Help needed on extremely high electricity bill

Gentlegiant

Talldave said:

You need that dodgy feed to downstairs disconnected.  No ifs/buts, and no agreement to halve future bills. They may be 100% electric AND be running a cannabis farm.

Yes I agree. Whether or not it feeds the flat below, it needs to be removed if its not directly serving a purpose in my flat 

Gentlegiant

Hasbeen said:

Gentlegiant said:

Hasbeen said:

Still waiting to see if the photo of the 3000w baby cot/heater will appear.

Its 30W read it wrongly 

Still to much

Ask your Health Visitor what she thinks of electrical baby heaters.

Ok Thanks! 

BooJewels

I haven't even been able to find any device for sale that warms a baby cot - I've found a couple with rocking actions, with music and sounds or light shows - but none with applied heat - and most were battery powered removable modules.   So the odd feeling I had when it was first mentioned, that it was a red herring, persists.  

I'm happy to try and help anyone in genuine difficulty, but this is turning into something else.   I'm out.

tim_p

Gentlegiant said:

Hasbeen said:

Still waiting to see if the photo of the 3000w baby cot/heater will appear.

Its 30W read it wrongly 

That’s more like it!  You’d have been broiling the little mite otherwise!

matelodave

You can get cot sized heating pads but looking at the interweb, cooking babies, doesn't seem like ever such a good idea. It can increase the risk of SID syndrome apart from the risk of electrocuting the baby if it gets soggy wet.

But as you say, the object of this post was to try and sort out his energy consumption and find out what the problem was. That would be the fact of the extra cabling going somewhere else.  I guess the mains feed from the MEM box originally went to the splitter and then the meter feed and and downstairs feed would have come from the splitter but some incompetent electrician has wired it up incorrectly and fed the splitter from the meter.

Sorting out the bill might take a bit longer as somehow the OP has to try and get the consumption apportioned between him and the other consumer

 I guess we've just about managed that and mumbling about baby cooking is really just slewing off at a tangent, especially as we now know thats it only 30w and not 3000.(which can make a lot of difference to both the leccy bill and how crisp the baby gets)

Phones4Chris

I'm afraid I've been busy all week, so unable to come back and comment further until now. I've just quickly read all the posts since my last one, so I hope I haven't missed anything too significant.

matelodave said Sorting out the bill might take a bit longer as somehow the OP has to try and get the consumption apportioned between him and the other consumer

Err, No! Sorting out the bill is do to with @Gentlegiant and BG, this "apparent" consumption from another flat is between @Gentlegiant and the landlord and should NOT EVEN be mentioned to BG as it will only give them more leverage to ignore the Back Billing issue. (I say "apparent" as we don't yet know what it is.).
@Gentlegiant You've said you are awaiting an amended bill, BUT you did not say what response you got to your first call to BG - it sounds like she just poo-pooed your bit about Back Billing - was she rude or just dismissive? You don't say what was discussed in the 2nd call - was back Billing mentioned and what was said?
If not (or even if it was and the bill hasn't been amended correctly when you get it) you'll need to go back to them again, and you may well need to push this hard as I'm sure they will try their best to bill you for the whole consumption!

You need to say things like "my pattern of consumption hasn't changed since I moved in", "I don't have an electric shower", "I don't have a tumble drier" (and similar if correct) - "I don't have any appliances that would consume the amount of power that you are claiming I've used in the period May to December 2020.
The previous bills have been inaccurate. My total usage since I moved in therefore needs to be averaged over the whole period AND you can only bill me for the last 12 months because of OFGEM's Back Billing rule. (And quote it at them) "You cannot be charged for gas or electricity used more than 12 months ago if you have not been correctly billed by a supplier."
It's not MY fault you haven't read the meter or asked me for readings, that's your fault. I was not aware of the situation.
(You should also check - using the on-line account? if there's been any rate changes during the whole period).

Now, regarding the potential consumption from the flat below (if that's where those cables go). This has nothing to do with BG, you should NOT mention it to them, it will cloud the issue. The meter and account is in your name and you are ultimately responsible to BG (unfortunately).
You say that flat below has been empty since the first lockdown. Did you see people regularly there before, were they always the same people, did they look like occupants or maybe "visitors" ?

