Insane gas bill in new house

dunstonh

I live in a three bed semi on my own admittedly, I have been with British Gas on a dual fuel thingy for donkeys years and I pay <£55.00 a month.

So you have the benefit of building up summer credit. The OP started payiing after Summer so has had the worst months for energy use with no credit built up during the Spring/Summer months.

It may not be that they have a higher usage as a yearly average. They just havent had the chance to average it yet.

thickasabrick

That appears to be a reasonable monthly gas bill for the type and size of property.

We have a 4 bed modern (1987) end terrace with 4 bedrooms, two large living/dining rooms, study and large kitchen. Triple glazing (0.5 u) throughout and at least 250mm of insulation in the loft, cavity wall insulation so theoretically very energy efficient.

Actual gas usage for the last 11 months so winter, autumn and summer.
March: 1770.56 kWh - £59.36
February: 1702.89 kWh - £56.75
January: 2345.71 kWh - £76.72
December: 2300.6 kWh - £75.35
November: 1601.4 kWh - £54.07
October: 1229.24 kWh - £43.03
September: 462.38 kWh - £19.7
August: 349.6 kWh - £16.49
July: 603.34 kWh - £23.66
June: 281.94 kWh - £14.26
May: 553.66 kWh - £22.02

Calculating your gas charge
We charge gas in kWh (kilowatt-hours). To convert gas units to kWh we use the following calculation:
gas units used x calorific value 39.1 x volume correction 1.02264 / 3.6 = gas units expressed in kWh

Actual gas usage in the last 12 months 14,292 kWh

Typical profile for heating is 8am to 9am, 6pm to 10pm, although most of the time the bedrooms are off and only the master bedroom has programmed heating between 7am and 9am and 9pm and 11:30pm with the others on demand using smart home heating with Drayton Wiser multizone. Heating is usually set off all summer and called on demand.

Ypnos wrote: »

Hi everyone


Moved into a new house in Sep 2018. Oct 2018 switched from default supplier (SSE) to Eon.


First bill from SSE on bog standard tariff was 91 for 6 weeks (combined). My current tarrif is EON Go Online 1 Year v18, which came up as best option on uswitch.



So, the house is an old (1875) 4 bedroom mid terrace, family of 4, everyone out during the day. The boiler is a Biasi combi, about 8 years old and it is the only gas appliance in the house.


I am paying Eon £70 a month without fail and since October and yet I am £500 in debt! Considering the last house we lived in had a bill of £68 monthly and we spent most of the time in credit, I have to wonder what on earth is going on! Is my boiler uneconomical? Is there a type of fault that could make it burn more gas? It had a service in October by British Gas Homecare. I tested the meter itself and the reading doesn't move an inch when the boiler is off.


Anybadvixe would be greatly appreciated!



Thanks

st999

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Give us actual meter readings

Former_E.ON_Company_Representative:_Malc

Ypnos wrote: »

Hi everyone


Moved into a new house in Sep 2018. Oct 2018 switched from default supplier (SSE) to Eon.


First bill from SSE on bog standard tariff was 91 for 6 weeks (combined). My current tarrif is EON Go Online 1 Year v18, which came up as best option on uswitch.



So, the house is an old (1875) 4 bedroom mid terrace, family of 4, everyone out during the day. The boiler is a Biasi combi, about 8 years old and it is the only gas appliance in the house.


I am paying Eon £70 a month without fail and since October and yet I am £500 in debt! Considering the last house we lived in had a bill of £68 monthly and we spent most of the time in credit, I have to wonder what on earth is going on! Is my boiler uneconomical? Is there a type of fault that could make it burn more gas? It had a service in October by British Gas Homecare. I tested the meter itself and the reading doesn't move an inch when the boiler is off.


Anybadvixe would be greatly appreciated!



Thanks

Hello Ypnos and already some great advice on here -thanks all.

As others have said, make sure we're billing to actual meter readings and not estimates. If estimated, please let us have up to date readings. We'll be happy to rebill and review the monthly payments.

I also agree with dogshome about the gas. Check we're billing to the right number of dials/digits. The older imperial gas meters (cubic feet - ft3) have 4 dials and the newer metric ones (cubic metres - m3) have 5 dials. Not including any red digits on both types of meter.

