Energy Prices (Strictly NO referrals!)

Capodecina
Soldato
Joined
1 Aug 2005
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20,001
Location
Flatland
It's not saving you any money by having estimated readings which are lower than actual - it's costing you a lot more. You're going to end up paying the higher price cap rates for electricity you used a while ago when it was actually cheaper.
Get a proper meter reading done soon. Don't leave it until after the prices increase again!

When are these price increases happening? Will try to get the meter before then.
 
Soldato
Joined
7 Nov 2009
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19,820
Location
Glasgow
I’m somewhat hoping the government have a plan ready to be announced once Liz gets into the big seat to give them a nice boost in popularity.

But then I remember it’s the Conservatives so guess that’s very much wishful thinking.

I need to think about how I can get my house less leaky for winter but it being a 1920s semi, there’s not much that I can do beyond draught exclusions. How I wish I had cavity walls!!
 
Joined
4 Aug 2007
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21,582
Location
Wilds of suffolk
It's flexible. Apparently the fixed rate would be £467.74 a month.

I am speaking to the wife about getting a smart meter. Something looks like it's wrong. I don't think we have to tell the landlord about it, but we will out of courtesy.

Electric shower, or immersion water heating?

I would walk round together, list out all the items plugged in/wired in.

You can then eliminate the smaller items for now, such as TV boxes, and focus in on the big ones, washing machine, tumble drier, immersion heater, cooker etc

Then assign average times the things are on, some will be more tricky than others of course, like immersion, but your ideal is to get an estimated usage per device that covers something like 80% of your usage
Then you can start to focus on if you can change patterns on those devices.
Taking slightly shorter showers etc.
 
Caporegime
Joined
13 Jan 2010
Posts
32,738
Location
Llaneirwg
Electric shower, or immersion water heating?

I would walk round together, list out all the items plugged in/wired in.

You can then eliminate the smaller items for now, such as TV boxes, and focus in on the big ones, washing machine, tumble drier, immersion heater, cooker etc

Then assign average times the things are on, some will be more tricky than others of course, like immersion, but your ideal is to get an estimated usage per device that covers something like 80% of your usage
Then you can start to focus on if you can change patterns on those devices.
Taking slightly shorter showers etc.

We have a 10kw electric shower and still don't go over 10kw a day usually. Forgot about that big boy!

Yeah I remember seeing the meter say 10kw. Gf was in shower. Kind of shocking!
 
Capodecina
Soldato
Joined
1 Aug 2005
Posts
20,001
Location
Flatland
OK we have written to the landlord asking if he's OK with us getting a smart meter. Let's see how this goes and we can work out what's really happening with the electricity in our flat.
 
Soldato
Joined
28 Oct 2006
Posts
12,456
Location
Sufferlandria
When are these price increases happening? Will try to get the meter before then.
I think the next price cap will be announced at the end of August then applied from the end of September.
It's going to be a significant increase over the current prices so you need to make sure that you pay for all of your actual usage at the current prices before the increase.
 
Joined
4 Aug 2007
Posts
21,582
Location
Wilds of suffolk
We have a 10kw electric shower and still don't go over 10kw a day usually. Forgot about that big boy!

Yeah I remember seeing the meter say 10kw. Gf was in shower. Kind of shocking!

Yeah but if you have a 10kw/h shower and you have a couple who both like 15 min showers your at 5kw a day. So right now about £1.50 a day, or £45 a month just for that! Come October will be approaching £100 a month!
And in theory one of he easiest things to realy make a difference on, certainly for blokes, I mean 3-4 mins should be enough.
I actually turn our shower off mid shower, so I wash my hair then turn off, lather myself up, turn it back on to rinse off. Not to save money (thats a side gain) but because we have one of those daft rainfall jobbies
(Yeah it wasnt my choice but I gave in), totally daft things, trying to lather up whilst its trying to wash it off you!
 
Soldato
Joined
25 Nov 2009
Posts
2,559
I’m somewhat hoping the government have a plan ready to be announced once Liz gets into the big seat to give them a nice boost in popularity.

But then I remember it’s the Conservatives so guess that’s very much wishful thinking.

I need to think about how I can get my house less leaky for winter but it being a 1920s semi, there’s not much that I can do beyond draught exclusions. How I wish I had cavity walls!!
stick some kingspan on the external walls and get a negative air pressure door test done.
 
Soldato
Joined
22 Jul 2014
Posts
3,862
Location
Oxon
It's not saving you any money by having estimated readings which are lower than actual - it's costing you a lot more. You're going to end up paying the higher price cap rates for electricity you used a while ago when it was actually cheaper.
Get a proper meter reading done soon. Don't leave it until after the prices increase again!
I don't think this is true, they will bill at the rates applicable for the date range of the usage. There may be overlap at the sides due to them estimating how the actual usage was spread out but they won't charge all of it at the rates at the time of the bill.

My smart meter was having issues sending reads earlier this year and they rebilled me for the period overlapping January to April at my old fixed rate, the pre-current cap rate and new cap rate respectively.
 
Soldato
Joined
7 Nov 2002
Posts
7,514
Location
pantyhose factory
Yeah but if you have a 10kw/h shower and you have a couple who both like 15 min showers your at 5kw a day. So right now about £1.50 a day, or £45 a month just for that! Come October will be approaching £100 a month!
And in theory one of he easiest things to realy make a difference on, certainly for blokes, I mean 3-4 mins should be enough.
I actually turn our shower off mid shower, so I wash my hair then turn off, lather myself up, turn it back on to rinse off. Not to save money (thats a side gain) but because we have one of those daft rainfall jobbies
(Yeah it wasnt my choice but I gave in), totally daft things, trying to lather up whilst its trying to wash it off you!

showers are for amateurs, real mean just clean their balls with an oily rag before going to bed..........................
 
Soldato
Joined
16 Jun 2005
Posts
24,133
Location
In the middle
All of the things we use electricity for, it is easy to forget what we can't really avoid.

Just running your fridge and having a shower once per day will cost you nearly £50 a month soon.

That is simply wrong.

b8vAh2N.png
Without sounding overly stinky, I grew up in a time when you had a wash every day at the sink, and a bath once a week.
The daily shower seems a fairly modern thing. Unless you've been out getting sweaty you don't really need it.
 
Soldato
Joined
23 Oct 2002
Posts
4,021
Location
_
Just logged in to octopus, and they've got a 'crystal ball' mode, which seems to bung in some future price cap predictions. I currently pay £226 a month, and Octopus are recommending I drop that monthly to £191, but also present me with this graph:

P3rki18.png

Which I can only balance the "account balance" blue line on, by upping my monthlies to this:

OzPiVNT.png
 
Soldato
Joined
25 Nov 2007
Posts
5,581
Location
London
It's not confusing at all, if you know how much your electricity costs (for example 30p a unit), 1kw/h is going to cost you 30p for 1 hour.

by adding the /h you have made a problem.

By saying you've used 5kw/h, means you have used 5kw for an unknown amount of time, meaning it is impossible to determine actual usage in kwh.

If you simply remove /h from your sentence, everything makes sense, this is what the other poster was talking about.
 
Caporegime
Joined
13 Jan 2010
Posts
32,738
Location
Llaneirwg
Without sounding overly stinky, I grew up in a time when you had a wash every day at the sink, and a bath once a week.
The daily shower seems a fairly modern thing. Unless you've been out getting sweaty you don't really need it.

We don't full shower every day.
Also we don't use our hot water tank with the power shower. So it probably isn't as expensive as it sounds.

Sometimes I'll shower in the evening and not the next day, then in the morning. Obviously with sports or when it's hot it's every day!
 
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