Gas/electric bills

andyred said:
Do you not get a monthly reminder for meter readings and then jump on line and upload ?
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No - and this is part of the complaint as every time we try to access the online meter reading entry we come up with an error- we started complaining about this a year ago!! Anyway they read the meter on a regular basis so in my view they should have put our payments up not down!
I've no problem paying for what we have used but I think they have mis-managed the whole thing over the last year or so.
 
stevetiler said:
Does anyone know how to work out what a single item uses ? I'd like to know if our hot-tub is using excessive energy- it has its own mini-fuse board in the garage so was wondering if I could use one of those energy meters that clips over the cable?
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Your hot tub will in all likelihood be the culprit especially if you have it on all the time keeping the water warm. Anything with a heating element will cost a lot of electricity.
It looks like when they dropped you down to £120 you started to pay too little.

My electricity bill is usually around the £100 mark (varying a bit up or down depending). Over Jan and Feb I was converting my garage into my office and as there was no heating in the garage, Over the last month as it was so cold, I plugged in a 2kWh electric heater to take the chill off while I was working. My electricity bill for that month jumped to £185 which means the heater alone cost me around £80 for the month.
 
stevetiler said:
Does anyone know how to work out what a single item uses ? I'd like to know if our hot-tub is using excessive energy- it has its own mini-fuse board in the garage so was wondering if I could use one of those energy meters that clips over the cable?
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Should be a rating plaque on the hot tub, I would have thought. Without one, take two meter readings a couple of hours apart, switch the hot tub off and take a second pair of readings.
 
stevetiler said:
I'd like to know if our hot-tub is using excessive energy
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If its on......yeah, its using excessive energy, its an excessive luxury with excessive overheads.

I would imagine anyone that has one doesn't really care too much about energy bills, or at least they didn't when they had the thing fitted.
 
Wow. Do you live in a mansion or something? We spend a combined £30 for both gas and electric a month, less at the minute.

Edit, just saw that you have a hot tub. Have you thought about having a smart meter so you can see what used what?
 
Matt- said:
Wow. Do you live in a mansion or something? We spend a combined £30 for both gas and electric a month, less at the minute.

Edit, just saw that you have a hot tub. Have you thought about having a smart meter so you can see what used what?
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That's ridiculously low though, surely more than that in the winter months
 
Yep I’m with the smart meter gang ,also the hot tub will be the culprit here I’m afraid ,the other expensive user is if you have one a pond pump they suck the electric out .

I would also advice if you haven’t done it already changing every single light bulb to L.E.D equivelants ,home bargains do a super cheap range only had one bulb go faulty in two years of use .
 
tijuana taxi said:
That's ridiculously low though, surely more than that in the winter months
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At the minute we use about 80p - £1 a day for both. In winter, when it was cold, about £1.50 a day roughly. Small 2 bed semi detached bungalow. Very think loft insulation, cavity wall, new boiler etc. Think we’re goong to have a shock when we move soon!!
 
I fit smart meters for a living and people are very shocked when they see the price of their hot tub
 
Turn everything off from the fuseboard if possible and then switch on the hot tub fuse and measure it after an hour. If it's not the hot tub, it's something else.
 
Yes I was thinking of a smart meter- any good/bad points about these?
Regarding the hot-tub - we appreciate this uses a lot of energy but we've had it for ten years and never had these type of bills!!
They are doing a seven day test on our meter readings to see what's going on
 
stevetiler said:
Yes I was thinking of a smart meter- any good/bad points about these?
Regarding the hot-tub - we appreciate this uses a lot of energy but we've had it for ten years and never had these type of bills!!
They are doing a seven day test on our meter readings to see what's going on
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Make sure you get a SMETS2 meter, and not an older version which is not compatible with all suppliers (in case you want to move supplier in the future).

If you use the functionality (turning things off when you see usage spike) you may find some benefits, but other than that, I don't think there is much the consumer can benefit.
 
Meeten said:
If you use the functionality (turning things off when you see usage spike) you may find some benefits, but other than that, I don't think there is much the consumer can benefit.
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Unless you consider that having accurate readings automatically transmitted to your supplier is a benefit. It would mean no surprise bills of £1000, for example.
 
