Day and night rates/meters

Gerry1

Colin3783 said:

Since we’ve had our bill we have turned off the water boost and only ‘boost’ it for an hour each day, see picture. My DNO is Scottish and Southern, I’ll contact them in due course to make sure everything is in order however o believe the landlord has taken care of that as the account with them is in his name.

We have thermal heaters in the house which we’ve now stopped using for now anyway.

And yes the readings Octopus have are my own taken the minute I walked through the door on day 1.

Oh dear, seems to be one big muddle, at least in the way it's described.

• You need to check right now with Scottish and Southern to see who is really supplying you.  If it's not Octopus then at some stage you'll be hit with a big bill on a rip-off tariff from someone else.

• If you turn on the 2-hour Boost it's likely to be on an expensive daytime rate.  You should use the timed control instead: Boost is intended only for emergency use if you've messed up or been away.  Work out which rates apply for each as described earlier.

• How can you be paying a bill that's in your landlord's name?  You'll have fun trying to cancel that when you move out !
  

• What are your 'thermal' heaters?  If they're 'on demand' (i.e. not storage) they'll be on an expensive rate.  Again, find out which circuit and rate applies.

Sorry to be all gloom and doom, but if this confusion is as bad as it seems then you could be storing up a lot of expense and difficulty for yourself, especially when winter comes and / or you move out.

Colin3783

 Not at all Gerry I appreciate the advice.

I have contacted SSE in the past few minutes via an online form as it is impossible to contact them via phone at the moment so we’ll see what they say.

Is it possible to know when the ‘timed’ water heating will be on? Other than sitting looking at the meter to see when the light is on.... if not then I’ll just leave it on overnight and turn off when we are up in the morning. 

Gerry1

If you use the link that I provided, it will tell you your supplier immediately.  The meter should look after the timing of the lower immersion heater so you should be able to leave it permanently on, but it would be a good idea to check it by letting the water get cool and then pressing the rocker switch down during the day.  It should stay cool unless you rotate the Boost knob so that the upper heater gives you half a tank of expensive hot water (or you wait until the cheap rate kicks in).

Colin3783

Perfect thanks Gerry, Octopus are suppling me so all good there.

Just need to work out what exactly is being supplied a night rate in my house so I can cut back effectively, I don’t understand why I have an “off peak supply” switch in my cupboard though and also a 24hr normal supply (see pic) the off peak supply switch is my main switch...

The owner is an electrician so maybe he can explain for me.

Gerry1

Sounds like it was a legacy THTC system that's being phased out.  Forumites report that trying to switch suppliers always ends in tears, although Octopus may offer some sort of escape route.

However, it looks like you don't have storage heaters but do have an expensive instantaneous shower and some cripplingly expensive Octopus rates: I'm paying single rate at 12.11343p per kWh inc VAT, but with your three rates you're paying up to 18.207p ! 

Similarly, your daily charge is 47.481p, mine is 13.2825p (plus 17.29p for gas).  Perhaps Octopus's Tracker would be better?

Best move before winter sets in...

Colin3783

Thanks Gerry, I’ll give them a call and see what they can offer.

matelodave

Before giving them a call you really do need to understand what you've got and how it works because you wont be able to describe what you've got (they wont know, nor even care)

The old THTC or some legacy set ups had three rates - a timed (or remotely controlled rate) that powered your storage heaters and hot water.during off peak times. A second heating rate that you could use for heaters and were charged at a different rate and then a peak rate which powered everything else. The problem is that very few of the new suppliers can cope with that so you end up with two standing  charges plus two or even three rates which you've now got to decide which powers what and when.

It does look as though your electrician has tweaked the suppliers somewhat and possibly altered the hose wiring so and you need to find out exactly which fuse is fed from which meter and when its live, so you know what is being fed from which supply and how much it's costing you.Get yourself a pencil, paper and someone to help and check out everything.

Whilst trawling about I found this which might be of some use - have a look at it all but most importantly para 30 (however it only seems to cover a single tariff rather than E7)
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/58513f75ed915d0aeb00009e/energy-market-restricted-meters-order-explanatory-note.pdf