4 DECT phones would I save on electricity?

david1946

I have 4 DECT phones that are always charging and each consumes 5 watts per hour.

Would I save any electricity if I only charged them for say 5 hours a day using a timer in each socket or would it just work out the same?

Verdigris

If they are like my phone, you'll spend your life re-setting the time and date if you interrupt the power supply.

You are unlikely to recover the cost of the timer plugs, in saved electricity, in your lifetime.

Merlin139

First question I would ask is do you need all 4 hand sets plugged in at once?

I have 2 and only one docking station is used. The instructions for the phones say you should try to let them run down once a week. For this reason we put 1 phone in the docking station on Sunday night and take it out Monday morning. The other goes on on Thursday night and comes out Friday morning. 

Only the main one is plugged in which has answerphone incorporated. Since we changed our phone to one that blocks out all unwanted calls or screens calls we now maybe get 2 calls a month on our landline. 

Neil_Jones

You could just leave the phones off the chargers until the batteries run low and then it'll justify the 5w to recharge the batteries.

Remember the main unit (connected to the phone line) needs to be on at all times otherwise you can't receive any calls and none of the other phones would work either.

wittynamegoeshere

I doubt that they consume 5W all the time, probably just when they've just been switched on and they're attempting to charge the battery.  At some point it will cut off.

I notice that if I pick mine up shortly after using it it's warm, presumably as it's been charging after I'd depleted it.  But if I haven't used it recently it's stone cold.

Try plugging one in via whatever meter you're using then leaving it running for a few hours.

Rodders53

My Panasonic DECT phone set has the following specs:

Base unit (answerphone)  Standby approx 0.5W   Maximum approx 2.4 W

Charger unit  Standby approx 0.1 W Maximum approx 1.8W

So 3x charger plus base = 0.8 W standby to a max of 8 W, possibly (but unlikely in all probability). 

There must be other more power hungry things to worry about?

wittynamegoeshere

I reckon ours must cost a fair bit to recharge after she's been talking listening to her mum for ages.

Rodders53

wittynamegoeshere said:

I reckon ours must cost a fair bit to recharge after she's been talking listening to her mum for ages.

24 hours x 2 W @ 21p/kW = 1p  maybe 2p if prices keep going up.