Energy Prices (Strictly NO referrals!)

[SDK^]

@SDK^

How would I check the smart meter cost is correct? Can you explain about it not being set up right? It's an OVO smart meter, we've had it for maybe 3 years, I've never messed with it, just looked at it. I didn't know you can alter anything on it.

Just look at it, it's flipping ridiculous, burning way past budget and only half way through the evening. We've been out for 4 hours today as well.

First thing to do on that device is check you have the gas and electricity unit price set correctly. I’m not saying it’s wrong but you need to know it’s reflecting your actual unit cost.
From the home button there is probably a setting option for this.

 

[Tom|Nbk]

Curious how much people spend on electricity only? I have a 3 bed barn conversion. Basically two big bungalows in one. I'm using £70 a month on my own which has always astonished me and I'm on a cheap fix at 19p ish per kwh and standing charge of 24-25p from memory

 

[jonneymendoza]

Curious how much people spend on electricity only? I have a 3 bed barn conversion. Basically two big bungalows in one. I'm using £70 a month on my own which has always astonished me and I'm on a cheap fix at 19p ish per kwh and standing charge of 24-25p from memory

What tech do you use

 

[MatsyLR]

So far our charmaleon IHD shows £2 for both gas and electric today (on standard tariff) my pc has been on all day along with a TV downstairs. I expect it to be around £3 by midnight as drawing more power now (playing a MMO) and watching a movie on my Plasma before bed. This is with no heating and 2 showers. Used to be able to get away with around £60 a month when it wasn't cold

 

[SDK^]

@SDK^

How would I check the smart meter cost is correct? Can you explain about it not being set up right? It's an OVO smart meter, we've had it for maybe 3 years, I've never messed with it, just looked at it. I didn't know you can alter anything on it.

Just look at it, it's flipping ridiculous, burning way past budget and only half way through the evening. We've been out for 4 hours today as well.

It appears that In-Home Display automatically gets the tariff rates from a hub.
https://s3-eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/...blems-with-prices-tariffs-costs-and-bills.pdf

It’s probably accurate but worth checking your bills when they come in.

 

[VaderDSL]

@SDK^

How would I check the smart meter cost is correct? Can you explain about it not being set up right? It's an OVO smart meter, we've had it for maybe 3 years, I've never messed with it, just looked at it. I didn't know you can alter anything on it.

Just look at it, it's flipping ridiculous, burning way past budget and only half way through the evening. We've been out for 4 hours today as well.

What is currently using the most? How many watts or kilowatts are being used and is that bar mainly electric use or gas? Do you have an immersion heater or electric heaters? Is the boiler currently going? You'll need to see if something is on that shouldn't be or if it's all normal (albeit possibly excessive) usage?

Here I know with everything turned off (sleep) and with only the basic stuff in sleep or on (2xinternet devices, 3xTV, 2xSky Box, 2xethernet switches, 2x fridge/freezer, 2xsmart thermostat, 2xcomputers) base electricity use is around 100-150W.

 

[Mickie]

Care to provide the money for those of us who don't really have much left over after normal bills?

A panel of 50mm insulation board is £20

a open therm combi boiler with open therm thermostat around £1900 fitted.
Solar panels £5k

or 4 panels DIY around £1500

If you can’t afford to invest in your home buy 2w lightbulbs, eat microwave meals or slow cooker and use a laptop rather than a desktop computer. Your electricity will go from 12kw a day to 3kw

 

[Puzzled]

A panel of 50mm insulation board is £20

How much money will I save from buying my one insulation board?

 

[Mickie]

How much money will I save from buying my one insulation board?

Use it to make your self a coffin. You’ll stay warm. You could save £3,000 on your gas bill.

 

[Surveyor]

Curious how much people spend on electricity only? I have a 3 bed barn conversion. Basically two big bungalows in one. I'm using £70 a month on my own which has always astonished me and I'm on a cheap fix at 19p ish per kwh and standing charge of 24-25p from memory

11kWh/day. Not much use comparing, more a question of what are you running in your "two big bungalows" to use that amount?

