[John]

Originally Posted by IL Cattivo

Readings by the 3rd Party Company had not been put on the account, hence the 3 previous Estimated readings prior to my Customer reading last week.

I refer the honourable gentleman to the answer I made some moments ago

[IL Cattivo]

Duly noted John...

[shoestring25]

ou can't rely on meter readers. You should get in the habit of regularly submiting your readings. I do it on the 1st of every month, Npower only want 2 a year ! I won't rely on a stranger on getting it right .

totally agree that way you are fully aware of what your actually using and what its costing you

[SevloW]

I use British Gas for both my electric and gas and I pay for what I use each month so no nasty surprises. I have to do on-line meter readings around the 17th of each month and they send me an email around the 23rd of the month telling me what they will be taking on the DD.

[Phil57]

Although the matter appears to have been resolved, others should be aware of this................................
Meter data being changed from metric to imperial thereby creating a massive (incorrect) bill.

[IL Cattivo]

Does anyone out there (specifically EDF customers) have one of these...

https://shop.edfenergy.com/Item.aspx...9&CategoryID=1

I like the idea that it has the ability to turn off appliances, via the 3 transmitter plugs, at a scheduled time of the day rather than leaving them on standby. Useful to save electricity during the night for example when everyone in the household is asleep.

Obviously open to other similar products if anyone has had good experiences with something similar.

Thanks

[FishDUDE]

I live in a 3 bed terrace with gas ch and electric everything else just me the wife and 2 kids, we pay £75 gas £75 electric per month. I've had over the last 3 years letters demanding £1800 one month then the following month saying we are in credit by £400 then again in debt by over a grand then in credit etc.

Personally I think energy company's are a shower of ******* and are run by complete numptys who couldn't work out the worth of a £5 note without consulting with at least 5 tiers of management, several letters and perhaps in the end they just take the lotto numbers and divide that by the their phone number and just say is that it?

[FZR400RRSP]

Originally Posted by IL Cattivo

Does anyone out there (specifically EDF customers) have one of these...

https://shop.edfenergy.com/Item.aspx...9&CategoryID=1

I like the idea that it has the ability to turn off appliances, via the 3 transmitter plugs, at a scheduled time of the day rather than leaving them on standby. Useful to save electricity during the night for example when everyone in the household is asleep.

Obviously open to other similar products if anyone has had good experiences with something similar.

Thanks

How long would it take you to recoup the £70 cost of that in electricity?
I'd think it would be a helluva long time, for appliances on standby.

[IronGiant]

Originally Posted by IL Cattivo

Does anyone out there (specifically EDF customers) have one of these...

https://shop.edfenergy.com/Item.aspx...9&CategoryID=1

I like the idea that it has the ability to turn off appliances, via the 3 transmitter plugs, at a scheduled time of the day rather than leaving them on standby. Useful to save electricity during the night for example when everyone in the household is asleep.

Obviously open to other similar products if anyone has had good experiences with something similar.

Thanks

Yes I've got one, it came free with my last tariff. But it doesn't have a timer, you have to manually shut them down from the central control panel.

[reiteration]

Originally Posted by inzaman

That is super low, i thought we were on the low side - i ensure nothing is left on standby etc and for both gas and electric combined it is circa £1,400 per year

I also make sure that they get regular i.e. bimonthly readings as i send them over the internet as i dont want to get stung again.

yeah, I don't have gas and normally away at weekends too (and work full time) and last two bills were less that 120 each for a quarter (thus, around 250 for 6 months)...so, frankly if the bill does go up Ill be moving back to scottish power pronto..!

[peebly]

Originally Posted by ggrant

Crikey! Clearly I’m in a minority here!

I live in a two bedroom terraced house with just my wife (no kids) and we pay by direct debit every month. £35 each on electricity and gas. While the gas sometimes needs bumping up around winter, there is no way on this earth my bills are that high! At one point we had a £50 credit! Electricity gets used pretty heavily due to the number of appliances we have and the heating gets turned off as soon as possible, I think we turned it off around May this year with the odd requirement for the colder days. It probably wont be back on till around October/November either if it stays like this.

I know reading some of the prices quoted here I am beginning to think I am a member of illuminati.

I have two bedroom terrace house, I have prepayment meters. I put £25 on the electric each month (works out about £5 a week).

I put about £30 on the gas in warm months, maybe £40-50 when it's cold.

Npower told me people tend to watch there usage when using these meters. But still compared to other users, DAMN.

[a l e x]

Our DD for the electric is £25 a month, 2 of us living in a 2 bed new house with solar panels/heat regeneration system etc. Not submitted a reading yet, hopefully we're not in for any nasty surprises... the house builders cocked up when setting up the gas so we cannot get bills yet... the gas board do not recognise any of the houses as separate! Thats 8 months without a gas bill... I hope its not too much...!

Panels heat our water and we've not had the heating on for the last 4 months so i'm hoping its not too bad!

[a l e x]

Well this thread prompted me to check online... £47.50 in credit... great I thought!

Meter was read by them on the 03/05 - 894. Read by them a couple of days ago on the 06/08 - 1394. 500 kWh used. Works out at about £105 so as soon as that bill comes I think it means we owe them £57.50! I think i've worked that out right... if not then please correct me...!

[John]

how much are you paying per Kwh on your bill , 20p ?

[a l e x]

According to the website we are on the Standard Electric Tariff... so the first 180kWh are 24.729P and the rest are at 11.349p. So I did:

(180*0.24729)+(320*0.11349) which is about £81. I think thats right... not the £105 but still going to owe them £33.

My next challenge is to work out how to convert the gas meter reading in M3 to kWh...

[John]

Originally Posted by a l e x

My next challenge is to work out how to convert the gas meter reading in M3 to kWh...

the calculation should be on your bill somewhere., including the calofic value, which can change

[a l e x]

No bills yet... Meter still not recognised! Thought I'd try work it out myself so the bill isn't too much of a shock!

[John]

Correction factor The amount by which we adjust the amount of gas you’ve used to take
account of the season.

We multiply the m3 figure by the correction factor and then by the calorific value. Finally, we divide the
result by 3.6 to reach your kWh total.

from the back of my last bill. never notice the correction factor bit before

[Knyght_byte]

Imperial (FT3) gas unit to kwh - unit/s x 2.83 x 1.02264 x calorific value (average figure is 39.5) divide by 3.6 = kwh. Quick version? unit/s x 31.75

Metric (M3) gas unit to kwh - unit/s x 1.02265 x calorific value divide by 3.6 = kwh. Quick version? unit/s x 11.22

Basically, to check they are doing the conversion right, find how many units the bill is charging, and check the actual meter face for whether it says FT3 or M3 and, then multiply the units by the correct calculation above, if it comes to within a handful of units for whats on the bill, then they've charged the correct amount in units.

Also worth watching out for when a meter goes through zero, a lot of systems have issues with this, and end up crediting back from 9995 (imp meter) to 42 on a CV of say 39.1, then charge forward through the clock all the way to 58 but on a CV of say 39.8. You wouldnt think the .7 makes much difference, try it.....

One thing I'll say again, in this life, you and you alone are responsible for your financial position. Nobody else is. People can be held accountable for making mistakes against your financial position, but if you dont do anything to keep on top of things you know you have to pay for etc, then its also your own fault. No business gets things right 100% of the time, whether through fault of systems or staff. So why on earth wouldnt you check your bills/statements/etc each time one comes in to make sure nothing looks wrong? Why wait for something to go wrong, then spend ages trying to get it right?

Oh, the amusing part, the people you speak to very rarely actually fix anything, especially with energy, most of it is passed to a back office to look in to and fix, normally because it wont just involve the supplier, but also their industry partners as well (not competition, but third party companies used to do various jobs such as collect readings, etc). What tends to get things wrong is the systems used to automate...these systems only go wrong because of who programs them......the people who program them tend to be some of the smartest people in the country, not dumb people....so rather than slate companies for being full of dumb people who dont know their bum from the elbow, just consider that stuff goes wrong, and it always will do. The best way to get a good, swift resolution? Be nice and happy when you call and just say you need their help in sorting something out. Call Centre staff bend over backward for people who help in resolving the issue rather than just call up and shout from the off. If things dont work out that way first time around, then just escalate in the same manner, eventually you get the person who has the authority/knowledge to sort it. The shouting part from your side generally doesnt do much most of the time....other than alienate the person you speak to

[IL Cattivo]

Originally Posted by FZR400RRSP

How long would it take you to recoup the £70 cost of that in electricity?
I'd think it would be a helluva long time, for appliances on standby.

I have no idea to be honest FZR, but what I do like about it is that it can identify and bring to our attention trends in power usage within our household whereby we can see which appliances within our home are consuming the most amount of electricity and at what times of the day/night.

