I’ve just had the email from Shell.

How we worked out your new monthly payment (excluding the EBSS discount):
Predicted energy use
(3 months) £2233.50

WTF? That’s more than my mortgage! Granted it’s a larger house, but there’s only two of us living here.

Have you submitted correct reading with them?

Smart meter.

Can anyone see a flaw in this plan…?

Estimated usage over the next 12 months is approx £3,072 / £256 per month.

We’re currently up in credit heading into the winter. Could we withdraw that credit balance and peg the DD at £256? It’d mean we’d almost immediately be in debit but will obviously catch up by this time next year?

Il with Shell and they seem to manage your DD value based on the next 3 months rather than the longer term / 12 months.

The flaw may be that energy companies won’t want everyone doing this. It would mean them financing a huge debit as everyone went into the red through the winter.

So while one person doing it wouldn’t matter they may not encourgage it. I’m with Octopus and currently £500 in credit. I tried to withdraw some on the website. I think their estimate is high because our electricity consumption is going to be down a third compared to last year due to savings. Our gas is also going to be much reduced due to new CH boiler and contros and better loft insulation.

Octopus website would only let me request a £60ish refund from my balance with a click and wanted a phone call for anything more. Not a big deal. If I am right then my balance will still be a few hundred come spring and I will get it one way or another then. They think based on previous usage that I will be just in the red at the end of winter.

Well I guess I’m testing my theory! Took about 20 seconds via their automated chat service on the website to get a £450 refund. Balance is now nil but the current £256 a month DD should bring us to a nil balance next Sept. We can always chuck it back in the Shell account if needed but will be interesting if they now recommend / force an increase in the DD.

SP refunded the £66 yesterday. £500 or more in credit here, DD still at £330 per month, last two month’s bills were £180. SP saying I’m not paying enough, so can’t change DD, but it’s based upon previous years and we’ve slashed electric consumption. I expect a nice balance come spring – will withdraw it then and go on holiday !

Is anyone expecting electricity usage to go up in winter?

Obviously we’ll need more lighting but that’s a pretty small portion of the bill. We aren’t expecting to tumble dry still, and we’re probably watching the same amount of telly now as we will in winter. The CH pump will be running longer I expect.

Expecting a slight rise in use from what we’ve been doing (cutting use), but I’ll be keeping eyes on it. I have got to heat the conservatory where I work one or two days a week, although a jumper takes care of most of it. We are out more at present – i.e. work and Uni.

Gas will jump, but that’s due to it being 3x more expensive !

And still waiting for my refund from shell. Tick tick tick ..

£101 three month gas/leccy bill here.Thats after the £60.00 Boris bung of course.
I,m also now practising navy showers.One minute then out.No birds have rejected my wiffy Knackers yet!

So we’ve manually worked out our new electricity costs. Since Oct 1st we have only used 44kw according to the meter, so about 3.7kw per day. At 34p or so that’s just over £15 for 2 weeks.

I cancelled direct debit with Bulb went upto £333 from £254 and they would not reduce, have about £450 in credit. Now after checking bills they are never more than £180, last month £140. Now I am just paying £200 per month by transfer but will reduce to £150 now have additional from Government they can use my credit if over £200.

Bulb did send me a letter today about the difference in charges with government top-up but will just wait until monthly bill to see how it works out.

Our fuel bill is essentially whatever the current diesel price is.

No gas. Solar electric. Solar shower topped up with the water from the kettle if feeling luxurious otherwise it’s a short, cold shower (outside to boot). Two parking heaters, but not needed yet despite it being 8°C this morning. A brisk walk and down jacket help.

My DD with Shell is £170.00 / month (dual fuel).

They’ve just credited the £66.00 to my account – so income into account is £236.00 this month.

I have a Powerwall solution with 2 batteries which takes care of everything with a plug on.

Gas is used for central heating (not been on since March), showering (still mostly at the gym!) and cooking so fortunately it’s pretty low

I’m also starting to think about looking at ways to move as ‘off grid’ as i can. Be interested to know if anyone here has managed it? I can’t do much about the water supply, but looking ways to dispense with reliance on gas.

I cancelled direct debit with Bulb went upto £333 from £254 and they would not reduce, have about £450 in credit. Now after checking bills they are never more than £180, last month £140.

Bulb are ridiculous. I have just cancelled the direct debit with them as the ignored by request to reduce to something that reflected my use. This is a business account so they are charging us 65p kWh, despite the wholesale price capped at 21p. Absolute disgrace.

My account is £200 in credit and my next bill will be around £60-£70. They were going to take £130 on 1st November. I will just top it up on a monthly basis.

I am scratching my head here….

Octopus
We are fixed until September 23, they have £750+ of our money in credit, our smart meters have now started working, they have neatly added our subsidy to reduce our payments, great.

Currently we are paying £158 a month in total with & without subsidy.

By April they forecast we will be £1k in credit(!)

Yet their website is recommending we double our total payment to £310….?!

Is it me? I could buy a bike for that….ahem.