 

[MatsyLR]

A panel of 50mm insulation board is £20

a open therm combi boiler with open therm thermostat around £1900 fitted.
Solar panels £5k

or 4 panels DIY around £1500

If you can’t afford to invest in your home buy 2w lightbulbs, eat microwave meals or slow cooker and use a laptop rather than a desktop computer. Your electricity will go from 12kw a day to 3kw

I wish I had £8.4k just burning a hole in my pocket, I bet most the country wished they had any portion of that spare (keep in mind most the country are on minimum wage which is barely enough to get by after bills) It would take me about 2-3 years to save that. That's assuming I didn't need to spend the little I have left over after bills on other things that may pop up out of the blue. This isn't even taking into account the cost of living and fuel going up which is going to cut that easily in half or more leaving little to go into savings.

 

[TonyTurbo78]

What is currently using the most? How many watts or kilowatts are being used and is that bar mainly electric use or gas? Do you have an immersion heater or electric heaters? Is the boiler currently going? You'll need to see if something is on that shouldn't be or if it's all normal (albeit possibly excessive) usage?

Here I know with everything turned off (sleep) and with only the basic stuff in sleep or on (2xinternet devices, 3xTV, 2xSky Box, 2xethernet switches, 2x fridge/freezer, 2xsmart thermostat, 2xcomputers) base electricity use is around 100-150W.

It's an immersion heater, tank is in the bathroom, water heating is off and set to only warm up once we need it, central heating isn't on a timer or set to all day with thermostat at 18c or anything like that, we just turn it on manually when we can't take the cold.

We aren't the sort off ppl to leave landing lights on, bedroom lights etc, we only ever light the room we are in, usually only thd lounge. Then it'll be usual stuff, 55" OLED, sky box, soundbar and sub, router. We use battery powered small lights in the lounge, very rarely use ceiling lights or side lamps. We don't own a phone landline. We always turn off sockets upstairs when we wake up or don't need them. We just can't understand how our usage seems so high. We look at other houses in the neighbourhood that constantly have all lights on in most rooms, central heating steam coming from their vents morning and nights and can only image what their prices are like.

Currently watching TV in the lounge, no pc on, no phones or ipads powered, no mains lighting on, no heating on, just essentials our meter is fluctuating between 188w and 295w

 

[robj20]

Insulate your home. Buy a new combi boiler and fit solar panels. Then your monthly bills will come down.

Return on investment times put me off.
Tempted by a grid tie in setup though to deal with the house idle usage.

 

[crazyDAJT]

@SDK^

How would I check the smart meter cost is correct? Can you explain about it not being set up right? It's an OVO smart meter, we've had it for maybe 3 years, I've never messed with it, just looked at it. I didn't know you can alter anything on it.

Just look at it, it's flipping ridiculous, burning way past budget and only half way through the evening. We've been out for 4 hours today as well.

i have a 5 bed detached and used 2 units of gas day November to end of Jan. this is 63kwh of gas or around £4.64 in new rates? Ex standing charge. I don’t have a smart meter, or any electric heating of water.

thsts a lot as it’s quite mild at the moment. I have had the heating on for <2hr today, at the wife’s request.

 

[potatolord]

Well, the wife and kids went away for the weekend, so I turned the heating off yesterday morning to save money.

Just had to put it back on as 12c is a bit cold, even for me.

One tip I would have is: put washing out on the line, rather than tumbling it. They suck power at a tremendous rate.

 

[Nemiyen]

Could I ask what you guys spend a day on gas and electric combined on average?

We've been absolutely gobsmacked by what our smart meter shows at the end of the day. This is not something we are just dealing with today, but we've not understood the crazy prices our smart meter has been showing each evening for the last 3 or 4 years. Considering we only have a small 3 bed home and in our opinion we are such a careful household when it comes to energy usage. We only ever have the lights on in 1 room, we unplug most things we don't use, we never charge our phones through the night, we always leave the oven door open after dinner to get the heat into the house etc.

So our average daily cost for 2021 was £3.91. In the colder months through the year we only ever had our central heating turned on if the temp in the house got below 16c, but we'd only blast it for maybe an hour in the morning and only 30 or so minutes in the evening from around 8pm.

