Electricity costs: faulty meter = £2400/pa?

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Electricity costs: faulty meter = £2400/pa?

24 posts & 16 voices | Started 11 months ago by spacemonkey | Latest reply from tomaso

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spacemonkey - Member

I know we already have a recent thread covering energy issues in general, but mine's more specific - so any feedback would be appreciated.

Basically, we've gone from using 17kwh/day this time last year to 55kwh/day now (according to EON and out meter readings). In the last month we've used 1200kwh during the day alone! Which hardly stacks up seeing as we used 2800kwh in the whole of last year. Hence EON are saying we're likely to pay IRO £200/month! Naturally I disputed this so they're sending an engineer to test the meter.

Anyone else had a similar experience? Can meters be that far out?

Cheers

EDIT: 3 bed home with normal usage

Posted 11 months ago #
teef - Member

Test it yourself - switch everything off and put a 1 kW heater on for an hour - see if it uses 1kWh of electricity.

Posted 11 months ago #
craigxxl - Member

No one said running your own cannabis farm would be cheap

Posted 11 months ago #
leffeboy - Member

...or buy a clip on meter that you put over one of the wires.

We had our meter stop working completely for a while once and in that case the electricity company had standard rules about how to estimate the usage and they used then. It seemed sensible to we went with that (I'm not UK but I imagine they would have a similar thing)

Posted 11 months ago #
spacemonkey - Member

Hmm, I'll see if we can dig out the clip-on meter that we used to use. Missus removed it a while back and may well have thrown it away.

Definitely makes sense to test activity for an hour or so.

Cheers

Posted 11 months ago #
coffeeking - Member

3 bed semi here. £25 per month, rarely higher even though I do stuff like leave computers on at times, weld, stuff like that.

General use is about 7kWh a day, sometimes 12 if we've lots of washing/drying.

Just turn everything off and see if it's still moving, then introduce known loads.

Posted 11 months ago #
spacemonkey - Member

Sounds about right CK. We also use leccy for hot water because we're on oil (no gas in these parts), so expect to use maybe double that number of units which is fine. Was about £600 for last year's bill (and as much again for oil).

Have just started monitoring the meter, but really need to dig out that clip-on thingy.

Posted 11 months ago #
Shakey - Member

Got a letter from EON a week or so ago saying we were £200 in debit and they were going to raise DD to £100 from £55. It had been at £55 for previous few years with Scottish Power but meter readings seemed correct so agreed to change it to £75.

Have been monitoring meter, which is on my desk, and average is £51 per month (unless Kettle is on and then it shoots up to £271 per month!!!)

Posted 11 months ago #
wwaswas - Member

no suspicious wires running out your attic into the neighbours?

as above turn everything off (personally, I'd just shut the power off at the fuse box to be sure it's all off) and see how whether the meter is still registering a current drain.

Posted 11 months ago #
spacemonkey - Member

Got a letter from EON a week or so ago saying we were £200 in debit and they were going to raise DD to £100 from £55.

Same here: but £35 to £115!

Have you got a remote monitor that sits on your desk? Or do you just happen to be near the meter?

Posted 11 months ago #
Shakey - Member

Have you got a remote monitor that sits on your desk? Or do you just happen to be near the meter?

EON supplied a meter which I have on my desk. I tend to look at it quite often

Posted 11 months ago #
djglover - Member

Have you left the immersion on?!

Posted 11 months ago #
MrTall - Member

I also have a remote meter that British Gas (electricity) supplied to me when i swapped to online billing. I find it useful as you see the real time cost of the energy you're using and it has made me better at turning lights off and not leaving things on standby etc.

My bill went up to around £55pm but after i started giving them actual readings they've dropped it to £25pm (3 bedroom detached).

I have had a problem in my office though as despite the fact i have just 2 rooms with an adjoining door and run a fridge, 2 computers and phones my average quarterly bill was coming in at over £500 which was just not right. To test the meter they wanted to charge me £200 which would only be returned if it turned out the meter was faulty. However it all seems to have gotten sorted now as it's back to around £200pq.

Posted 11 months ago #
spacemonkey - Member

EON supplied a meter which I have on my desk. I tend to look at it quite often

They gave us one too, but this was about 2-3 years ago. But it has to hang off the meter feed. Hence wondering if your's does the same or is remote.

Have you left the immersion on?!

It takes about 30 mins to heat from scratch, and sometimes we accidentally leave it on for a few more mins. But if the tank isn't being drained them I'm guessing it's using minimal or no energy. And we've being doing this for ages so it's got to be something weird.

