My bill is shooting up!

pritchah

Just paid my latest bill and got a popup that from July we'd be paying £97 a month. A bit of a shock as up to now we've been paying £50 per month

The context is that from 5/7/2021 - 4/7/2023 - we've been on the Exclusive Energy v 6 tariff (electricity only). £50 pm direct debit. Unit charge 18.651 per Kwh; standing charge 19.187 per day

For at least half the year, we've used less that £50 worth of electricity per month. Over the year, on average, we used a fraction over £50 per month worth. 

Our total usage over the year was 2838 KWH

So, have we just been lucky to be on a low fixed rate for the last two years? Do we have to bite the bullet and now go to the higher rate, or are there better options?

CSI_Yorkshire

pritchah said:

So, have we just been lucky to be on a low fixed rate for the last two years? 

Yes.

pritchah said:

Do we have to bite the bullet and now go to the higher rate?

Yes.

matelodave

I'm afraid you are going to get a rude awakening as you've managed to dodge last winter's bills with an excellent tariff.

The electricity cap on the standard variable tariff is now over 30p/kwh and the standing charge is 45-50p/day depending on where you live.

You might be lucky if you are with a company that offers you a new fix but it's probably only worth it if you can get it at or below the capped rates as its likely that the cap will increase again on 1st October.

2838kwh at 30.2p/kwh which is the rate in Eastern Region comes to £857 plus 365 at 45p/day £164.25 = £1022/12 = £85.16 per month, however it looks like they could be factoring something to cover the expected increase in October.

You could probably argue it down to £90 a month but be prepared for an increase later on in the year.

Use your own figures to work out what you should be paying as the rates are different depending on where you live.

QrizB

pritchah said:

The context is that from 5/7/2021 - 4/7/2023 - we've been on the Exclusive Energy v 6 tariff (electricity only). £50 pm direct debit. Unit charge 18.651 per Kwh; standing charge 19.187 per day
For at least half the year, we've used less that £50 worth of electricity per month. Over the year, on average, we used a fraction over £50 per month worth. 
Our total usage over the year was 2838 KWH

Your bill for the last 12 months will have been just under £600, so £50 a month works nicely.

Assuming the same usage for the next 12 months, and the average capped rates of 33.21p/kWh plus 52.97p/day, your bill will be £1140, £95 a month. So £97 a month is about right too.

Edit: I think I have used the current EPG rates, not the Ofgem capped rated that will apply from July. See mateleodave's post above for the July prices.

pritchah

Thanks all for your comments - I wasn't getting the email notifications for some reason (will check) so I didn't know I'd had responses until I logged in just now

I've had an email from British Gas this morning, advising that our dd will be £85.05 (from the July payment I guess), so this will be in line with your comments. Maybe even on the positive side, but still a hefty increase

We're in Wales, so I'll check the future rates in a moment

Thanks again

poppellerant

Unit cost for 365 days: 2838 * £0.30 = £851.40

Standing charge for 365 days: 365 * £0.53 = £193.45

Total annual cost: £1044.85

Monthly cost: £87.07

The prices are taken from here and will vary per region.