My usage is huge between 2am-9am

raemcc

Yes stock photo! Sorry for the confusion, ours in the kitchen is very much set to summer (is in fact set to off rn) 
6am, we are on £1 and 1.58 KWH. (There’s a standing charge in that and my man works past midnight often) so it was that hot water heater! What an absolute drain. Thanks for puzzling this out with me. I guess we need to play the game of “how little hot water can we get away with” for the next few days until we come to a compromise between the kitchen box and the smart meter box 🥲

raemcc

Also the bright app shows this. Has Scottish power flipped us backwards. 

Mstty

Glad you have found the source now you can get to play how little time can we have the hot water on 👍 

Someone earlier suggested the last hour of your economy 7 for heating the hot water and that makes sense as it's the warmest when you want it. 

Robin9

raemcc said:

... House is all electric.  I will go round and check the storage heaters! 

Can you double check please -  are they actually storage heaters or on peak panel heaters ?

raemcc

They are big rectangle boxes. I’ve lived in a flat with storage heaters before and they are identical. 

I think this weirdness has been a combo of the water heater and the rates being switched. Explains why it’s only costing 2p to run a washing machine in the day. It understandable why I was so confused about the supposed extreme expense of my night time water heating. I haven’t entered any ratings flipped round and the smart meter still doesn’t seem to have talked to Scottish power in any way visible to me, so hopefully it’s easy to fix

[Deleted User]

raemcc said:

 I guess we need to play the game of “how little hot water can we get away with”

Hi,

try my previous suggestion,

'you would be better with immersion timed to catch the last hour of night rate just before you get up in the morning, with a well insulated tank should last until evening.'.

You can adjust times if more needed, or a quick 'boost', though that would be at dearer rate.

raemcc

Yes I will try that going forward. I have been told by Scottish power it will take up to a month for my smart meter to swap the rates around so I’ve just to ignore it telling me we’re spending £££ at night (I work in software for a company that often works with Scottish power, it’s going to be so hard not to email someone and ask how tf their software works- certainly does not take our software a month to communicate properly with their devices ) 
going forward I think I will set the water heater to do the last hour of the night cycle to be mor efficient. I guess the smart meter has taught me at least some things. Thank you. 

k_man

frugalmacdugal said:

raemcc said:

 I guess we need to play the game of “how little hot water can we get away with”

Hi,

try my previous suggestion,

'you would be better with immersion timed to catch the last hour of night rate just before you get up in the morning, with a well insulated tank should last until evening.'.

You can adjust times if more needed, or a quick 'boost', though that would be at dearer rate.

If the tank is well insulated (and lasts until evening), does it make much difference if the tank is heated in the first or last hour of night usage?
I would be tempted to go middle of night usage, just to avoid any potential BST related issues.

Albeit in this case it seems night usage is using daytime rates currently.

daveaspy

if your showers are electric, do you even need to heat a big hot water tank? What do you draw hot water out of the taps for? You might well want it for washing, but think if you really need it. (We have a combi so hot water is mostly on demand, but I tend to use cold water at most taps as the hot takes so long to reach them and I cant be bothered waiting that long while heating up long runs of pipes under the floor )

raemcc

daveaspy said:

if your showers are electric, do you even need to heat a big hot water tank? What do you draw hot water out of the taps for? You might well want it for washing, but think if you really need it. (We have a combi so hot water is mostly on demand, but I tend to use cold water at most taps as the hot takes so long to reach them and I cant be bothered waiting that long while heating up long runs of pipes under the floor )

We don’t have a dish washer! So I guess washing hands, occasional baths, and the dishes. The dishes is the main reason! Have never had an issue washing dishes in the evening with the hot water set to stop heating at 3am. So the “last hour heat” idea might not be needed. Especially if there’s a worry around time changes.