Huge Electric Bills

Mrs_R_Badger

When my son moved out of our house a few months ago, we thought that we would start to see great improvements in our electricity bill as there was just my elderly mother and me at home and we didn't think that either of us were huge consumers.  We had a very scary bill a few month ago.

On submitting a meter reading, I found that we had used around £120 of electricity in the space of a month.  We have 2 x fridge freezers (I'd like to just have one, but my Mum feels differently), we both charge our phones daily, Mum also charges her IPad daily and I charge my laptop about once a week.  We have an Alexa so my Mum can turn the lights on when she goes to bed, but we don't use it fir anything else.  The TV in the kitchen is on for a lot of the day, the microwave is used quite often.  Most cooking is done in the Aga but we use electric when the Aga is off in the summer.  Apart from that we have electric lighting, use the washing machine a few ties a week and the kettle about twice a day.   I can't see where we are getting such huge bills from.  I tried a price comparison, but that didn't make much difference as we are using so much - in excess of the suggested levels for families with high use.

We don't have a smart meter - we have heard lots of negatives, but will get one if it will help to get us out of these excessive bills. 

I'd really appreciate advice as we can not afford to see our savings being swallowed up to pay these huge bills each month.  Thanks.

niktheguru

A smart meter won't suddenly dramatically reduce your meter readings but the in home display may give you a fair idea when you are using quite a bit of electricity at any one time.

120 pounds in a month is good going. What is the tariff you are on for your electricity. Do you have gas central heating or storage heaters? How do you have showers in the morning, electric ones or from a gas boiler. Do you have an immersion heater, is it switched on? Check all these things first as these tend to be the high users.

The number of people who come on these boards saying their usage is high it must be the meter, when actually they've got their immersion set to on for hours a day.

Let us know how you get on.

MWT

Mrs_R_Badger said:

On submitting a meter reading, I found that we had used around £120 of electricity in the space of a month.  

Do you submit a reading every month?

if not then your previous reading will have been an estimate and you may not actually have used all that in the one month.

Check your meter reading again now and see how much you have used since the last reading…

Reed_Richards

The most expensive thing you can do with electricity is to heat something:

Room heating
Heating your hot water with an immersion heater
Electric showers
Tumble drier
Electric hob/oven
Microwave
Washing machine/dishwasher
Old style filament or halogen light bulbs that get hot to the touch
Kettle

You have mentioned some items on this list but perhaps there are others you have overlooked.

Reed_Richards

The other thing is, did you submit two meter readings a month apart or just the one?  If it was just the one then it is likely that the higher than expected bill was because you had been being billed on estimated readings that were lower than your actual readings so the big bill was a catch-up over a much longer period of time than just a month, all the time since you meter was actually read previously, in fact.  

Gerry1

No need to worry about charging phones, laptops and tablets, their consumption is negligible.

What powers the Aga?

Robin9

@Mrs_R_Badger

Can you resd your meter today plesse

Mrs_R_Badger

Thanks you all for your comments.  I appreciate you taking the time to reply.  

I do now provide a meter reading every month, so I know that my figures were from electricity we had used.

We do have an immersion heater, but never use it.  I keep checking in case it has accidentally be turned on, but it hasn't.  Our Aga runs on oil as does our central heating and the boiler heats the water too so this will not impact on our electric bill.  

In the winter, My Mum uses an electric heater or an electric blanket for an hour at nights if she's cold. But these high readings have come from a time when electric heaters are packed away and electric blankets not in use.

I don't own a tumble drier - living in an old house, I have a Sheila maid over the boiler or I dry outside where possible.

The only thing I can really think of is the new fridge freezer which seems to whirr and clunk all day long - even so I would not expect my bill to be so high.

Back to the drawing board.  

macman

Forget about iPads, laptops etc and concentrate on the big ticket items: space heating, hot water heating, tumble driers, electric showers. Everything else is trivial, unless you are cultivating pharmaceutical products in the loft...
What was the actual kWh consumption for that bill, rather than £££'s, which tell us nothing. Were both reads actuals, or estimated? This could just be a catch-up bill.

Gerry1

Let's see the actual meter readings for the past year together with the price per kWh and daily charge, inc VAT.

Tallerdave

What energy rating are the fridge freezers and how old are they?

The only real way to investigate is to get an energy monitor and start switching things off.