Oct price cap increase likely to push energy bill to over £10k... for a family of 4...

MariaAH

p.s. of the post-Oct figure of £10,850, the EV charging is approx £2K and gaming PC/aircon is £1K, so remaining is about £7,850...still eye watering...

Sea_Shell

Just goes to illustrate how his crisis will effect everybody,  even those considered "comfortable" up to now.

It's not just a "poor" issue. 

But there should be savings to be made by reducing the "other" usage, because that £7850 is indeed eye watering.

Some (more) detective work is required.     Every watt counts. 

chris_n

• TP monitor is plugged in with TV/SkyBox/Playstation at the moment, nothing overly scary there at the moment.

When you say nothing overly scary at the moment you have to think about the time multpliers as well as the equipment and realise that you may have many devices that use just a little more than 'average'. When I left the UK I gave my daughter a brand new 55 inch Samsung QLED TV, turned out it uses somewhere around 170W. Her previous Samsung 48 inch LED TV uses 50W, a difference of over £100 at the new rates (allowing 6hrs / day). The MSE guide elsewhere lists TVs at 30W so that could be another £25. A Sky Qbox is listed at 45W so that is putting my old TV and a Sky box at well over 200W.
When you have multiple TVs ( we certainly did  when the kids were at home) you could easily be spending £500 at todays rates.

sienew

Sea_Shell said:

Just goes to illustrate how his crisis will effect everybody,  even those considered "comfortable" up to now.

It's not just a "poor" issue. 

But there should be savings to be made by reducing the "other" usage, because that £7850 is indeed eye watering.

Some (more) detective work is required.     Every watt counts. 

Honestly? This isn't a fuel poverty issue, this is an overuse issue. This is 3x the average households usage (there are EV's to consider as well).

GingerTim

The 'good' news is that there is still a lot of scope in your electricity usage to make significant reductions.

MariaAH

chris_n said:

• TP monitor is plugged in with TV/SkyBox/Playstation at the moment, nothing overly scary there at the moment.

When you say nothing overly scary at the moment you have to think about the time multpliers as well as the equipment and realise that you may have many devices that use just a little more than 'average'. When I left the UK I gave my daughter a brand new 55 inch Samsung QLED TV, turned out it uses somewhere around 170W. Her previous Samsung 48 inch LED TV uses 50W, a difference of over £100 at the new rates (allowing 6hrs / day). The MSE guide elsewhere lists TVs at 30W so that could be another £25. A Sky Qbox is listed at 45W so that is putting my old TV and a Sky box at well over 200W.
When you have multiple TVs ( we certainly did  when the kids were at home) you could easily be spending £500 at todays rates.

I know - its all very frightening...I will leave TP plug in to see how the 'nothing overly scary' adds up over a week...as I said, we will be sitting in darkness round a candle at this rate...

Mstty

Why don't you set yourself a target you will be comfortable with?

Otherwise I fear you may say, that doesn't cost that much, neither does that but when they all start adding together.......

If I have read your figures correctly taking away your son's PC/Aircon/EV charging and the Fridge freezer you are still using over 100kWh a week which to be Frank is extremely high when you take all the big energy munchers off.

MariaAH

sienew said:

Honestly? This isn't a fuel poverty issue, this is an overuse issue. This is 3x the average households usage (there are EV's to consider as well).

With respect, we have 3 adults that work from home, at home all day, using electricity for their occupations, and light and heating during the winter, vs other households where all adults work away from the home during the working week. I did not create the definition for 'fuel poverty', but it states that spending more that 10% of net income on energy is fuel poverty, hence we are in fuel poverty even before the Oct increase.

Your critique would be better served being aimed at the Government, the 'fat cat' CEOs at the energy companies and the greedy shareholders, all of whom are complicit in this crisis.

Please be kind! We are all in this together and are trying to support each other...

And it's all relative...we have always lived within our means...our means may be a little more than some due to our jobs, but this is now well exceeding our means. It's all relative, everyone is being pushed beyond their means, and being pushed into fuel poverty. There are very few in society who will not be impacted by this madness.

For those that may be interested...

Our March 2021 annual energy summary was £2157, with a monthly DD of £170 (similar consumption, albeit without the EVs/Gaming PC)
Our annual consumption at the moment stands at £5880 (£4200 without the EVs/Gaming PC), and our monthly DD is £545.
In Oct, annual usage will be £10,850 (£7850 without the EVs/Gaming PC), with a DD which will be in the region of £900.

So from Oct 1st, this is an increase of £5693 in our annual energy bill from where it was at March 2021. We do not have £5693 per annum spare to absorb these breathtaking increases. How many people would!

This is reminiscent of the late 80's early 90's when the staggering increases in interest rates saw so many people across all sections of society in negative equity and losing their homes. People across the whole of society are impacted by this crisis, not just the poorest, although their plight is the most devastating.

MariaAH

Mstty said:

Why don't you set yourself a target you will be comfortable with?

Otherwise I fear you may say, that doesn't cost that much, neither does that but when they all start adding together.......

If I have read your figures correctly taking away your son's PC/Aircon/EV charging and the Fridge freezer you are still using over 100kWh a week which to be Frank is extremely high when you take all the big energy munchers off.

Absolutely agree that over 100kWh a week is too high...and I hope that the TP link monitor investigations will shed light onto what is adding to that figure...its a bit of a long process, but changes are afoot...

Thank you for your helpful contributions on this thread...

QrizB

With respect, you're a family of four with three working adults. You're already in a better position than the majority of families with only one or two working adults.

This forum has given you the tools you needed to identify and reduce your energy consumption but it's going to take commitment from all of you to make it work.

You need a proper family discussion about how you can get through this.