Consistently underquoted energy costs

harrym1byt

I cannot at the moment get to check or edit my details in the Energy Club, it will not allow it due to the fact that I am in the midst of switching, but...


When setting up your annual gas consumption, would it not be sensible of the site to allow the option to enter M3, as that is what the gas meters register in?



My own spreadsheet accurately predicts the true costs, simply because I feed the data in as M3 and it does the cost calculation taking account of the correction value for the area.

System

harrym1byt wrote: »

I cannot at the moment get to check or edit my details in the Energy Club, it will not allow it due to the fact that I am in the midst of switching, but...


When setting up your annual gas consumption, would it not be sensible of the site to allow the option to enter M3, as that is what the gas meters register in?



My own spreadsheet accurately predicts the true costs, simply because I feed the data in as M3 and it does the cost calculation taking account of the correction value for the area.

Tariffs have daily standing charges and a price per kWh. I am not sure what value there would be in PCWs allowing consumers to get a quote using cubic feet or meters. Gas volume to kWhs conversions are based on an average calorific value which varies by region and through the course of the year. That said, multiplying cubic metres by 11.2 will give you a pretty accurate kWh conversion.

anniecave

harrym1byt wrote: »

Gas heated and gas HW, apart from electric shower - three bed semi.


I think it is maybe beginning to dawn on me where the error is - gas meter in M3 and units in gas unit in Kw. I have not looked into that properly yet, but - Might that be the cause?

Yes, gas units are not the same as Kwh's. Some meters measure in cubic feet, some in cubic metres, so you need to use the correct conversion amounts. I think you have answered your own question!

Biscuit_Tin

harrym1byt wrote: »

I cannot at the moment get to check or edit my details in the Energy Club, it will not allow it due to the fact that I am in the midst of switching, but...


When setting up your annual gas consumption, would it not be sensible of the site to allow the option to enter M3, as that is what the gas meters register in?

Yes, it would not be sensible to do that not least because there is another variable involved in translating M3 to kWh.

You can obtain your kWh figures from your supplier if they are now shown on a recent bill

harrym1byt wrote: »

My own spreadsheet accurately predicts the true costs, simply because I feed the data in as M3 and it does the cost calculation taking account of the correction value for the area.

That's a clever little spreadsheet you've set up that goes and collects the otherwise unknown variable (Calorific Value) from an external source

Whilst you may get away with that for your own occassional personal use, there may well be an issue with a commercial organisation such as MSE/MSM going off and frequently accessing this data from a third party site.

It would also require, as your own clever little spreadsheet also does, the dates of the consumption as the calorific value varies over time.

(My guess is that your speadsheet is not quite as accurate as you think it is, but if I'm wrong, I am impressed by the lengths you have gone to to ensure it's accuracy :T)

harrym1byt

The spreadsheet is not entirely my own efforts, it was one I came across long ago and adapted to my own needs. It doesn't get the caloric value itself, I simply set up all the the data of unit cost, standing charge and CV up once per year when I move supplier. The change in CV is only tiny, so doesn't affect the cost by much.



Its prediction of the likely cost can be much further out, but becomes more accurate as the year progresses. It uses a factor for winter and another for summer weeks, to reflect increased and decreased consumption.



I suppose now, I ought to add in a extra calculation, to auto calculate gas Kw from M3, taking in the CV factor :rotfl: