Having some work done in the house at the moment and our electricity use has sky rocketed. They are using spot lights and some power tools which presumably use a lot of electricity but i checked the meter before going to work this evening (after builders had left) and i seem to have used 8 kwhs in 5 hours with only the fridge/freezer on??? Thats about what on average i’d use in a whole day! Do electricity meters ever go wrong and go too fast? Or can a fridge suddenly start using more power? Its all a bit odd really and seems like it will get expensive very quickly if i dont work it out

how long are the builders there for ?

odd smell near the roofspace ?

😉

(unplug yr fridge and watch the meter for a bit)

I can flog you our energy meter – we used it after oddly high bill to check usage/culprits.

£15 posted in mint Nick, no box?

They’ll drink a lot of tea. That’s a lot of kettle usage

Have you got a leak?

Crikey – that’s something running at 1600W – ought to notice that… Not got an immersion heater on have you? 😯

They’ve been here for about a week and got another couple of days to go.
The loft is free of smells and lights!
I can understand why the Usage would be up generally at the moment just a bit worrying that im using so much power without anything switched on!

Just checked the immersion and its not been left on, thought you may have nailed it there!

What fuse board?

Erm i have no idea im afraid

I don’t know about the numbers but some power tools will use a lot of electricity and halogen spotlights certainly will. Our builders at work use 2 or 3 of those double 500w lights on a tripod so maybe 3kw there. If they are using stuff like cement mixers for hours on end or concrete breakers then it’s entirely possible it’s high but normal usage considering.
Plus the average kettle is 1800w!

When I built my extension I had multiple fan heaters in the room drying it out for days before plasterboarding etc. It’s stuff like this that you don’t really consider when extending.

Yeah i can understand that and it makes sense that our usage would go up a lot, the bit which has stumped me is that its gone up so much over 5 hours when there is no one in the house and everything switched off apart from fridge/freezer and router

I meant to add that I think it’s a trait of smart meters to be delayed. I have had a couple and they seem to give funny readings but average out at the end of the day.

Its not a smart meter its an “old school” one. Can they do that?

I’m out of suggestions then. I wrongly assumed you were getting your data from a smart meter and as I mentioned the ones I have had have had a bit of a lag. I would probably check around the house for anything left on maybe coincidently to the builders being there. Otherwise there may be a lag on metering but I wouldn’t know.

Take a reading and switch off an entire circuit at the consumer unit, take another reading and switch back on. Repeat over the next couple of weeks for other circuits

Watch out for undesirable consequences; the freezer defrosting, falling down the stairs because the lights won’t work, etc, so be selective about which circuits you test 🙂

One of my staff complained that their house was using too much after getting a large bill, said he thought the meter must be faulty, he claims to have reported it.

I knew that his wife had just finished uni and was at home full time, and when I am in the staff village dealing with other issues, the A/C was often on, all of them at times, and the houses are terribly insulated and the A/C is 20 years old.

Second bill came in, 25% higher than the last, he was having a moan about how he shouldn’t have to pay, the meters must be faulty, both meters must be faulty yadyadayda.

I mentioned to him that I had been in and out of the village a lot recently, having to deal with water leaks, security issues etc, and that everytime I had been in his A/C was on, which I found strange as he was at work.

Oh – my wife is at home, but she knows not to use the A/C.

Turns out his wife, had not only been A/Cing the whole house with four inefficient A/C units all day, she had been doing it often with the windows open, and going out for the morning just leaving it on so that the dogs didn’t get hot. Making sure they were turned off before her husband got home.