Huge electricity usage all of a sudden? eg: 9 fold increase?

[NeilF]

My partner's father had an electricity bill through which was £1800. He lives alone in a one bedroom flat run from electricity (no gas).

Looking at the history of readings over the past 15-16 months, for a whole year up until Sep this year, all was normal, he was using a sensible/expected fraction of what we for example use (a household of two adults + two children). Then, over the past three months his usage has shot up such that he's using by my approximations NINE times more than we are! So his usage must have gone up somehow like 15-18 fold?

Anyone experienced something like this? My hope is the meter on the property is going bonkers? It's a dual reading one giving a rate 1 and rate 2 reading supposedly for day and night? Ironically, it seems to be the night reading that's the monstrous one!?

 

[CapitalOne]

Either that or is someone pinching his supply?

 

[NeilF]

Either that or is someone pinching his supply?

It would have to be all the other half dozen people in the other flats to account for that sort of increase!

If it ends up going to the onbudsman, a NINE fold increase in usage will hopefully sway it in our favour of there being some sort of mistake/problem!?

 

[jsmoke]

Is he not paying expected amount for a while and this is the excess over a long period?

 

[sideways14a]

Either that or he has a wicked grow going on.
Thats a lot of an increase..

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

Surely the best thing in the very short term is to monitor the usage, check it daily for a week to see if its consistent or fluctuating, then compare the week to the trend.

You also want to know when the last real readings were taken, as its possible its a long time ago and a recent one has picked up a different usage pattern to the estimate.

If the night reading is monstrous, has he got storage heaters? These do pull a lot of juice and could easily account for a big bill if the meter hasn't been read, and the estimates of usage were based on previous tenants who hardly used it or something.

 

[balls]

I would suggest he's been on (under)estimated bills for a few months / years even

My parents were recently stung with an £8k bill, (under) estimated bills for 11 years. They live in the sticks and didn't take any meter readings themselves even when they had a electric AGA put in

 

[NeilF]

He's only been in the property about two years. The mad reading was Sep-Dec this year. His activity was no different to Sep-Dec 2018!?

What follows is based on actual readings...

Reading over year Sep 18->19:-
September 2018: Day rate=7830 Night rate=44570
September 2019: Day rate=10326 Night rate=46110
Usage: Day rate=2496 Night rate=1540 = About 300kwh per month, which seems sensible! (We use about 600kwh)

Mad reading over previous 3 months Sep 19 to Dec 19:-
September 2019: Day rate=10326 Night rate=46110
December 2019: Day rate=10941 Night rate=58362
Usage: Day rate=615 Night rate=12252 = About 4000-5000kwh per month which seems MAD!

Reading over a ten day period in Dec were giving as estimate of about 1800kw usage per month which is still mad


In short Sep 2018->Sep 2019 he used about 4000kwh. In Sep 2019->Dec2019 he used about 12900kwh - THREE TIMES MORE IN A QUARTER OF THE TIME! EEK!

 

[psd99]

someone is *hacking* into his electricity supply?

 

[jsmoke]

Simply phone energy supplier and ask for someone to look at meter.

 

[TheVoice]

Might be an issue with the meter, the day usage looks much lower than the previous year whilst the night usage is substantially higher so unless he's become nocturnal it might suggest the meter isn't reading correctly (or he's not reading it correctly).

 

[NeilF]

Might be an issue with the meter, the day usage looks much lower than the previous year whilst the night usage is substantially higher so unless he's become nocturnal it might suggest the meter isn't reading correctly (or he's not reading it correctly).

If you look, day usage is actually spot on. A whole year (Sep 18->Sep 19) about 2400. A quarter of that time (Sep-19->Dec-19) about 600.

It's the night time rate over the past three months that seems to have gone mental, with him using over 13x the amount of electricity in previous periods on average per month.

 

[NeilF]

Anyone here using electricity only for their house/flat? What is your monthly kwh usage roughly? Especially in winter?

