Help! £400 a month electric bill - one person, 2 bed flat!

Gerry1

See which register increases during the day, e.g. when using the tumble dryer or the cooker etc, that will be the day rate.  If there's only one immersion heater on a 24h supply, speak to your landlord about fitting a local timer.  Don't get a mechanical (motorised) one because a power cut can throw it out of kilter, with expensive results.

As an interim workaround, switch the immersion heater on before going to bed and off when you get up.

MWT

You will need to explain that to your supplier and they may want to send a meter reader round to confirm.

You can easily work out your current cost using the tariff information on your bill, assuming that is your current tariff...

It is still not going to be cheap, but not as bad as it was before.

The period you are looking at will be much higher than most of the rest of the year due to the extreme cold.

Should be about £266.11 for the power, plus your standing charge of £11:30, so say  £277.41 if those meter reading were taken today.

You should be able to find a cheaper supplier as well, but I'd get the meter reading mix-up fixed before you try to switch...

lovelouise

The lower reading (1) is the one that is increasing, I’ve got the washing machine on and can see it going up. 

I did a uswitch comparison and am on the cheapest tariff already. Will phone them
monday to get the meter readings sorted and hopefully it will be less of a shock to the system than £400!

Gerry1

Your tariff is cripplingly expensive !  14.09p/kWh night, 19.72 p/kWh day, daily charge 31.22p !

Switch today, start comparing with Citizens Advice and 'Switch with Which?'.

Take a guess at annual usage of 2200kWh (split 580 / 1620) which is the average usage if the meter has been installed for five years as the datestamp suggests.

lovelouise

@Gerry1 the bill I posted was a final bill for the previous supplier before I moved in. I switched to a tariff which is 24p standing charge, 17.7p day rate and 8.5p night rate. I used uswitch in December when I moved in. 

MWT

lovelouise said:

I switched to a tariff which is 24p standing charge, 17.7p day rate and 8.5p night rate. I used uswitch in December when I moved in. 

Excellent, then ignore my calculation in the earlier post

Verdigris

t = total (ignore), 1 = day rate (R1), 2 = off peak (R2)

lovelouise

Thanks for your help all!

Lisi299

before you ring the supplier do a load test, as they will ask you to do one. Take a reading before washing or boiling a kettle note the time and then again when you take the next reading for both 1 and 2 this will confirm to them which is which. As only one will move which you have confirmed is the lower number.

looking at usage for the last month you have used 1386 units day and 428 night on what they they are saying is day and night. I do think they could be transposed as with storage heaters should be higher at night this time of year, best to speak to them and see what they say.

lovelouise

@Lisi299 great, thank you.

I’ve been advised on another forum to stop using the immersion heater for water and use a kettle instead. Would this affect my bill significantly? I only put the hot water on for an hour when I get home from work. It isn’t on the E7 circuit according to an electrician, and is literally just an on/off switch in the kitchen.