£60-£70 a week in electric!

[Snow Owl]

This isn't right!

We're in a 3 bed house and pay £70-£80 a month for electric AND gas!

 

[redlemonade]

Something is definitely wrong here. If your downstairs neighbours are paying less, there's definitely a problem. As heat rises, I'd expect that they'd be paying more!

Are you renting? Not sure of the law in the uk but here every rented accommodation has to pass an energy rating (ie landlords have to pass a particular standard in energy ratings to be allowed to rent out their accommodation). Legally, you're entitled to see this energy rating. I'd check that out. If you're not using storage heaters, or the immersion, something else is wrong. Best of luck with it!

 

[highhopes19]

Thanks guys as suggested by pp I tried registering my account on southern electrics website but its now telling me my account number is wrong should be 10 digits when mine is clearly 9!!! So it won't let me access my account x

 

[R_x]

Do you have to be on a prepay meter? Can you not pay a monthly dd x

 

[redlemonade]

Hmm that's really strange. I assume you've got correspondence from them with your account number on? You could send them a copy and prove you are who you say you are and insist they let you access your account.

Is there not an independent body that ensures accommodation is complaint with energy ratings? Or as a pp said, contact citizens advice?

Also, as r_x said, it's a lot more expensive to pre pay in the long run. I hope you get this sorted!

 

[Tanikins]

We lived in a 2 bed with elevtric heating and we could use £5 in 4 hours just on heating. Electric heating is a bitch used atleased £20 in electric and we got a gas heater and bought a bottle every 3 weeks at 33 each time

We now have a 3 bed with gas heating. Just had a statement, in last 3 months we used 101 electric and 73 gas

Never use electric heating its stupidly expensive

 

[Kate&Lucas]

Yeah that's ridiculous. It takes me 2/3 days to run off £4 electricity.

 

[QueenMummyToBe]

Could you get someone to check your heating system?
We are in a new build all electric house & our neighbours when we first moved in had their heating set up wrong & it cost them £300 in a month.

Xx

 

[highhopes19]

Could you get someone to check your heating system?
We are in a new build all electric house & our neighbours when we first moved in had their heating set up wrong & it cost them £300 in a month.

Xx

I'm not sure who I would call tbh , I phoned moat housing when this first occurred and they said its not their problem... I have no idea what I'm paying my service charge for they do nothing but that's a different moan lol

The people below us have there Emerson on constantly as they don't know how to turn it off (my other half has just cam back from their flat he showed them how to set it up) but they are only using around £25 a week in the winter with that on 24/7 x

 

[Pandora11]

if you don't have any gas at all, that probably has something to do with it. Gas is a lot more efficient and cost less and so using heating and cooking on top of just tvs, lights and appliances with the electric will drive your prices up. you're still using it when you're not it, really depends what you have in your house.

and also, you can't directly compare to your parents house, prices have gone up, but mostly, it's about lifestyle and usage not how big your house is. our gas and elec have been similar no matter if we lived in a terrace, semi detacted or bungelow all of very different sizes, even taking into account of prices rises.

If there's no error you'll have to really take note of how much you have plugged in. i.e. a phone charger that is plugged in but switched off still draws electricity.

i think your bill is high but if it's for all your appliances/energy supply and you have no gas i don't think it's that excessive. Especially with low rating appliances etc.

Oh. also if you're in a communal building with stairways and lighting you could being billed for that. We were once until we had them sort it out.

 

[highhopes19]

if you don't have any gas at all, that probably has something to do with it. Gas is a lot more efficient and cost less and so using heating and cooking on top of just tvs, lights and appliances with the electric will drive your prices up. you're still using it when you're not it, really depends what you have in your house.

and also, you can't directly compare to your parents house, prices have gone up, but mostly, it's about lifestyle and usage not how big your house is. our gas and elec have been similar no matter if we lived in a terrace, semi detacted or bungelow all of very different sizes, even taking into account of prices rises.

If there's no error you'll have to really take note of how much you have plugged in. i.e. a phone charger that is plugged in but switched off still draws electricity.

i think your bill is high but if it's for all your appliances/energy supply and you have no gas i don't think it's that excessive. Especially with low rating appliances etc.

Oh. also if you're in a communal building with stairways and lighting you could being billed for that. We were once until we had them sort it out.

Our communal electric is in with our service charge.

Its extremely high considering our neighbours are in all day have the exact same size flat but are using only about £20 that's with emersian element on all day.

As said before we are soooo careful with all our electricity we have candles lit for example in the evening 1- because we like it lol but 2- so we don't have to use the lights.

