Moving away from Economy 10

Rhegarty14

Hi - the apartment i live in has electricity only and has an electric boiler and has normal radiators we use central heating very normally we took out storage heaters years ago.

We have always been on economy 10 and use 7800 kWh per year and pay £90 per month.

Id like to know if I would be able to move to a normal conventional energy package to save money - is this possible and would it be of benefit for me to do this?

Any advise welcomed!

Gerry1

You'll have to guesstimate how your annual peak and off peak kWh usage figures would translate into the equivalent E7 day and night hours. Then use comparison sites to check the pricing.

Probably best to take some daily readings at the start and end of your local E7 times when it's a bit colder and darker to get an idea of the percentage that would be used on the E7 night rate.

Check carefully beforehand, especially the existing Ts & Cs, because you probably won't be able to go back to E10, certainly not without a charge.

Many suppliers will offer a single rate tariff even if you have an E7 meter, and those with over 50,000 customers have to do so for E10 meters, so if single rate looks promising it wouldn't need a meter change. However, if you use day rate electricity for the boiler it will be very expensive !

matelodave

How much energy have you used in the past 12 months - check your bills and meter readings.
Add together the amount used on peak rate and the amount used on the off-peak rate and it should give you an idea of your total consumption.

Put that into a comparison site to see how much a single rate tariff would cost.

It's more difficult to try and compare with an E7 tariff because you normally only get off peak rates between midnight and 07:00 and your sort of heating is probably off for most of that time, so you'll be running it at peak times although if you are prepared to check your meters at midnight and 07:00 for a couple of week you might get some idea

Gerry1

If you look back through similar posts, it seems that many forumites suggest it's highly problematic to switch E10 to another supplier.

Unfortunately you're between a rock and a hard place: electricity for space heating is always expensive, even more when it's full price. As you can no longer store heat for this purpose, you're having to rely on the afternoon boost to avoid the full horror of 'full price all day long'. But E10 seems doomed so you'll have to keep checking whether it makes economic sense to resist being shunted off it. Sorry to sound so gloomy...

Presumably it's impossible to get gas made available? Might be worth it if you own the apartment: as well as much lower bills, it would be far easier to sell and you'd probably recoup much of the capital costs.

Richie-from-the-Boro

They've been getting rid of [on a wittle down process] all forms of exotic metering for over a decade. They've been getting rid of E10/E18 etc tariffs for over a decade, and yet it survives as a no competition highly priced form of choice to this day and beyond.

A brick is a brick, more bricks .. .. .. and you won't need top up times or top priced tariffs, friends. Think about this and get comfort not fear.

matelodave

Richie-from-the-Boro wrote: »

They've been getting rid of [on a wittle down process] all forms of exotic metering for over a decade. They've been getting rid of E10/E18 etc tariffs for over a decade, and yet it survives as a no competition highly priced form of choice to this day and beyond.

A brick is a brick, more bricks .. .. .. and you won't need top up times or top priced tariffs, friends. Think about this and get comfort not fear.

Not really sure what you are trying to say.

It appears that the OP has a wet central heating system with a flow boiler which required leccy when he requires heat - it's not a storage heater.

They are probably the most expensive form of heating known to man (apart from Fischer and their ilk) so you really need the cheapest leccy you can lay your hands on for the times when you require heating (not usually between midnight and 7am).

Although e7 is cheaper than a single tariff overnight it's usually significantly more expensive during the daytime so the OP needs to identify when he's using most of his energy and get the cheapest rate for the period he uses it. There's no point in having a cheap rate overnight if he cant benefit from it and then paying peak rates during the day.

We use leccy to run our heatpump which heats our house, usually between 07:00 and 22:00 so an E7 or E10 tariff wouldn't suit us but a cheap single rate tariff does. Symbio at 11.5p/kwh works out at about the cheapest we can find.

Richie-from-the-Boro

Don't disagree Dave the Matlow. I was just making general comments on E10 and pointing out that more storage of cheap stuff is a better working solution to 99% of all shortcomings on night store for the many thousands who :

- are off gas
- run out in the evenings
- on 'captured' E tariffs
- don't know how to use NS, etc

Yes I read the O/P was on wet paying £90pm. That does not tell me any info, its annual cost that (summer £?) counts.

Best of luck.

matelodave

As the OP reckons he pays £90 a month for 7800kwh means he paying roughly 13.8p/kwh (including his standing charge) my Symbio single rate tariff (11.5pkwh + 15p/day s/c) would work out at around £80 a month saving £120 a year.

It's certainly worth considering as the whole market is then available not just E10 suppliers

Robin9

Can Symbio's (and the other small suppliers) systems cope with dual MPAN and also add together the multiple registers to give a simple unit charge and single standing charge ?

matelodave

Robin9 wrote: »

Can Symbio's (and the other small suppliers) systems cope with dual MPAN and also add together the multiple registers to give a simple unit charge and single standing charge ?

Dunno, but that's what would have to be taken into consideration if the OP wanted to swap to a different tariff structure. Some rewiring might be required as well depending on configuration in the house.

Richie-from-the-Boro

HISTORY

About '82[ish] there was a national rewiring of HA/LA properties NOT for NSCH but under / over-ceiling heating. Simultaneous was the absorption of the local authority DLA's and council housing stock of millions went to HA's management.

THIS gross tariff and its heating type was national,in all 23 RAB's ready for the transition starting 90's area boards were replaced by regional electricity companies, which were then to be privatised.

Put simply new NSCH installed / water controller and new meter. Avoiding expensive refurbish, they simply put in an isolation switch for the under / ceiling circuit.

So some were / were not / converted. Hence the reason all experienced MSE posters caution on getting a sparky to 'check'

Dual MPAN's aggregation counting is generally not difficult, its the particular accounting systems that can't cope.