Astronomical gas bill - very stressed and need advice

tj2000

Hi everyone. I've read through about every thread I can find on crazy utility bills, and nothing I can find comes close to the scale of what I've been lumped with. Here's the summary:

- Moved into a property on 1st June; gas metre reading taken (have photograph)
- Didn't hear anything from supplier until recently, when they sent an estimated bill for 4 months (June - Sept) for £1800
- Assumed their bill was based on a ridiculous estimate, or a crazy rate
- Checked the metre, and it's actually a bit higher, and their rate is competitive.

So that £1800 bill was purely for 3 people having daily showers. Now central heating is coming on, I would expect the coming winter months to incur around 3x the gas usage of what's been a very hot summer, which will extrapolate to a £9,000 annual bill. That's a pretty serious, may have to move house kind of number if there's no solution.

So I'm really looking for advice from somebody who knows about gas on how on earth this is even a possibility. Here's my possibilities:

- Gas leak. Nah. I'm pretty sure that truck load of gas would have killed the whole street by now. Discounted.

- Imperial metre being charged as metric. The metre has 'm3' on it which I believe makes it metric. Discounted.

- Former readings estimates or other billing mishap. Already said - photos obtained. Also the fact that the supplier estimate this outrageous bill very closely to the actual metre readings, which says that the previous occupants were paying that much (presumably why they left). Discounted.

- We use more energy than we think / the house cold or draughty etc. We've lived in similar sized properties for years (3 occupied bedrooms, 1 spare, modern construction, double glazed). There has been no change to our usage and we've never had an annual bill for more than £1,400. Also as the central heating wasn't on for that period, the house construction is pretty much irrelevant. Discounted.

- Faulty metre. Advice on the internet says that broken metres will be ticking around when the boiler is off. When ours is off, it's not spinning. So I'm inclined to discount this, but is it a possibility that they can be broken in such a way that it multiplies the actual usage? I can't find any online evidence to say that that's a possibility, but maybe someone here knows what's actually inside them things?

- Europe's most inefficient boiler. I must say - it is a crappy boiler, and tends to take ages to start making hot water, then keeps intermittently going cold again. Whilst it feels convenient to say it's the boiler, I can't find anything on the internet to suggest that it's possible for a boiler to be running at what must be around 15% efficiency - as if that were possible surely there'd be other people saying the've got a gas bill up by a factor of 5 and then found it it was this. But nowhere can I find such a story. Again - is there a boiler / gas person who knows?

So yep - will be getting the boiler looked at whatever. But if it's not the boiler, is there any other possibilities out there? And is it in any way a possibility that a solution can't be found, and I'll end up liable for £9,000 of gas by the end of the year, and will have to move house? It feels like it can't be real, given that's the equivalent of gas for 6 properties. But right now I feel like I'm clutching at straws. Maybe there's something else possible?a

Robin9

Please post a imgur link to the photo - you cant place the link direct but add some obvious spaces.

What type of meter is it ? You say m3 and I think there are two options - a cyclometer type which may have a number on the right which you ignore when reading - a modern digital type which can be very difficult to read. Mine is the latter and I need to press button 9 to read and unless I am directly in front of it it is easy to read a 1 as a 7. When entering on line you may have to enter a leading zero - there is a difference between your reading of 01234 (decimal) 5 and 1234

If you don't already do so get into the habit of reading your meter at least once a month.

Can you double check the meter readings please and post them here

tacpot12

Your usage does look to be excessive. We have a large, Victorian end terrace with solid walls and our entire energy bill (gass and electric) is about £2,100 per year.

Do you have a hot water cylinder?
Does the cylinder have a thermostat?
How is the cylinder insulated?
What times is the water set to be heated?

What is the make and model of the boiler?

BTW: We have an old boiler (G-rated for efficiency), and a cylinder in the loft. The cylinder has a thermostat that is set to 60 degrees C. We have the water heated between 6:30am and 9:00 and 3:30pm and 10:30pm. Our cylinder came pre-insulated in blue foam. I had to work really hard to find a cylinder that I could buy as a home owner that was Part L compliant (rather than the lower L1b standard). If you replace your cylinder (if you have one) make sure you don't get one that only meets the L1b standard.

Cardew

Welcome to the forum.


You have eliminated the usual causes of 'silly' bills*, but you haven't included the most important information i.e. the actual and estimated meter readings. Are you sure you are excluding the red fractional figures?



An £1800 bill with gas @ 3p/kWh equates to approx 60,000kWh - which is approx 5,350 metric gas units. Obviously this is an impossible amount to use over 4 months in a 3 bed property.


* you haven't eliminated that your supply is being used in the next door factory;)

molerat

As above, nowhere have you mentioned the meter read you took in June and the actual meter read today. Without those everything is just baseless speculation.

tj2000

Thanks for the replies folks.

There's no cylinder as it's a combi boiler. The boiler it'self is a Worcester 28CDi, though it's clearly an older model than what comes up on google.

I'm going to struggle to get a photo up, however the readings are:
1st of June: 25974
Estimated Oct 1: 30938
Actual reading: 31132

The most recent actual photo I have says 31132, then 3 red digits (792). No preceding 0. It's a Schlumberger meter - can't see a model number anywhere.

So that's 58,000 kw/h of actual consumption. Which at my supplier rate is £1661.52 (I now realise the £1800 I quoted was inclusive of electricity, which in itself is a little high, but we do have an electric oven and hob - yet one more reason why the gas bill makes no sense).

So I can't see any way that it's a reading of the metre failure - and as I say, the supplier knew already that they've charged this kind of gas bill to the property historically given that their estimate was so close to the real reading.

matelodave

Are you reading the meter a bit more often than June & October. Hopefully you are now reading it daily if not weekly to try and find out what is going on.

Leaving 3-4months between meter readings doesn't give you any scope for identifying a potential problem and getting it resolved before it gets out of control.

Reading the meter at least monthly and sending them into the supplier should at least avoid you getting estimated bills and you'd see that something was not quite right and you could have done something about it.

Cardew

I can only think you misread the meter on 1st June(I appreciate you said you took a photo) or you have a faulty meter. Did you notify supplier of initial reading of 25974?



However for the supplier to estimate an Oct 1st meter reading of 30938 they clearly are using a higher start reading than 25974. They could never estimate consumption of 58,000kWh in 4 months



You need to determine the closing meter reading for the previous occupier.

Raxiel

Agree with the others who ask for photos, if you use imgur and just post the 7 digit code at the end of the link someone can turn it into a proper link for you.


Is it a mechanical or digital meter? Is there any possibility it's giving a 'rough calculation' kWh figure thats being misread as the volume reading (which is actually on another screen)? 5158 kWh (about 450m³) is much more reasonable.


And it's 'meter' btw, a metre is the unit of length.

tj2000

Yep - lesson learned to not leave these things. It was one of those things where we didn't actually know who the supplier was, and was waiting to receive a letter, that for whatever reason, didn't come until months later. So just falls off your radar.

Cardew - you say that they could never estimate that consumption, but that is exactly what it states on their letter. I was many years ago a debt / financial advisor and I've seen thousands of utility bills, and I've never seen anything like this one. So whilst I appreciate it doesn't look plausible, here we are all the same...

tj2000

Raxiel - it's an analogue meter. So there's really just the 5 characters in white, then 3 in red. It's a primitive thing, without much scope for misinterpretation. There is literally nothing that would show in that image other than printer sticker showing 'Schlumberger, made in england', a serial number, 'm3', 'Qmax 5m3/h, Qmin 0.12m3/h, Pmax 75mbar, V 2dm3' ' Property of Transco plc'.