Please help spot the high energy usage source

Moskovite

Hi, 
I've recently moved into a new build 2 bed apartment and am now facing a £300 electricity bill from British Gas. I had a smart meter reading pre-installed and it currently is in the region of ~2000KW usage after only what has been less than 2 months. It's a standard electricity only tariff with BG (19p per KW). According to their stats my daily usage is somewhere between 6 and 8 pounds (30-40 KW per day).
Now I'm scratching my head trying to identify the source of such huge usage. Here's all inputs:  
1. I've got a Gledhill ES direct 150L unvented hot water cylinder. The upper immersion heater has always been on and the lower heater (with a timeguard fused spur time watch FST24) has always been off.
2. In my previous flat my combined gas+electricity bill from EON was in the region of £40 per month.
3. Most of the day my heaters are running in Eco mode (18-19C) with occasional 20-21C manual mode but no more than that. Both en-suite and bathrooms have towel rails running on a modest 2 out 5 heat setting. 
4. I take hot bath once week but again the hot water is nearly enough to fill the tub then it runs cold. 

Please help to identify what could be the source of such massive bills. Thanks.

Robin9

@Moskovite  Is it possible that you are paying for the previous tenant \?

Is this electricity only ?

More details of your heating system please - does your electric boiler feed a wet radiator system . If so expect very high bills.  Or are they a panel type heater - also results in big bills.


When you moved in did you read the meters and contact the existing suppliers. ?   Do your bills show these readings ? Are the readings shown as E for Estimated ?

Did you then change suppliers?  If not you are a=on a standard tariff - you can certainly better 19p/kWh !

Although the meters may say they are SMART  their smartness doesn't always transfer to the new supplier and the system relies on you reading the meter.  What are the latest readings on the bills and what are they today

PS the Smart meter is the one in an outdoor box  - it's not the one in your kitchen - that's the IHD toy

tacpot12

Can I suggest that you document the rating of each item of electrical equipment and multiply this by the number of hours that you have them switched on (on average per day). This will give you an upper limit for your electrical consumption per day. The space heaters and immersion heaters will have thermostats, so even when they are "on" they are not necessarily consuming energy. If the weather is cold, the space heaters will be drawing more energy than when the weather is warmer. 


Check that your daily usage is not above this upper limit. If it is, you have a more fundamental problem. You possibly have something piece of equipment that is drawing power that you are not aware off. If you turn off all your heaters, does the meter still show you are consuming energy? If not, then the issue is that the equipment you know about is consuming all the energy you are using. Electric-only heating is more expensive than central heating using a gas boiler. I'm paying about 15p per kWH, so you can improve your tariff to reduce costs. 

Hasbeen

And just to add to the posts above. The upper immersion heater should not be left on all the time. 

The bottom heater is designed to heat the whole tank. It is meant to be used with E7 electricity. When electricity is cheap, a timer turns the bottom heater on, and you have plenty of hot water for the next day.

The top heater heats only half (or a third) of the tank. This is used if you only want a small amount of hot water, but want it in a hurry. The water should be piping hot in about 30-45 minutes.

You would normally use the top heater to provide an emergency top-up if you run out of hot water heated by the bottom heater. This would usually be during the day (on full price electricity).

tim_p

Has been beat me to it about the immersions. It sounds like the OP is all electric, but everything is peak rate (and a very high tariff too @ 19p / kWh. No wonder the bill is so high. If there are no NSH and everything is peak rate then all you can do is find the cheapest tariff you possibly can and start to turn stuff off or down while looking to move to somewhere with gas (assumes it’s a rental property)

Moskovite

@Robin9 it's a new build, there was no previous tenant. Yes, it's electricity only. Room heaters are panel type, i.e. no water. When I moved in the readings were ~300KW. Bills are not shown as estimated. I did not change the supplier (yet). I do not have access to the smart meter outside but they're fed to BG automatically every half an hour. I don't have a "toy" in my kitchen.
@Hasbeen In the fused time switch for the lower immersion heater I have got 4 options: 1. Programmed times 2. Override ON (always on) 3. Override OFF (always off) 4. Boost (1-2 hours). What would be the correct setting to use to make the consumption optimal? I am not quite sure what E7 is or how I make usage of it with my immersion heater below. Also for how long should I switch on the upper heater if I run out of hot water? Does it need to be turned on if I use the Boost setting from the lower heater? Does Boost setting need to be activated when the lower/upper immersion heater is on or off?
I'm pretty certain the matter is in the cylinder usage like you described but I'm just trying to makes sense out of how it should be set/used. 

tim_p

First thing, reading the above is that you must get access to read your own meter, until you can do that you’re pretty much in the dark (no pun intended). I’ll read the rest now....

tim_p

It’s not just the cylinder. If you’ve got panel heaters then they are a huge part of the problem. All that said, given its a new build you’d expect it to be super insulated - do you have an EPC that might give a clue (potentially not worth the paper it’s written on though). 

Tallerdave

tim_p said:

First thing, reading the above is that you must get access to read your own meter, until you can do that you’re pretty much in the dark (no pun intended). I’ll read the rest now....

Totally agree. Demand access from the managing agents/company. You might even find that access to the meters is possible with an easily available "FB" key.

Photos of the immersion heater setup might help. You really want the main heating element coming on for a couple of hours at the end of the off-peak period. 

tim_p

Tallerdave, I suspect there is no off peak here, it’s all peak and 19p per kWh at that too, possibly plus VAT from all we know so far. 

Moskovite

I've got Heatstore HSDI1000 Dynamic Intelirad Electric Oil Filled Radiator 1000w. It says this radiator is intelligent enough to only use the energy required. I mostly use them in the Eco mode 18-19C. But yes they're turned on at all times. Perhaps I should programme certain times, just like with the hot water cylinder (what would those be?).