Electricity bill seems very high

DralZx

Hi,

In the process of looking for a new energy deal and the bill has got to the point where it has to be wrong.

Context: I live in a two bedroom flat with my wife. We both work full time so are out of the house most of the weekday. We do have a lot of electrical appliances (Gaming PC, TV, consoles, phones and laptops) as well as the usual suspects (washing machine, tumble dryer, radiators microwave). We don't have gas only electric and our latest comparison quote was £178 a month.

Apparently we use 16,000 kWh a year? It feels like this can't be right so my question is what should I do? Any advice would be great.

Thanks!

DEV1L

What heating system do you have? I live in a 2 bed flat pretty much exactly the same as you ( electric only, tvs, tumble dryer etc. )
My bill for 2017-2018 was about £1000 give or take a few pounds here and there. But i do have storage heaters and a prepay meter.

Robin9

DralZx - what figures have you been using to get your estimate ?

The most accurate is to use two ACTUAL readings 12 months apart. Do not use ESTIMATED figures or £ or number of rooms. If you don't have to figures go back through your bills till you find an ACTUAl, read your meter today and do some simple maths.

Remember it is an estimate - what you actually use will depend on weather, your lifestyle.

If you haven't been in the habit of reading your meters at least monthly start now. Also read and understand your bills.

macman

The 'usual suspects' are heating and hot water. How are these provided-what sort of heating?
Are you on E7 or a single rate tariff?
16,000kWh is high, but not impossible in an all-electric property.

DralZx

Hey guys,

Thanks for the replies. I'm going to try answer as best as I can.

Our bill is generated on Meter Readings and the quotes are from the electricity company. We are on a single rate tariff.

Heating is through storage heaters and is only used through the winter months.

I read the meter before I went to sleep last night and then one as soon as I woke up, so the only things that were drawing electricity would be things like Fridge-freezer, router, TVs on standby, nothing was left "on" and the reading went up by 3kwh from Midnight to around 7am, which seems a little high? It leads me to think that there is a problem with a certain household item.

I've been asking friends who have similar daily usage to myself but live in bigger properties than I do, but their bills are much lower.

I'm going to turn ALL the plugs off tonight except for the fridge freezer and start there, but any other advice or pointers are so very welcome.

Thanks!

Robin9

DralZx wrote: »

Hey guys,




I read the meter before I went to sleep last night and then one as soon as I woke up, so the only things that were drawing electricity would be things like Fridge-freezer, router, TVs on standby, nothing was left "on" and the reading went up by 3kwh from Midnight to around 7am, which seems a little high? It leads me to think that there is a problem with a certain household item.

!

Do you have an Immersion Heater for your hot water - that might be on a timeswitch such it comes on at night.

A good candidate is your fridge - freezer.

Robin9

DralZx wrote: »

Our bill is generated on Meter Readings and the quotes are from the electricity company. We are on a single rate tariff.

Heating is through storage heaters and is only used through the winter months.

This may well be a fundamental cause - if you have storage heaters you ought to be on a E7 tariff

When you say your bill is generated on meter readings - are you relying on a meter reader or do you take them yourself. Have a look at your bill - are there (E)'s after the readings. Are there two sets of readings - one for day , one for night ?

DralZx

Okay, my apologies guys we don't have storage heaters but we do have an E7 boiler.

Checked the meter again when I came home from work and it's up another 3kwh.

As for meter readings we do them ourselves. We just got our new quote at 13,500 kWh for the year which is still very high.

Testing begins tonight.

Robin9

By E7 boiler you mean a boiler heated by electricity that heats hot water for a conventional wall mounted radiator system.

Possibly the worst (most expensive) form of heating you could have.

Check out your domestic hot water system - immersion heater as per my earlier post ?

DralZx

I mean it has a control unit that says Economy 7 and it's attached to our boiler / water heater.

I'm not super sure what it is. We have wall mounted electric heaters (Dimplex).

Sorry if I'm not getting the right answers to you. I'm not too wise to this stuff. Show me a PC or some code and I'm great but this is like another language haha

Robin9

That's far more straightforward.

More questions:

Can you give the make and model number of that controller please. Does it have a timer - if so what times ?

Can you look at your bill and give details of the Tariff.

Also from the bill can you give readings for the last 12 months or so - make sure you include references to Actual (A), Estimated (E) or Consumer (C).

You can probably reduce your costs by getting a better tariff and learning how to control your heating.