Since our last bill the wife and I are now becoming more energy aware and we would like to keep a track on what we're using. Regardless of the expense up front I believe this could be a useful tool to have in our home to monitor and keep a track on our usage.

Powering off appliances that are in standby is merely one of it's useful perks, it does have others too...

[neilios]

A useful calculator here..
Gas and Electricity Calculators and Tools

[Exemplar]

Jeepers guys!

We have a five year old David Wilson home, semi detached, three storey, four bedroom (three en-suite I'll have you know...).

We pay £61 or £62 a month combined.

I'm not sure of the relevance but I did it through top cashback and got the tariff from work (half our company is a waste company, other half is an energy company).

I kid you not we do pay this. I'll see if I can dig out an example bill if needed.

Have the people with massive bills been to see their neighbours and check what sort of payments they are making (if neighbours are close and in similar houses of course)?

Alex

[John]

do you submit readings ? if yes then you have nothing to worry about

[IronGiant]

Originally Posted by Exemplar

We pay £61 or £62 a month combined.

You pay £61 for gas and a £1 for electricity?

[John]

Originally Posted by IronGiant

You pay £61 for gas and a £1 for electricity?

git ! I love rain me

[NorvernRob]

Originally Posted by kbfern

Never get sucked into paying a low monthly DD as you will nearly always find you run into problems within a few months they will try and jack up your payments or if it does not come to light for a year or so you will end up with a huge shortfall to pay off.

I always tell them what I want to pay based on my last years actual usage and then calculate what their unit charges are.I have switched suppliers 3 times in the last 4 yrs and have never had a bill bigger than covered by my stipulated monthly direct debits.

I am currently with EDF and my deal finishes with them 30th Sept and I have already worked out that I won't owe them more than +/- £20 on my original estimates for the 13 month contract.

I have a 1930's 4 bed semi and we pay £140 a month DD, I work from home so our consumption is a bit higher than most. To be honest anyone paying less than £100 per month on a DD with prices as they are for gas/electric is going to find themselves in arrears over a 12 month period as you are probably not paying enough.

I know a few of my friends and family who have run into problems with virtually all the major suppliers as their billing systems are utter crap.The only way to generally avoid problems is to monitor your consumption on a monthly basis and if things do not compute correctly jump on them quick as most folks don't do this and usually 1-2 years latter wham!!!! we have just got this huge bill.You then have a devil of a job going back over many months trying to sort it all out.

Well said.

Too many people haven't got a clue how much energy they're using which is crazy in this day and age. I'm with EDF and run my account online, you can enter your readings anytime you want and know exactly where you stand in relation to usage and payments.

To the OP - our boiler is a 1970's abomination, and the timer has broken so i've just left it on water only 24 hours a day for the last few months - and my recent bill was under £100 for just over 3 months (95 days).

My winter bills (obviously I don't run the heating 24/7!) are around £250, so in total £700 per year for gas. 3 bed semi with a wife and a baby so we used the heating a lot more than usual last winter.

Remember that's also with a supposedly 'inefficient' old boiler, yet my bills don't seem to be any more than anyone elses I know and less than most. We pay £121 per month for gas + electric combined and are currently £108 in credit, I also have a 2,000 gallon Koi pond which has quite alot of equipment running on it.

Make sure you check Uswitch/Moneysupermarket regularly and don't be afraid to switch providers as often as need be. My fixed deal finishes next month and this is the first time in 6/7 years that I haven't been able to secure a cheaper tariff, a 5% rise is the best I can do.

[NorvernRob]

Originally Posted by a l e x

According to the website we are on the Standard Electric Tariff... so the first 180kWh are 24.729P and the rest are at 11.349p. So I did:

(180*0.24729)+(320*0.11349) which is about £81. I think thats right... not the £105 but still going to owe them £33.

My next challenge is to work out how to convert the gas meter reading in M3 to kWh...

I would look to see if you can get a better tariff first - my electricity is 28p per day standing charge and a flat rate of 8.084p per kWh. I know tariffs and rates are geographically dependent, but you should always be able to do better than a suppliers 'standard' rates - they're used for ripping off pensioners who don't know any better.

[a l e x]

Yeh I've seen a few better, go away tomorrow but will be changing when we get back. Worked out our kWh for the past 8 months of gas, only used around 2900. Reckon gas should be no more then about £25 a month at the very most. £50 a month combined.