 

[TheVoice]

Ah apologies, thought the two were for a comparable period, you're right. In that case it suggests something is using huge amounts of energy overnight e.g. storage heaters, water immersion heater etc.

Anyone here using electricity only for their house/flat? What is your monthly kwh usage roughly? Especially in winter?

About 330 units a month over winter, for a two bed flat. Single rate though.

 

[Psycho Sonny]

My partner's father had an electricity bill through which was £1800. He lives alone in a one bedroom flat run from electricity (no gas).

Looking at the history of readings over the past 15-16 months, for a whole year up until Sep this year, all was normal, he was using a sensible/expected fraction of what we for example use (a household of two adults + two children). Then, over the past three months his usage has shot up such that he's using by my approximations NINE times more than we are! So his usage must have gone up somehow like 15-18 fold?

Anyone experienced something like this? My hope is the meter on the property is going bonkers? It's a dual reading one giving a rate 1 and rate 2 reading supposedly for day and night? Ironically, it seems to be the night reading that's the monstrous one!?

is the history of readings real readings he took himself or estimated?

i'm guessing you need to turn everything off in the flat then look at the meter. it shouldn't be moving.

then turn on 1 thing at a time and see if it spikes. then do a reading after a month and compare with before.

if he was on estimated usage before then the bill could be legit.

 

[NeilF]

Ah apologies, thought the two were for a comparable period, you're right. In that case it suggests something is using huge amounts of energy overnight e.g. storage heaters, water immersion heater etc.

Understood, but he's not changed anything since the same time last year. ie: Why is Sep-Dec 2019 different to Sep-Dec 2018?

Sep18->Sep19 he used about 4000kwh
Sep19->Dec19 he used nearly 13000kwh!

A 2kwh bar heater left on 24/7 every day for three months would only use about 4300kwh!

And we're supposedly only looking at the night time period too, what ever time that means.

 

[NeilF]

is the history of readings real readings he took himself or estimated?

i'm guessing you need to turn everything off in the flat then look at the meter. it shouldn't be moving.

then turn on 1 thing at a time and see if it spikes. then do a reading after a month and compare with before.

if he was on estimated usage before then the bill could be legit.

All the readings in the post above are actual readings... Not estimated.

Sep18->Sep19 he used about 4000kwh
Sep19->Dec19 he used nearly 13000kwh! Note: A 2kwh bar heater left on 24/7 every day for three months would only use about 4300kwh!

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

Maybe hes got a new crypto crunching neighbour who has somehow tapped into the supply

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

Understood, but he's not changed anything since the same time last year. ie: Why is Sep-Dec 2019 different to Sep-Dec 2018?

Sep18->Sep19 he used about 4000kwh
Sep19->Dec19 he used nearly 13000kwh!

A 2kwh bar heat left on 24/7 every day would only use about 4300kwh!

And we're supposedly only looking at the night time period too, what ever time that means.

Nighttime is probably eco 7, which iirc starts somewhere between 11 and 12 and ends 7 hours later (its a phased switch so that it doesnt see a massive spike the moment it clicks in)

 

[Psycho Sonny]

All the readings in the post above are actual readings... Not estimated.

Sep18->Sep19 he used about 4000kwh
Sep19->Dec19 he used nearly 13000kwh! Note: A 2kwh bar heater left on 24/7 every day for three months would only use about 4300kwh!

do you have readings for the full year as opposed to 3 months vs 3 months of differing years?

as in how do we know for example during Dec 18 -> Sep 19 any real readings were submitted and not under readings?

it would be best to stick all the figures into a spreadsheet and do a bar graph and compare each month of each year side by side.

so jan 18 beside jan 19 and feb 18 beside feb 19.

then a total 18 usage vs total 19 usage side by side.

otherwise do as i said. turn everything off and look at the meter. then turn on one device and check the meter. then turn on another and check again. before turning everything off check how fast the meter is going.

either a faulty meter, someone has tapped his supply or under readings inbetween.