But the last 2 days or so since the increased pricing, by 9am our meter has already shown £2.71 and £2.59 for yesterday and today respectively, that's only from having thd heating on for 30 minutes and showers running on economy. Last nights gas and electric combined total on the meter was a mind shattering £5.11. At 18.30 this evening we are already £4.26 and we've only had the heating on again just once this morning for 30 minutes, 2 quick showers, just 1 TV on for a few hours, a few cups of tea and dinner we have just made. I can see tonight's total being more than £6 which is quite frankly both disgusting and scary as hell thinking how we are going to manage the increased costs. At this rate we are going to be spending £40 a week on gas and electric.

Does this seem to compare to you all? Myself and my wife are very worried about these spiralling costs. So much so my pc hasn't been turned on the whole of last week to see if that helps.

We've been paying £150 a month before the increase with octopus.

They're now saying our monthly bills on the new price cap is going to be £326 per month for gas and electric!

We are in a solid brick 1930s house with pretty much no wall insulation and just the loft done.

We've got a combo boiler that's about 3 years old so should be quite efficient.

I've been comparing to friends usage and our weakness is the gas. Electric usage is about the same as them but our gas usage is double.

I could sit in the cold but the girlfriend and daughter wouldn't stand for that!

I've majorly adjusted the temperature on the thermostat down to 19 degrees but it just means the house is cold, due to the lack of insulation I guess.

I wish we would have put internal wall insulation in when we got the house and re decorated but now it would be a right pain to do, but might be the only option at this rate!

It'll be 430 in October with the next increase too!

Edit: This is going by what the boiler says we have used so we haven't got a gas leak lol.

 

[Liquid_Entity]

Hoovering once a day
Kettles boiled 4 or 5 times a day
We have electric hob and oven so that's on at least twice a day
Microwave
Bathtime for kids
Showers for adults
Heating on thru winter to 20/21c as house is terribly insulated
TV on, ps4, lights on, ipads, phones charging
The list is endless

 

[Mickie]

It's an immersion heater, tank is in the bathroom, water heating is off and set to only warm up once we need it, central heating isn't on a timer or set to all day with thermostat at 18c or anything like that, we just turn it on manually when we can't take the cold.

We aren't the sort off ppl to leave landing lights on, bedroom lights etc, we only ever light the room we are in, usually only thd lounge. Then it'll be usual stuff, 55" OLED, sky box, soundbar and sub, router. We use battery powered small lights in the lounge, very rarely use ceiling lights or side lamps. We don't own a phone landline. We always turn off sockets upstairs when we wake up or don't need them. We just can't understand how our usage seems so high. We look at other houses in the neighbourhood that constantly have all lights on in most rooms, central heating steam coming from their vents morning and nights and can only image what their prices are like.

Currently watching TV in the lounge, no pc on, no phones or ipads powered, no mains lighting on, no heating on, just essentials our meter is fluctuating between 188w and 295w

You’re heating a 200L tank of water with a kettle and you’re wondering why your electricity bill is so high. Most people heat their tank with gas or don’t have a tank at all.
A cheap fix for you would be economy 7 for your hot water needs.

 

[LabR@t]

Plugged a power dessert reader on the kettle 16kw in a fortnight.

16 * .30 * 2 - £9.60 a month Bolling the bloody kettle ffs lol.

The tumble drier packed up last month so got a new heat pump replacement

 

[TonyTurbo78]

We've been paying £150 a month before the increase with octopus.

They're now saying our monthly bills on the new price cap is going to be £326 per month for gas and electric!

We are in a solid brick 1930s house with pretty much no wall insulation and just the loft done.

We've got a combo boiler that's about 3 years old so should be quite efficient.

I've been comparing to friends usage and our weakness is the gas. Electric usage is about the same as them but our gas usage is double.

I could sit in the cold but the girlfriend and daughter wouldn't stand for that!

I've majorly adjusted the temperature on the thermostat down to 19 degrees but it just means the house is cold, due to the lack of insulation I guess.

I wish we would have put internal wall insulation in when we got the house and re decorated but now it would be a right pain to do, but might be the only option at this rate!

It'll be 430 in October with the next increase too!

Edit: This is going by what the boiler says we have used so we haven't got a gas leak lol.

WOW, just wow. That's absolutely frightenly extortionate.