If we're billing incorrectly as dogshome describes, please let us know. It'll speed things up if you can tell us the meter serial number and give an up to date reading.

Should the billing be right, we'll be happy to look at spreading the balance over a more manageable period. We can also talk to you about energy saving measures like loft and cavity wall insulation. There's more about this on our website including details of help through the Government led Energy Company Obligation (ECO) scheme.

Hope this is useful Ypnos. Let me know if you need any more information as happy to help.

Malc

bugslett

Raxiel wrote: »

We're on the same tariff, and while it is a good one, we're paying about £80 a month for a 3 bed house that is relatively well insulated and efficient and with the benefit of a summer credit.


I agree with others that it seems right. You have bill shock right now but it should come down (quite a bit) in the summer and settle on a more realistic average by the autumn.


Edit: You should have got a summer credit refund from SSE when you switched which should offset these higher bills.

dunstonh wrote: »

So you have the benefit of building up summer credit. The OP started payiing after Summer so has had the worst months for energy use with no credit built up during the Spring/Summer months.

It may not be that they have a higher usage as a yearly average. They just havent had the chance to average it yet.

Well plenty of people are saying it seems right as raxiel does across the year. I tend to be frugal with energy (obviously subjective), so it seems sensible to take my approach and consider how you use your energy.

Ypnos

Hi everyone. I'm really sorry it has taken so long to reply - I have had quite a lot on.

Since I last posted, I racked up quite a lot of debt with E.on and have spent 3 months paying £183 a month to pay it off. While I was paying the debt off, the regular use was not being paid (this was set by E.on, not me) so I am now in debt again and the E.on system is recommending that I up my monthly payments to £200 a month. I doubt this is normal as E.on's own website says that I am paying close to 5 times as much as similar homes in my area (though it does not specify what type of homes or how wide the area is). This amount is crippling us.

I asked a neighbour 4 doors up how much he pays and said about £120 a month combined, also with E.on


OK readings in kWh:

3 Apr to 16 Jul 2019
Electricity - 1199
Gas - 4952

18 Jan to 3 Apr 2019
E - 775
G - 8987

3 Oct 2018 to 18 Jan 2019
E - 990
G - 11510

These have all been my readings. There was some overestimation in April, but I corrected this and should reflect in the numbers above.

Thanks

Ypnos

To answer some questions here:

E.on is using my readings

The house has loft insulation

It is double glazed

I had a Hive fitted to control the boiler and I'm quite draconian with its use

OP is there anything you could do with the agreement of the members of the household to cut usage?

I am very strict with the usage, but we do have two babies so I can't have them shivering.

If we're billing incorrectly as dogshome describes, please let us know. It'll speed things up if you can tell us the meter serial number and give an up to date reading.

An E.on engineer came out 2 weeks ago to do meter reads. I wasn't home, so I don't know if he might have found that the meter was wrong, with regards to the way I'm billed.

Here are my meter serials:
Electric: 16K0103134
Gas: G4KS0044478161

Robin9

You have a old house - badly insulated by todays standards -

Your electricity is about average - assuming about 1000 units for the missing July 2108 - Oct 2018 (I appreciate you weren't there but you will be this Summer/Autumn) is about £650 a year; gas 500 for the missing quarter is £900 a year. Add standing charges and VAT £1700 a year

What figures did you initially give to SSE and then to Eon as your estimated consumption - I hope it wasn't the £68 from your old house or the number of rooms.

Are your readings actually being used by Eon -

Talldave

Those figures look ok, based on age of property and likely insulation, or lack of! The 70 you were paying initially was mostly going on electricity. I'd guess at 120 a month once the debt is cleared.

To put things in perspective, the 3 bed detached single glazed cottage I'm renting consumed 2,200kWhr of gas in the coldest week in February, but just 72kWhr last week. Looking at 56,000kWhr for the year - only 2.499p per kWhr now though.

Ypnos

With regards to the meters themselves, the electric meter is one of the LCD ones beige with buttons down the side. The Gas meter looks like the old style silver boxes, but it has an LCD screen stuck to the front.