Is my Energy Bill too high?

follett

Hi,
I recently moved into a one bedroom property with my partner. In our first month, December, we managed to rack up an electricity bill of over £200 with a 16p per kwh tariff. Now it is an electricity only flat and we did have the heating on semi regularly but even so the bill seemed absurd. As soon as we saw the bill we tried hard to conserve energy as £200 is too much. For the last week, even though the flat is quite cold, we left the heating off and read the metre daily to try and work out how much the bill would be with no heating on. It turns out in one week with no heating on we use £90 worth of electricity a month. I do work from home so am inside with my computer on all day but even so to use that much electric seems over the top to me. Our boiler is a Sadia heatrae electromax and recommends having the hot water on at all time (it takes 3 hours to heat up from cold), so we leave it on. 
I've spoken to our energy provider who told us to perform a creep test which I did and the metre isn't faulty in that sense. However I am worried something is going wrong somewhere as the bill is crazily high.
We are basically choosing between paying £200 a month and freezing right now.
Does anyone have any advice?

JJ_Egan

What are your meter readings and what are your tariff prices ??

couriervanman

16p kwh...... ouch that almost 4p per kwh more expensive than the cheapest

niktheguru

Electricity only flats are expensive. 
What "heating" are you using, night storage, convector/fan, oil filled rads?
Try get on a cheaper tariff, you can get 14p per kwh tariffs these days, that will save you about £25 a month at current usage.
Also, remember when it gets warmer you will use less energy, so it will get better.
Someone with more knowledge about your boiler may be able to give you advice on how to set the water.

Robin9

Describe your heating to us please.
Is it storage rads, panel heaters, underfloor, fan heaters   - do you have lots of ceiling lights - big American fridge/freezers ?
You say 16p unit so I presume single rate ie whatever your heating is it all charged the same.

Take lots of meter readings -  every 3 hours if necessary to find out where your energy costs are. Use the actual meter rather than any IHD.

Gerry1

Sounds like you're renting and you don't have night storage heaters.  If so, the unwelcome news is that the only realistic course of action is to find a competitive single rate tariff (start comparing using Citizens Advice and 'Which? Switch') until you can move to a property with gas central heating.

Hasbeen

follett said:

Hi,
I recently moved into a one bedroom property with my partner. In our first month, December, we managed to rack up an electricity bill of over £200 with a 16p per kwh tariff. Now it is an electricity only flat and we did have the heating on semi regularly but even so the bill seemed absurd. As soon as we saw the bill we tried hard to conserve energy as £200 is too much. For the last week, even though the flat is quite cold, we left the heating off and read the metre daily to try and work out how much the bill would be with no heating on. It turns out in one week with no heating on we use £90 worth of electricity a month. I do work from home so am inside with my computer on all day but even so to use that much electric seems over the top to me. Our boiler is a Sadia heatrae electromax and recommends having the hot water on at all time (it takes 3 hours to heat up from cold), so we leave it on. 
I've spoken to our energy provider who told us to perform a creep test which I did and the metre isn't faulty in that sense. However I am worried something is going wrong somewhere as the bill is crazily high.
We are basically choosing between paying £200 a month and freezing right now.
Does anyone have any advice?

A Heatrae Sadia Electromax? I thought they were combi boilers? 3 hours for hot water, is it heating a copper tank in cupboard and wet wall radiators or wet under floor?

Boiler for central heating and hot water?

The most expensive heating there is. 

If it is a single rate of 16p then look at the switch with which or the citizens advice switch site for comparisons.

Post your daily readings and what tariff you are on

daveyjp

45kwh per day is high, but not unfeasible, especially with an electric boiler rated at 6 or 9kw.

If you have an electric shower use that and boil the kettle for hot water, rather than having a full tank of hot water being kept hot.

follett

Hi,
Appreciate all responses as I'm very naive on the topic.
Day 1 metre rose by 8kwh (we turned heating and hot water off)
Day 2 metre rose by 19kwh (hot water turned back on)
Day 3 metre rose by 23kwh - by this point i've left hot water on as the boiler manual reccomends and I turned heating on for 30 mins to 18 as the flat was 15 degrees and we were freezing
Day 4 metre rose by 14kwh - Heating off all day
Day 5 metre rose by 22kwh - Heating off all day
Day 6 metre rose by 18kwh - heating off all day.

follett

Current tariff is with SSE 16p per kwh and 20p standing charge a day. We are renting. When we moved in we actually received bills to  the occupier saying they were £1000 in debt for electricity.
We have switched to Octopus on a cheaper tariff and further applied to get on an off peak/peak tariff as the boiler is supposed to heat the water automatically at off peak times? 
I believe our radiators are panel and it is one electric boiler for hot water and heating.
There are a ridiculous amount of ceiling lights  (30 in the lounge alone) so that could be another culprit, although we tend to switch on just a few

Gerry1

follett said:

We have switched to Octopus on a cheaper tariff and further applied to get on an off peak/peak tariff as the boiler is supposed to heat the water automatically at off peak times? 

I believe our radiators are panel and it is one electric boiler for hot water and heating.

That will probably be a big mistake if the day rate is higher.  The increased spend on daytime electricity (which will probably have a higher rate than single rate would have) will obliterate any hot water savings on the overnight rate.  That's certainly true of conventional Economy 7 although Octopus may have some clever tariffs that aren't quite so bad.

Unfortunately you have the most expensive system it's possible to have.  The only realistic answer is to move.