timer.
The cheap 7 hours can be out of synch and it could easily be in the daytime sometime.
If all is well and he actually is only using 20% of total at night rate then maybe its better to go single rate for the 24 hrs

All good advice, but I have a feeling the answer is going to be much simpler HM.

matelodave

I'm with Raxiel & EachPenny on this.

Has he been persuaded to swap storage heaters for some with magic ingredients which they call storage heaters but are not.

More info please. who makes the heaters, name and model

Cardew

matelodave wrote: »

I'm with Raxiel & EachPenny on this.

Has he been persuaded to swap storage heaters for some with magic ingredients which they call storage heaters but are not.

More info please. who makes the heaters, name and model

Not only filled with magic ingredients, but they have a special coating which means Ohm's law doesn't apply.

You can get him to go to Trading Standards and complain, and see if they can help.

Robin9

Monfrite - have you been able to find some of the answers to the questions asked ?

macman

If the heaters are indeed the magic custard filled ones beginning with 'F', then they are completely useless to run on E7, as they don't store any heat on cheap rate. So it's a cynical double whammy: overpriced heaters, and an overpriced/unsuitable tariff.