Electric Bill

I remember when I moved into my last flat in Edinburgh, the previous tenants hadn't paid a £600 bill and the name on it suddenly changed to our names - we inherited an epic bill and the landlord didn't want much to do with it! :(

It did get sorted, eventually.
 
.Lethal said:
Not being funny here but rather than checking this thread 5 times in the last 5 minutes you should be on the phone to the electric company.

I hope your not one of those kids who gets there mother to do everything for them.
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I don't see how anyone could accidentally interpret that to be funny.
 
Looks like a reading error. Don't worry about it, the utility company will fix it eventually.

Wouldn't have this problem with smart meters, :).
 
Windle said:
Central Heating is electric

My sherlock powers are picking up a clue.....

Electric heating costs a bomb, for reference I had 2 storage heaters which charge at night and release heat during the day so you get a cheap nightly rate. Running these at a reasonable middling heat, comfortable but not roasting was costing approximately £200 a month.

Needless to say I don't use them anymore and use cheap(er) convector heaters until I can get a house elsewhere and move out of here,
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I use storage heaters well heater .. i don't use the one in the bedroom as being in bed is enough heat I only use the one in the lounge, my last electric bill was around £40 so depending on how much electric you use is depending on how much it costs. Im with scottish power, I was with e-on but got advised to change and it the best move i ever made.
 
Jonny69 said:
I need not read any further. I have identified your problem.
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Never ever had a problem with Npower and they supply our electricity and gas in my house.

Although 2 yrs ago i had an almighty gas bill come in during the summer mths...something like £600 which i rung up and asked them why it was so large...they said it was an error and fixed it...even came round and replaced the gas meter as it was faultyand was over reading the gas consumption we were actually using.

Swings and roundabouts i suppose...some people will say BG are great whereas i would say they are the worst whereas people will say other companies are perfectly fine.
 
To true get away from Npower, absolute rip of merchants. I would say that bill is probably right considering it is Npower and electric heating. Get a gas bottle heater if they are sill available.

easy way to check compare bill with your move in meter reading and the actual reading now against the bill.

Spawn said:
Never ever had a problem with Npower and they supply our electricity and gas in my house.

.
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they charge more than anyone else by a considerable amount. My bills have dropped by almost 50% when I moved away from Npower.
 
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I'm with eon on economy 10, [not provided anymore] but same principle as 7. I pay a fixed direct debit every month of £64. use a lot of power in the day such as 8kw shower, TV, PC, as we are at home all day. Day time units are 16p and overnight units for heating panels are 6p per unit.

Does not matter if you leave the panels switched on all day as they will not draw any power until the cheap night-time rate comes in. I leave my input on 3/4 and adjust output through the day from min to max depending on how cold it is. It does seem as though something is wrong with your reading.

Beside the panels being on cheap rate at night other power sockets should also be on same so its much cheaper for me to shower after 10pm at 6p per unit than during the day at 16p per unit.

Being on economy 10 means I get 7 hours through the night and 3 hours in the day to top up, this daytime rate is adjusted by the power company and switched on when the draw on their power is at its lowest.

[Edit] Check your hot water is set correctly if its storage, you may be heating it up during the day on the top-up element at 16p per unit instead of through the night on cheap rate.
 
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Jesus, those costs are sky high!!

We pay 11p per unit any time of the day on a non economy 7 system with Scottish Power. Boiler heats as and when the water drops below 60 degrees (no control over it other than turning it off), all our heaters are 1.5kW wall panel heaters that we turn on as needed and probably 2 or 3 of them get used for a few hours each night atm.

I mean, if you take one of the heaters at 1.5kW, thats 1.5 units per hour its on full whack (which they never are as they have a thermostat so in reality they are heating for about 50% of the time they ar switched on). So if we pay 11p pepr unit thats 16.5p per hour of usage, £27.72 per week, £110.88 per month (assuming 4 weeks in a month).

So really, unless you have like 10 of the things on for hours and hours at a time, with an economy 7 boiler you would have to be working REALLY hard to use that much electricity (though your tarriffs are very high!)

I'd get it questioned, either the meter is faulty or they haven't taken the readings you submitted when you moved in, into account, and someone has used loads of units in between the previous tenants moving out, and you moving in.
 
The readings are all correct, we changed to npower when we moved in and the start readings with npower match the final readings with the old company (who were used for 2 months till we got switched).

I think I will question the Tarrif prices with them based on what you say manic_man. Using as much as we have this past 6 weeks even 4 pence per unit would save 71 quid.
 
change suppliers, now you have been there work out units you use, then go search their websites for unit price. Don't use comparison sites.
 
Do some maths with suppliers and work out how much you are using at what times to decide what to go for.

I pay £13 a quarter to sit on a flat rate of 9.2p/Kwh on an Npower tariff. Cheap.
 
90% sure that Npower actually just completely randomize bills

every single bill we got off them was wrong. even when theyd had people come out and read meter and then after that had someone replace the meter. the bills where still always wrong and funnily enough they only overcharged us. never under
 
Lots of new apartments built in the last few years seem to have electric panel heaters rather than storage heaters. These are the cheapest for them to buy and install, but cost a small fortune to run on daytime electricity. There's actually little point being on Economy 7 wth these unless you solely run them at night.

Firstly, find out your Economy 7 times because they do vary around the country. In some places, they aren't continuous - in my area it's 10:30-12:30 and 2:30-7:30.

Check your water heater timer is running during your Economy 7 times. Avoid using the boost function or heating the water outside these times if at all possible. Consider cranking the thermostat on the water heater up to around 75 degrees (although be careful, especially if you have kids) so that you use less hot water for washing etc as you dilute it with cold. It's cheaper to boil the kettle to wash up that put the hot water on.

Run anything electric you possibly can during Economy 7 times. If you can, wash during these times (but it might be too noisy). You should be able to tumble dry though - this uses lots of energy.

Change to the cheapest energy provider for your usage.

Also check your lights - lots of flats have mains halogen lighting with 50W bulbs, swap them for 35W ones or preferably LED ones which use very little power if you can manage with lower light output.

My summer usage with no heating, just general electric and hot water is around 20kWh per day. Last winter, between December and February with my storage heaters on it was 52kWh.

I don't believe your bill is wrong. Your tariff seems high. I pay 9.687p day rater and 4.5p night plus 17p per day standing charge. During winter it's an 80/20 night/day split, with the heating off it's nearer 50/50.
 
Just been looking at some Scottish Power tariffs, they seem a lot cheaper than npower. They appear to have a tarrif aimed at people that have electric heating too called "Online Energy Saver 7"

Pretty Cheap.
 
Yep Scottish power are cheap. My bills have gone from £90 to around £55 last month and remember that's a flat rate all year so for Scottish power to be that cheap in winter on actual readings is a massive change.
 
On a 'key' electric meter here for an electric only flat. If I use heating, fires, everything really, then I could maybe use £12 in a week? Ok maybe £15 being really silly but it is usually closer to £9-10. In the summer months it rarely crosses the £5 mark. :cool:
 
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