Hasbeen said:

OP when you get home. Go to the door of the empty flat below you.
Lift the letter box and see if you can smell something Weedy? 
At the moment it appears you are getting power taken from you?

Talldave said:

The high consumption is most likely down to storage heaters or a cannabis farm in the flat at the other end of the mystery cable.

Hasbeen said:

OP at this stage I would not trust the LL or his "technician"
If it is bypassed you need an independent to verify.
I would suggest getting an actual Electrician out to have a look before the weekend.
It will cost you but could rectify your problem.

@Gentlegiant you need to take these remarks seriously, you have no idea what is going in in the flat below and the possibility of this sort of thing is NOT UNHEARD OF. So snoop about a bit. It seems rather strange that the consumption appears to have gone down (if I've recalled the previous posts correctly) since you've mentioned all this to the landlord! It may all be perfectly innocent, but seriously, if you truly have some strong suspicion that the flat below is being used in such a manner and the landlord's "technical" doesn't want to disconnect the cables - there's no-one living there, so why not? - then there's definitely something suspicious. But don't say that to the LL !

niktheguru

i'd be interested to hear what the "technician" has to say about the setup. Probably that the meter tails and junction box have been "tampered with" and we don't know by who and it wasn't by him (if he is a regular), seeing as the tails have been removed from the bottom of the meter (hence been opened by somebody)
I very much hope the OP has taken pictures of the current setup before things are moved around. It would be useful seeing as the landlord owns the property below, to go and see what the meter downstairs is like (or at least wherever those cables go!) and what happens to electricity in the bottom property when those other tails are removed. (Potentially if those cables go to the downstairs meter before the consumer unit then they have been paying for that electricity twice??)

I'm sure we are all awaiting with baited breath to see the outcome of this visit this weekend. I'm assuming the OP didn't get an independent electrician in the end. Heres hoping everyone else involved is trustworthy!!

tim_p

niktheguru said:

Heres hoping everyone else involved is trustworthy!!

I think that unless those suspect cables turn out to be totally innocent and go literally nowhere then *someone* with access to both flats isn’t completely trustworthy. 

coffeehound

tim_p said:

niktheguru said:

Heres hoping everyone else involved is trustworthy!!

I think that unless those suspect cables turn out to be totally innocent and go literally nowhere then *someone* with access to both flats isn’t completely trustworthy. 

Yes, how could the LL not know what was going on?  " . . and we call this one the 'Magic Flat' because it never recieves electricity bills . ."

matelodave

coffeehound said:

tim_p said:

niktheguru said:

Heres hoping everyone else involved is trustworthy!!

I think that unless those suspect cables turn out to be totally innocent and go literally nowhere then *someone* with access to both flats isn’t completely trustworthy. 

Yes, how could the LL not know what was going on?  " . . and we call this one the 'Magic Flat' because it never recieves electricity bills . ."

That's not necessarily true. the "magic flat" may well have had a leccy meter and they may have been paying their bills quite unaware that it was coming through someone else's meter from upstairs.
However that said, who ever fitted a meter in the other flat should have been aware that it wasn't directed connected to an energy suppliers incoming fuse.

An alternative scenario is that the landlord had his own meter downstairs and was happily charging the tenant and pocketing the money knowing that the upstairs tenant was paying for it all.

Had the OP been a bit more proactive in reading his meter regularly and checking his bills properly it should have become pretty apparent that summat was wrong around two years ago. Hes now got a fight on his hands to prove that the meter has been wired incorrectly, that another person's energy has been measured through his meter as well as his own so he's got to try and recover the difference from either the downstairs tenant or the landlord. because as far as BG are concerned, he is their customer.

I think the lack of seals on the meter, the splitter and the MEM box tends to indicate that some nefarious activity has been going on in the past and getting the landlord's technician round to sort it out gives them the opportunity to try and recover he situation before there's a visit from the BG Revenue Team - which would be my next port of call