Can I save money on my electricity? Economy 7

twotonealex

Evening All,

Quick bit of info:
Myself & my partner live in a 2 bed flat in Bristol. Purpose built apartment building (1980's), medium to good insulation. Second of four floors.
Economy 7 storage heaters, replaced in 2016 for some slightly more efficient ones, these are used on a medium setting in the winter with output turned right down until we are home.

Everything is turned off when not in use, we have an electric shower that is used at 6AM in the morning during 'cheaper rates'. We haven't turned on our water boiler in over a year! Just boil a kettle once a day when we have a coffee/wash up at 6-6:30AM.
Washing machine, not dryer.

We're with Scottish Power:
Online Fix & Save August 2018 (coming to an end in a week or so).
Annual Usage: 6730 KwH
Annual Day: 3201 KwH
Annual Night: 3529 KwH
Total cost for the year £1106.64
52.4% Night vs Day usage

Direct Debits have gone up and down but if I averaged the cost over 12 months it's £92.22.

Scottish Power have offered a 1 year fixed at £1113.30 or £92.78 a month.

I've used the Cheap Energy Club, obviously using the exact usage in units will be more accurate, so having used them the cheapest fixed is with Yorkshire Energy @ £1140 a year or £95 a month.

Right now it seems our best option is to stick with Scottish Power on there 1 year rate, and just see if we can use even less!

Is there anything else I can try? or am I doing good to essentially keep our costs at the same in a world where energy continues to rise?

Thanks

Skools_Out

twotonealex wrote: »

Evening All,

Quick bit of info:
Myself & my partner live in a 2 bed flat in Bristol. Purpose built apartment building (1980's), medium to good insulation. Second of four floors.
Economy 7 storage heaters, replaced in 2016 for some slightly more efficient ones, these are used on a medium setting in the winter with output turned right down until we are home.

Everything is turned off when not in use, we have an electric shower that is used at 6AM in the morning during 'cheaper rates'. We haven't turned on our water boiler in over a year! Just boil a kettle once a day when we have a coffee/wash up at 6-6:30AM.
Washing machine, not dryer.

We're with Scottish Power:
Online Fix & Save August 2018 (coming to an end in a week or so).
Annual Usage: 6730 KwH
Annual Day: 3201 KwH
Annual Night: 3529 KwH
Total cost for the year £1106.64
52.4% Night vs Day usage

Direct Debits have gone up and down but if I averaged the cost over 12 months it's £92.22.

Scottish Power have offered a 1 year fixed at £1113.30 or £92.78 a month.

I've used the Cheap Energy Club, obviously using the exact usage in units will be more accurate, so having used them the cheapest fixed is with Yorkshire Energy @ £1140 a year or £95 a month.

Right now it seems our best option is to stick with Scottish Power on there 1 year rate, and just see if we can use even less!

Is there anything else I can try? or am I doing good to essentially keep our costs at the same in a world where energy continues to rise?

Thanks

The first question you should be asking yourself is why the tariff you have been offered by SP is not coming up on the CEC, and if it is, why it is not the same price as you have been quoted.

Second question to ask youself is why you have paid over £1000 on your current tariff, when the figures you have provided suggest an annual cost of a little over £900

This is based on
Unit rate: 15.426p per kWh
Night unit rate: 8.276p per kWh
Standing charge: 32.88p per day (£120.00 per year)


However using your figures, the results I obtain are:

OneSelect - Secure July 1 Year Fixed 2018 - saves £73 (i.e. £833pa) based on what yopu paid last year

E.ON - E.ON Go Online 1 Year v16 Paperless - costs about £20 (i.e £925 pa) more than you paid last year
(Not available direct - only via participating comparison sites)

Both of which beat Yorkshire Energy who come in at £934 per year

The best SP tariff does indeed cost £1113 per year, but you have to look a very long way down the list to find them.

Source: Energyhelpline

(All assumes you accept paying monthly by Direct Debit)

twotonealex

Thank you for your informative response!

That's strange indeed - I put the figures into multiple comparison sites and it brought up the same sort of spend figures I should have paid, but thought nothing of it as I assumed those sites were wrong.

I've looked at the tariff online, and it matches the costs you quoted for day/night etc.

What's the first port of call to resolve this? Should I ask for a breakdown of the bill for the last year? I'll do that now!

Apologies for the stupid questions, I'm crap with energy stuff!
Thanks!

twotonealex

Update - spoke with a helpful chap @ Scottish Power.
We did the maths behind the figures and established:
3201 units X 15.426p = £493.78
3529 units X 8.276p = £292.06
365 days standing charge X 32.88p = £120.01
TOTAL £905.85

He advised there was a debit on my account last August of £114.23 when I started this new tariff.
This would take the total cost to £1020.08, meaning I have still overpaid by £86.56.

He has raised a complaint on my account as he didn't have the tools to be able to tell me why this is the case, in addition, there is a debit of around £75.XX showing on my account, even with us opting to increase DD over the year to clear the debit/SP putting up DD, this amount has never changed, and is the same to the penny. He advised he believes this to be a system error and is another reason to raise it.

As far as I'm concerned, I believe the debit of £114.23 we carried into August 2017 should have been cleared long ago, and this £75.XX is some remainder of this that should have cleared long ago.

Therefore, providing this debit is cleared, we will be switching to one of the providers available via CEC and can start paying what we should for electric.

Any thoughts?

Thanks!