Assuming there are no ironing boards in the way, or you are in a area with poor comms....

And smart meters have never given inaccurate readings.....
 
stevetiler said:
Hey Matt, how do I go about getting a smart meter fitted?
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You would have to speak to your energy supplier.

Although like someone else said, it could be worth waiting until SMETS 2 is fully up and running. At the moment, I’m fitting SMETS 1 which has actually come a long way from the older smart meters (loads less issues). Old style smart meters can have firmware upgrades done to the lastest SMETS1 firmware but I don’t believe current meters will be able to have a SMETS 2 update (confusing I know). Like the person above said, if you were to change suppliers, your smart meters won’t read automatically and your little monitor won’t work anymore. They will just work as dumb meters like you have now.

I may have missed something while scanning past posts, but have you checked your tarriff recently to make sure you’re on the cheapest deal?
 
We were offered one, but it will only work with the electricity account. For some reason, which is beyond me, the gas meter is attached to the building next door, and a smart meter in the house doesn't have the range to communicate with it. The supplier says this may be resolved later this year. We'll see.
 
Matt- said:
I may have missed something while scanning past posts, but have you checked your tarriff recently to make sure you’re on the cheapest deal?
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Yea apparently we wasn't on the best tariff but we are now- I cant decide weather to take this further or put it down to experience. Have to say the girl I'm dealing with at co-op energy has been really good, we've obviously used this energy
so entitled to pay for it - just think it has been badly managed. After all we started complaining about the on-line meter entry a year ago but in the end you just get p***ed off with it and start doing something more interesting right?
 
stevetiler said:
Yea apparently we wasn't on the best tariff but we are now- I cant decide weather to take this further or put it down to experience. Have to say the girl I'm dealing with at co-op energy has been really good, we've obviously used this energy
so entitled to pay for it - just think it has been badly managed. After all we started complaining about the on-line meter entry a year ago but in the end you just get p***ed off with it and start doing something more interesting right?
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at £200 a month I don't think I'd have been able to afford to do anything else!
 
I believe all suppliers are required in their licence to physically read meters at least every 12 months, hence the backbiting limit.

We are 2 adults, with me at home 4/7 and her not working but a number of computers and tv's on a lot, usual electricity load, 5 bed house to heat. However we put in a new Worcester Bosch boiler last summer (condenser - big hot tank). Before the boiler our dual fuel bill was circa £120/month with pretty much no under/over-payment at the end of a year, it's now down to £106 and I think that will end up with me overpaying a bit. I check my tariff every 12-18 months and change supplier every 2-3 years, as a result of which my annual bills have stalled pretty constant at about £1400 for the last 12 years. Mind you, I worked in the industry testing billing systems and change of supplier processes for several years so I know how easy it is.
 
Lindsay56 said:
I believe all suppliers are required in their licence to physically read meters at least every 12 months,
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Its called a "safety check" ;)
I've not been visited in a few years...
Smart meters, the only advantage I can see is to the supplier, they don't have to send someone out to read your meter... or send you emails to tell you its due.
for example, If *you* found that the TV was costing as much everything else put together, would you stop / cut down on the amount of TV you watched?
 
6 people in our house and we are heavy users. I know this and I've already tried to address it. I'm comfortable with the life Vs energy balance currently and we do about £150 a month combined gas and elec. How you do £200 per month needs to be addressed. You should be able to work it out very quickly with some simple isolation and power meter tests.
 
omens said:
I normally take a meter reading on the first of the month and enter it online.The direct debits are often then adjusted to reflect usage. In fact, I'm sad enough that I record the readings in a spreadsheet, calculate total usage and use that to compare tariffs from different companies.

Are you able to adjust your direct debits to reflect the extra usage so you don't pay the £1000 in one go?
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I do the same after having a similar problem as the op, never had any other problems since
 
Sorry to raise this again- just wondered what electricity tariffs people are paying?
We pay 14.28p kwh plus 20.14p a day standing charge for elec only with co-op energy- just wanted to compare this to other companies
thanks
 
stevetiler said:
Sorry to raise this again- just wondered what electricity tariffs people are paying? We pay 14.28p kwh plus 20.14p
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13.220p per kWh
16.422p per day

I'm with EON (for now...)
But that is part of a dual fuel package and allegedly cheaper than a single fuel tariff
 
Don’t forget it varies slightly by region due to transmission costs varying.
 