Our home is the first of its kind in kent for code sustainable homes level 3 it should be very very efficient and only use £40 a month that a week would make me happy at the moment lol xx

Something is not right x

 

[SassyLou]

If its a prepayment meter is it possible it was set to pay off a debt and hasn't been changed back? My friend was in debt with her electricity (which is why they put a pre payment meter in) and for every £5 top up £3 went on electric and £2 to pay the debt. Just wondered if yours is like this and hasn't been set back to normal pay as you go iykwim? When we moved into our last house it had a prepayment meter, I phoned them and asked that they change it to a normal meter so I could pay be direct debit, which they did. Xxx

 

[SophiasMummy]

There's definitely something wrong with your meter or someone's tapping it, im completely on electric, with storage heaters too. without the heaters on I can do two clothes washes (use the dryer too), run the TV basically all the time, charging my phone on and off for half the day every day, run a fish tank (filter, heater and everything),run the hot water heater for a couple hours every day and I leave most things that are plugged in turned on for £10 a week. with the heaters on during the winter my cost goes up to around £20-£25 a week depending on how many I have on

BTW Im in a large two bedroom flat, really high ceilings and rubbish insulation

 

[highhopes19]

We've got high ceilings in our front room Aswell Hun... I'm wondering if it could be our boiler system on googling it my heart sunk and I felt sick we have a nibe fighter 200 system and it seems we're not the only people with extortionate bills I just want cry even more

Feel like we've hit a brick wall because I may of found the problem but my housing association are refusing to deal with it because its a utility and they don't deal with tenants utility's despite it being down to the shoddy nibe boiler they've put in! One of the Neighbours (not the one mentioned before) are also having the same problem it turns out.

They've put a heating system in that's too small for the property's

Its a whole different situation now well I think anyway

 

[summer rain]

Is it a new build property? Could it be possible that electric used when they were building the flats is being wrongly attributed to you and added as a debt onto your meter? This happened in the development where I live and it was one flat in every block that was hit with a charge for electric before the flat was even completed, in our block this was our flat, thankfully the HA accepted responsibility and paid it all. A lady in another block got charged 2000 extra and took more effort to convince the HA it was electric used during building the flats that had gone onto her meter. Another thing is if it's a pre payment meter and it's economy 7 or 10 the rates may be much higher than those you have been quoted even if you have no debt with them, those sound like rates for a normal pay by bill meter to me. Another issue could be the switching times are out from what they say on the meter so you think it's what my kids call 'cheap electricity time' but it's actually the on peak time. Our electric bill is around £25 a week and with some prepay meters costing twice as much as we pay it's not beyond the realms of possibility that with a rip off prepay meter that it would be £60-£70 a week. There are better deals though I saw one electricity company that offers flat rate electric of 13p per whatever it is and it's the same for pre pay and normal meters. Perhaps look into switching? Xx

 

[amazed]

I have no advice we use alot of gas in the winter for the radiators but nothen like ur paying for your electric hope you get something sorted Hun x

 

[karlilay]

Went through this last year and the years before. I have the same heating as you, you need to switch to an econamy 10 meter, and make sure they have wired it in properly, is it a meter with 3 wires in the top or ones that are running though the bottom? I am an actual pro with this, please PM me if you have questions.

 

[minties]

Wow, I converted from pounds to NZ dollars, and you spend in a week what we do in a month. We have electric everything. You don't usually see gas in New Zealand.

Something certainly sounds wrong!

 

[summer rain]

if you don't have any gas at all, that probably has something to do with it. Gas is a lot more efficient and cost less and so using heating and cooking on top of just tvs, lights and appliances with the electric will drive your prices up. you're still using it when you're not it, really depends what you have in your house.

and also, you can't directly compare to your parents house, prices have gone up, but mostly, it's about lifestyle and usage not how big your house is. our gas and elec have been similar no matter if we lived in a terrace, semi detacted or bungelow all of very different sizes, even taking into account of prices rises.

If there's no error you'll have to really take note of how much you have plugged in. i.e. a phone charger that is plugged in but switched off still draws electricity.

i think your bill is high but if it's for all your appliances/energy supply and you have no gas i don't think it's that excessive. Especially with low rating appliances etc.

Oh. also if you're in a communal building with stairways and lighting you could being billed for that. We were once until we had them sort it out.

Our communal electric is in with our service charge.

Its extremely high considering our neighbours are in all day have the exact same size flat but are using only about £20 that's with emersian element on all day.

As said before we are soooo careful with all our electricity we have candles lit for example in the evening 1- because we like it lol but 2- so we don't have to use the lights.

Our home is the first of its kind in kent for code sustainable homes level 3 it should be very very efficient and only use £40 a month that a week would make me happy at the moment lol xx

Something is not right x

Even if they are charging the communal charge in with the service charge it's possible if not wired correctly, that you could be being charged for communal areas by accident. Worth looking into. We're very lucky as our insulation is great so we rarely need to put the heating on at all and we have these convection heaters that only heat up until they detect the room is at a certain temperature them it shuts off, we only need the lounge one on and the whole flat is heated in about 20 minutes. Apparently the average bill for 2 bedroom electric only places is 1400 a year, may have increased now as this was the 2011 figure. Ours is about 1100 a year so when I calculated it about £22 a week. We have tried to get it less than this by only using high drain appliances during the cheap times but it didn't make that much difference not that OH and kids were particularly good at sticking to that plan! Xx

 

[highhopes19]

Went through this last year and the years before. I have the same heating as you, you need to switch to an econamy 10 meter, and make sure they have wired it in properly, is it a meter with 3 wires in the top or ones that are running though the bottom? I am an actual pro with this, please PM me if you have questions.

It's the one with the wires running through the bottom

Added a photo of the meter

Is yours a lot more economical now and is it a nibe boiler Hun?

Xx