Electric Boilers

RandyMarshall

First post so be gentle! 

I recently bought a flat with a Potterton Gold electric boiler. I’m a first time buyer so not I’m too clued up on energy bills or boilers if I’m honest! 

I got a letter to the flat from Octopus Energy basically offering me different tariffs to carry on using them as the energy supplier to the flat. So after getting the keys on 6/11 and barely being in the flat I sent them a reading on 20/11 and they advised me I owed them £38.76 for usage between 6/11 and 20/11. 

I’ve since noticed that the boiler switch was left on for the full two weeks and used up a hefty amount of kWh at 27.7p per kWh at Octopus! I guess my question is should I be turning off the boiler when it’s not in use as my estimated annual cost based on those two weeks is looking pretty astronomical and I haven’t even officially moved in yet.

Any help is appreciated and apologies for the ramble! 

Thanks 

worrywart_3

Was the heating  on? Ask octopus to go the standard variable tarrif rather than a fix 

QrizB

Welcome to the forum.

The type of boiler you've got - using electricity to heat water for a wet central heating system - is sadly the most expensive mainstream way of heating a property. Given that it's a flat it's probably not a huge property but even so £20/week is at the lower end of the range for this time of year.

You do appear to be on quite an expensive tariff. You might want to contact Octopus and see if they have a cheaper option;; their "Flexible Octopus" tariff should be around 21p/kWh although this can be expected to rise in April.

Reed_Richards

Many modern room thermostats have a "Holiday" setting which typically maintains the temperature at about 12 C.  Or for just the basic frost protection 5 C should be about right.  

Robin9

By "boiler"  do you mean a tank feeding wet radiators ? If so £38.76 will be a ocean.  If you have what I think you have the heating costs will be astronomical.

If not what is your heating |?  Are you all electric ?   

Photo's of your boiler and radiators please.

Gerry1

Welcome to the forum.

Unfortunately there's not really a gentle way of putting this: buying a property with an electric boiler was an absolutely dreadful mistake.

Absolutely nothing is more expensive to run.  It's bad enough not having GCH, but at least with storage heaters the majority of your room and water costs could be shifted to the cheaper night rate.  With an electric boiler, the whole heating shebang will be clocking up at the cripplingly expensive day rate.

Sorry for the bad news, but sadly that's the way it is.

QrizB

Robin9 said:

By "boiler"  do you mean a tank feeding wet radiators ? If so £38.76 will be a ocean.  If you have what I think you have the heating costs will be astronomical. If not what is your heating?  Are you all electric?  Photo's of your boiler and radiators please.

The Potterton gold is a flow boiler (link to info). Can be used with an indirect cylinder and wet rads. Neat and compact but not exactly cheap to run.

jbuchanangb

You need to find all the controls for your central heating and water heating. Is there a timer control, is there a room thermostat, maybe combined with a timer? What control is there for the hot water tank? You need to set the heating on for the lowest room temperature you can live with, say 18C, and to be on only at the times you are in the flat. Likewise set the hot water tank to be on only when you need it. Way back when my daughter had a place with electrically heated wet radiator system, carefully managing the system with the controls successfully brought the electricity bills into the "manageable" range!

QrizB

Gerry1 said:

Unfortunately there's not really a gentle way of putting this: buying a property with an electric boiler was an absolutely dreadful mistake.

I wouldn't go quite as far as Gerry1 has; the flat may have many desirable features, be in a nice area, have easy access to local facilities, and so on. It may even have been very competitively priced, such that a £1000pa electricity bill is no big deal.

But he's right that this is an expensive way to heat a flat.

sjcsystems

The responses on this thread are predictable and no doubt well founded.  However think of the future.  We will not be transitioning to hydrogen.  The logistics of moving all of an estate at once to hydrogen makes it mind-boggling.  The supply isn't available anyway.  So with government already talking about levelling the playing field by imposing surcharges on gas, the OP may actually be in a really strong position.  

QrizB

sjcsystems said:

The responses on this thread are predictable and no doubt well founded.  However think of the future.  We will not be transitioning to hydrogen.  The logistics of moving all of an estate at once to hydrogen makes it mind-boggling.  The supply isn't available anyway.  So with government already talking about levelling the playing field by imposing surcharges on gas, the OP may actually be in a really strong position.  

So in 20 years time when the UK has moved to electric heating the OP might only be paying 3x as much as their neighbours who have heat pumps, rather than 5x as much as those with gas are today?

And why exactly have you chosen today to bump a three-week-old thread that the OP hasn't returned to?