Electric cooker causing huge bills?

Talldave

If the IHD is providing a true live consumption figure (in W), that is really useful to monitor as you run around switching things off.

LindaLou72

Talldave wrote: »

The wattage sounds OK - remember once the oven's up to temp, it goes off (apart from the fan) and then comes back on again intermittently to keep the oven at 180.


I think maybe you need to look at your "base" load. By 5.30pm you'd used over 10kWhr, which seems a lot. Have you got a 75" OLED TV on all day?


Is that 346W a typical figure? If so, you need to look at what is really on all day and find out where the cost is coming from.


That all said, cooking all the meals whilst the oven's on is obviously going to be better than 3 separate sessions. Re-heating something in the microwave doesn't use much extra electricity as it's only on for a short time.

The 346W does seem to be a typical figure. We don't even watch the TV - we use our laptops. I'm struggling to locate where a drain could be, because I've gone around the house switching things off and on. My daughter was home by herself today and when I got home from work this afternoon, the meter said we'd only been using 1p or 2p per hour. Not much changed since then, but it can go all the way up to 6p or 8p just as 'background noise'. We've got eco-bulbs and don't leave lights on everywhere, and appliances aren't on standby.

Maybe as others have been saying here, British Gas reckon we have a debt to pay? I've spoken to them but they haven't been able to tell me much.

LindaLou72

matelodave wrote: »

You really need to understand your energy consumption and not get hung up about the indications on the In Home Device connected to your smart meter.

In a lot of cases the tariff info is wrong and just watching the instantaneous reading is enough to frighten anyone.

You would be much better off reading the meter (not the IHD) and recording your use in kwh rather than £'s on a weekly basis so you can understand what is going on. Make sure that you check your bills/statements regularly rather than just hoping that it's all sorting itself out.

Even with smart meters some suppliers aren't using the data for billing purposes and still guesstimating your consumption - if that's the case get the bills corrected, don't accept estimates.

If you check your bills regularly and properly you wont get into the situation where your DD is miles too low because you'll know yourself whether it's paying for your consumption or not and you can do something about it before it gets out of control.

Induction hobs are probably the most efficient form of hob cooking but sticking the oven on for several hours to heat and reheat stuff isn't - learn to eat together so you aren't cooking several meals a day and use the microwave oven rather than the big one.

Thank you, I'll check the meter myself. I wouldn't have thought to, because the man who installed it said it sends regular readers to the supplier. But it's just as well to look at the actual readout myself and keep track of it.

I'm ill and can't eat ready meals an so on; have to cook wholefoods from scratch, hence the hob and the oven. I do wish it could be easier.

coffeehound

LindaLou72 wrote: »

The 346W does seem to be a typical figure. We don't even watch the TV - we use our laptops. I'm struggling to locate where a drain could be, because I've gone around the house switching things off and on.

Laptops can use several hundred watts while they are charging, so if there are three of you regularly using your laptops, that might cover some of your background usage figure.

Talldave

LindaLou72 wrote: »

The 346W does seem to be a typical figure. We don't even watch the TV - we use our laptops. I'm struggling to locate where a drain could be, because I've gone around the house switching things off and on. My daughter was home by herself today and when I got home from work this afternoon, the meter said we'd only been using 1p or 2p per hour. Not much changed since then, but it can go all the way up to 6p or 8p just as 'background noise'. We've got eco-bulbs and don't leave lights on everywhere, and appliances aren't on standby.

Maybe as others have been saying here, British Gas reckon we have a debt to pay? I've spoken to them but they haven't been able to tell me much.

I would forget looking in pence, it's too granular. Stick with Watts - that's where you will see the reductions. (But for reference, your 346W will use a unit (14p) of electricity in just under 3 hours (equivalent of 1000W for an hour)).


Depending on the age of the laptop, as coffeehound says, laptop power supplies can be a bit thirsty, even if the laptop isn't really charging at that point in time. Do some experiments monitoring the IHD whilst unplugging them all.


Don't leave anything plugged in that has a "soft" switch if you don't have to. I once encountered a treadmill that was using nearly 40W when "off".


For reference, if I come downstairs in the middle of the night, my monitor will be showing between 77W and 98W - which is annoyingly high to me, but there's 21W "wasted" on BT Wi-Fi discs (due to thick walls) and the I suspect the ancient boiler & burglar alarm are a bit thirsty too (rented property, can't change).


What's your middle of the night figure, boiler not running (yes, gas heating uses electricity for pumps & valves!)?

comeandgo

Do you have a pressure cooker, microwave or slow cooker. These all help to reduce the electricity you use while cooking. Put a lid on your pan, shut ring off a few minutes before you would usually as the pan and ring will still be hot. Cook in batches and freeze the other portions. There are just two of us, I always cook in portions of four. The other two we either have the following evening or freeze for later in the month.

PennineAcute

Is your IHD programmed with the correct unit price and standing charge?

dogshome

For a family home, a D/Debit of £70 a month is low, and most likely too low, and with Estimated bills you have built up debt


BG's demand for a £120 D/D is made up of a contribution toward debt and their guess of the power you are actually useing



Forget the novelty IHD, read the actual meters and send the readings to BG once a month


Estimated bills mean one of two things.
1) You are paying more money than the cost of what you use
2) You are underpaying and build up debt

Norman_Castle

LindaLou72 wrote: »

Have recently been informed by them that we need to increase our direct debit for electricity from £70 per month to £120. We've always paid between £60-70 pm until now, though it's partially my fault for allowing them to take estimated readings.

Was the £70 per month covering your usage? The increase to £120 may be to recover a debt discovered by a recent actual reading. The £120 may also be an overestimate. Some companies like customers to overpay. Giving actual monthly readings helps avoid this.


Fridges and freezers can be expensive to run. As they switch on and off the consumption doesn't always show on monitors.

Robin9

LindaLou72 wrote: »

............................ though it's partially my fault for allowing them to take estimated readings.

I recently got a smart meter installed, and got a portable electricity meter to check the usage of appliances. .................

Even though you've got a Smart meter don't turn your back on taking your own meter readings - check them against your bill and see how if your bill is in line with your DD.

As you've now got a new meter - check that the serial number matches that in your bill. Does your bill also show the old meter being removed and the new one installed - are the readings on the bill the same as on the card the meter installer left when he changed the meter.