Edf energy
13.86p per kwh
18.96p per day

Online Saver 12-month tariff
Dual fuel account.
 
stevetiler said:
Sorry to raise this again- just wondered what electricity tariffs people are paying?
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You need to be careful when comparing numbers. Some companies quote tariffs including VAT, and some quote them excluding VAT. It makes a difference.

FWIW, I'm with Ovo and my tariff is quoted ex VAT. Its the "Better Energy" dual fuel tariff:
12.68p / kWh (13.31p incl VAT)
23.50p / day (24.67p incl VAT)
 
I believe the cheapest online tariff (Certainly in my area) is available from OneSelect. Currently only one tariff available called ‘Secure 12 month Fixed’ I have been with them since Jun2017. Last year was trouble free but I admit to some Customer care concerns since renewal last month.

I have always read my own meters and kept a record of usage i.e 2017 annual kwh Gas 15,511. Elec 2262. If you have this info to hand you have a powerful argument when they overestimate your direct debit. Most are inclined to try this as they naturally prefer the cash in their account.
 
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StewartR said:
I'm with Ovo
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How do you find them?
How was the switch over?
How do you enter meter readings (online or app)?

They were one of the contenders last year and similar in cost to EDF but I'd never used a smaller company before.
 
badlywornroy said:
Most are inclined to try this as they naturally prefer the cash in their account.
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Shocker! :D
Although to be fair EON, work out what you use over the year and budget accordingly
Some of the time ( through the year) I'm in credit other times I'm in debt.
That's how it worked out last time I was with them, but I switched to SSE when their prices went through the roof.
The price this year is lower than it was in previous years, so I switched back.
 
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A friend, who always moans about price of everything, was convinced by someone to change to a company called Ebico (:thinking: )
First off they said they would do everything and the change over would be end of January, she paid both Ebico and her previous electric
company for february, as someone else has signed up for her she has no idea of her password so spent a fortune on the phone
sorting it out :rolleyes: Now it seems they have increased her payments by £15 a month, bringing them up to what she was paying before.
Once again she insists they never told her, but she also never checks emails to see, which is how I get told these things.
She is desparate to get a smart meter as she thinks this will save her a fortune, but she still keeps her heating on low in this hot
weather just in case it turns cold
Went through the same with BT a while back, she ran up a huge bill for going over her data allowance watching films etc. couldn't convince her that although
her grandson lets her use his Netflix account free she still has to use her data and again she doesn't get her emails from them as she doesn't
know what her sign in etc are
 
StewartR said:
I'm with Ovo
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omens said:
How do you find them?
How was the switch over?
How do you enter meter readings (online or app)?
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They're really good.
* Customer service is responsive.
* They pay 5% interest on any credit in our account.
* They operate "fair" pricing - when it's time to renew our annual contract we get offered the same prices as new customers.
* We have smart meters which really are useful (unlike most). There's an online facility to look at graphs of your energy usage, by month / week / day / half-hour time slot. For example here's our electricity usage yesterday.
Screenshot_20180714-210142.jpeg
We used the detailed data on our gas consumption, together with detailed temperature data from our Hive thermostats, to work out how the heating system responds - how long it takes to heat up and cool down etc - and therefore how to tweak it to maintain a comfortable temperature with minimal energy usage. We reduced our gas bill by about 15% as a result.

The switch over was totally painless. We have smart meters do we don't need to worry about readings, but previously they would email us to remind us that readings were due and we would enter them via the website. Easy.

All in all, highly recommended.
 
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Electric for us is

7.83p per day standing charge
14.92 per kWh

Gas
Same standing charge
3.41 per kWh

Both with Scottish power.
 
Matt- said:
Electric for us is

7.83p per day standing charge
14.92 per kWh

Gas
Same standing charge
3.41 per kWh

Both with Scottish power.
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14.92p sounds quite a high unit rate on electric - just looking at my latest outfox bill and it's 10.72p per unit and i'm in one of the most expensive regions (region 22)
 
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