Posted 11 months ago #
totalshell - Member

easiest thing in the world to check ( and scare yourself at the same time with how much you use) switch everything off that you would when you go on holiday ( tv off stand by etc etc fridge and freezer on) and you should be using 100-150w then turn on the immersion heater 1k then the tumble dryer washing machine kettle electric oven and finally the electric hob and toaster.. then work out you ll be bankrupt inside the hour..

the stuff aint cheap. we pay 80 a month for a 4 bed GCH house with tumble dryer and two primary school kids ( scottish power want 140)

Posted 11 months ago #
glenh - Member

Got a letter from EON a week or so ago saying we were £200 in debit and they were going to raise DD to £100 from £55.

spacemonkey - Member

Same here: but £35 to £115!

Not just me then. They wanted to put our combined monthly payment up from £70 to £170! Because we underpaid by £20 over the previous year!

Needless to say the £20 was paid and the switch to another supplier initiated immediately.

Posted 11 months ago #
wwaswas - Member

and two primary school kids ( scottish power want 140)

140 primary school kids will cost a fortune to run.

Posted 11 months ago #
djglover - Member

IME, Most of the time these things are down to change in circumstances or a series of (under) estimated bills.

When I first started working in the energy world I remember dealing with a similar complaint, turned out the customers son had been sacked and been spending all day at home using elec and gas and not told his mum.

Its very unusual for meters to suddenly start giving such spurious readings.

Posted 11 months ago #
ridingscared - Member

So are they basing this rise on actual meter readings or guesstimating future useage? I'm amazed that energy companies tell customers they need to raise the dd payments significantly based on speculation, people pay then think themselves lucky when they get a rebate whilst the companies are raking in interest on thousands of overpaying customers cash.

Posted 11 months ago #
thisisnotaspoon - Member

We had a second meter installed when the bill went up massively.

Missus bless her isnt technicaly minded couldnt fathom why the bill went up and down. So i spreadsheeted out the last 4 years bills and just pointed out the bill haddne quadroupled, it was just that £50/month was wayyyyyy to low and at some point the debt had to be paid, and that turning on all the heaters didnt help matters!

Posted 11 months ago #
woffle - Member

we had something very similar - moved into our house and had a regular usage with a regular DD that covered the costs (checked every month). We then forgot to supply a meter reading for 6 months at which point they sent someone round to read the meters. Suddenly we faced a bill of nearly £2K to bring the account in line This would have meant we'd have been using more electric (2 bed end of terrace, family of four, emersion on for 1/2 an hour a day, all new A++ rated appliances) than my folks in their 5 bed house with much older appliances etc (effectively our usage was supposed to have quadrupled during that 6 months).

We got a monitor and checked daily - we were back to using the same we had been when we moved in (and are still, 2 years on). The electric company checked the meter repeatedly, we had 3 engineers out who all reported we had a low usage household and that the bill was not right. However, despite this and daily readings for 3 months, lots of complaints etc, the co. refused to move on the bill and we eventually cleared the debt and moved suppliers.

Good luck.

Posted 11 months ago #
spacemonkey - Member

Hmm, that sounds grim Woffle. Did the provider bill you for not having a faulty meter?

Have just borrowed a monitor off a friend and it's showing monthly cost of £60 or so - which is fine for now. However, it says the time is 14:30 which is obviously well out. Can't find any way to change this manually so I'm now wondering if this is sent by the meter. If so, we're well out of sync. Maybe the result of a power cut or two - which we tend to get twice a year.

It's a Southern Electric device ITMAD. Trying to find instructions online but to no avail thus far.

RS, they're basing this on us using 55kwh/day at present - compared with 17kwh this time last year. Annually we paid around £400-£600 which was reasonable (given the climate etc). But we've accrued a £600+ debit in maybe 3-4 months alone - which doesn't stack up.

EDIT: managed to change the time.

Posted 11 months ago #
spooky_b329 - Member

then turn on the immersion heater 1k then the tumble dryer washing machine kettle electric oven and finally the electric hob and toaster.. then work out you ll be bankrupt

Don't turn everything on at once to see how high you can get your meter...my parents managed to blow the main incoming fuse a couple of years back, they'd been in the house about ten years but had just got unlucky one day, turned one too many things on and everything went off. (they have electric storage heaters, immersion heater for the water, cooker, tumble drier etc) It was half a day before they realised the power cut was only affecting their house, thankfully the leccy company came out and replaced the fuse for free as (if I remember correctly) it was an 80amp fuse and below the standard of 100amps.

Some of the electricity monitors are a bit carp and only give an instantaneous reading, giving an estimated annual consumption/cost based on the current usage. The good ones (like we got from Npower) give instantaneous readings for cost/consumption per hour, and also give you consumption for the day, consumption for yesterday, and a seven day running average. We are using a tad over £5 per week, come down a lot since getting the meter, and just had a £75 refund

Posted 11 months ago #
tomaso - Member

Have you got a teenage son who won't let you in his bedroom?
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Posted 11 months ago #

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