High bill

Help1234

Hello,

I live in a 2-bedroom second floor flat with my husband. The flat is electricity only, we don’t have any gas. For the whole month of May we have not turned the heating on at all (storage heaters), as the flat has been warm. So our only electrical uses are TV, laptop charging, phone charging, oven, fridge, kettle, etc and shower. I submitted metre readings and my bill for this month is £117. This seems really high just for the aforementioned usage? I’m with Bulb on their Pay Monthly Variable Long Off-Peak Meter.

Day unit rate

29.48p per kWh

Night unit rate

29.48p per kWh

Standing charge

41.66p per day

Assumed annual consumption

1716.70 kWh

There is no exit fee so shall I switch providers?

Mstty

What you need to know is your exact kWh usage. Whether you are in credit or not and make sure any bill you get has the correct meter reading and is not an estimate but an actual reading.

Once you have these together you can easily check any fixed rates offered for whether they look good to you or not.

molerat

1716 kWh annually seems low for a storage heated property.

Are you sure the meter being read actually yours - is it in a communal cupboard or outside your door ?

Are those unit prices correct - same for day and night ?

Post up any meter reads and dates you have.

Robin9

Help1234 said:

............... The flat is electricity only, ...................

Assumed annual consumption

1716.70 kWh

Are you sure about this figure - its about half of what would be used in a gas heated property and you are electric storage ?    Is it  the daytime estimate ?   If so what about the nighttime ?

You should be able to get a more accurate estimate from your own readings and the bills.  Go back about 12  months and find a bill that has A, C, R , meter read, our read, S on it ( but not E), Read your meters today and do some simple sums.

pochase

The annual cost for the 1716KWh would be £658 including standing charges, so less than £60pm in average.

If you are paying £117 for a spring month without real need for heating the assumed 1716KWh are far off. You have paid  for 353KWh, more than double what they assume for a month.

So the problem is not the rate, the problem is that you seem to use much more energy than what they assumed.

Can you please give us the reading for the start and for the end of the month and confirm that they are using real readings and not estimates?

Help1234

Sorry for any confusion. I only moved into this property on 30th December 2021 and they are my own meter readings taken from within the flat. It seems what happens is I give a meter reading and then a few days later then do an estimate and generate a statement. For April they estimated my readings on the 27th April and then generated a statement saying based on their estimations I used £162.80. I then provided my readings on 28th April, they generated some estimations on 1st May and generated another statement which said based on my provided readings I was due £36 refund. These readings were as follows:

Estimated readings 27th April:
8414
2901
9678

My readings 28th April:
8339
2875
9620

Estimated 1st May:
8347
2879
9630

For May I provided meter readings on the 26th May as follows:
8416
2902
9734

They then did estimations today 1st June and generated a statement. Their estimations were:
8446
2910
9766

I am in debit.

Robin9

I think you are providing readings a couple of days before they are needed but allowing for a few days gap between your readings and their estimates there is nothing to bother about.

I assume the first reading is day time, the second night?   If so - 77 units  and 27 night. 

From your quote it looks like you are paying the same rate for day and night - ie not E7 .  Have you consumption figures from when you moved in ?

Help1234

The first reading is Day, the second reading is Night (NT) and the third is Night (WD). I don’t have consumption figures from the previous tenants as far as I’m aware although Bulb initially estimated the usage would be £50 when I first moved in Lol.

Gerry1

You seem to be on a strange and rather pointless off-peak tariff that doesn't have a cheap rate.

https://help.bulb.co.uk/hc/en-us/articles/115003610092-Two-rate-meters-including-Economy-7-

Do the sums and see whether switch to EDF or Octopus would be cheaper.  You can join them on the SVT but only if you phone them.

Unfortunately you probably won't save much and might even pay more.  If you have the Long Off Peak tariff because your NSHs are under-dimensioned you might also find it becomes chilly in the evenings.

Robin9

Help1234 said:

The first reading is Day, the second reading is Night (NT) and the third is Night (WD). I don’t have consumption figures from the previous tenants as far as I’m aware although Bulb initially estimated the usage would be £50 when I first moved in Lol.

Have you the readings you gave Bulb when they became your supplier :

Possibly Bulb were using historic data but it may have been the previous tenant switched off the heating or were away a lot -  £50 for an electrically heated property even in the good old days does sound low.