As previously posted I have little confidence in the Shell app or the calculations that sit on it – don’t seem to take account of credit. The app is down for maintenance the moment so maybe there have been enough complaints for them to fix it – we will see…

The Energy Suppliers are taking the wee wee. Most of us have cut use with these incredible bills, so of course we are using less, but they aren’t accepting it when you try and reduce the DD. SP would never let me reduce mine other than £20 or so. I’d £500 credit in July, so googled how to fine the ‘refund’ option buried in their web site and got it back. I’m again, just 4 months later £500 up. I still can’t reduce it and they’d ideally want me to pay more.

@r8jimbob88 please tell me if you’re refund has/does actually appear on your bank as I’ve been trying via countless phone calls and app chat conversations to get my £1600 back, which isn’t even all my credit, for a month now, I had to start a complaint, they closed that saying they would pay it…. Still not got it. Getting very pee’d off and of it doesn’t appear in the next few days I’m escalating.

**** Bulb!

As I posted yesterday, £200 in credit, they are looking to take £130 next month, my bill will be £70 ish.

They ignored my messages.

Cancelled and DD and got an email that was trying to frighten me into renewing it within a few hours. Pity they couldn’t react to my early message as quick.

Hiya,

Just looked at my Bill. We are hardly using any energy at all but left the balance to take into account the winter. I have done a lot of work insulating the house and we are really using very little energy it seems.
My account is now sitting at £823 in credit. I’m getting a little annoyed at the moment half of me thinks cash it in and go on holiday, the other is cautious and thinking keep the balance there and let it dwindle over the winter. It doesn’t look like it will much though the current rate of consumption. We are using wood mainly for heating and the plan is to use more reverting to a back boiler next year to run the CH in addition to the gas. The gas I’m going to request pay as I use and standing order thereafter…

JeZ

@neilnevill

Yep £450 received back in my bank account from Shell. Said it would take up to 10 days but came through almost immediately.

I think their calculations are all a bit random. App was recommending that we increase our DD but at the same time recommended a refund of £220 but instantly allowed a £450 refund.

The app currently says estimated usage £374 a month which I assume is just looking at the upcoming winter months. Despite this it’s recommending a DD of £435 😅 whilst at the same time giving an estimated annual usage value of £3,073 (which I agree is pretty accurate) which equates to £256 a month.

I give up. Glad I’ve got hold of my money now although I expect they’ll force an increased DD at some point soon. I’ll look forward to challenging that.

Has anyone actually had any experience of telling their energy provider that they can’t afford the newly suggested DD increases?

Shell app is all over the place

Is anyone expecting electricity usage to go up in winter?

Our does as we use fan heaters to heat the workshop.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2no8sTY]Energy[/url] by Ben Freeman, on Flickr

**** Bulb!

As I posted yesterday, £200 in credit, they are looking to take £130 next month, my bill will be £70 ish.

They ignored my messages.

Cancelled and DD and got an email that was trying to frighten me into renewing it within a few hours. Pity they couldn’t react to my early message as quick.

Hhmmm …. I normally have my DD fixed at £70 every month since I joined them few years ago for gas and electricity. Never used more than £70 in the past.

Then I received an email telling me to lower my DD … errhhh? I know my credit is now almost break even with £85-ish bills for the last two months after being eaten away by the increase rate. Then they said something along the line of £66 whatever … can’t be arsed to read them all as I know I will keep usage to minimum and not much I can do …

Then they said something along the line of £66 whatever … can’t be arsed to read them all as I know I will keep usage to minimum and not much I can do …

You’re getting £400/6 = £66 as a credit every month for the next 6 months as part of the package from the previous chancellor to mitigate the price rises.

Shell app is awful. It shows two different figure when~£109 difference for my current credit balance, it’s suggesting I significantly reduce my DD when it was only increased by them after a phone call with me at the start of the month, it appears to say the government ebss £66 will appear as a discount on the DD yet my October bill shows the full DD and the ebss credit on top. I think I may have to switch to print monthly after billing. Still no sign of my refund.

Price cap will no longer be universal for the full 24 months. Details incoming…

Only in place in current guise until April’23. Bugger

Great. Trying to budget for the next 12 months is impossible. Especially with my fixed rate mortgage coming to an end next year too. Bad times

On a prepayment electric meter so I log how much we’ve spent each Monday. £30 in the last week! Was £15pw, then went up to £20, so that’s a big jump to £30!

We were just back from a week’s holiday, so a fair bit of washing and some drysoon use, plus my son on the PC or xbox practically all day during the school holidays. Schools back now, so it’ll be interesting to see how much it drops next Monday! Still not got our £66 voucher from EON, but they reckon it’ll be here by the end of the week….

I think the price cap will be lowered at the next opportunity or the first opportunity after the subsidy ends and warmer weather returns. It should give the same effect as handing cash out.
Aren’t wholesale energy prices decreasing at the moment?

pay by DD, but the £66 has appeared in my current account as a credit from BG, why can they not just knock it off the bill 🤔

retrorick
Full Member
I think the price cap will be lowered at the next opportunity or the first opportunity after the subsidy ends and warmer weather returns. It should give the same effect as handing cash out.
Aren’t wholesale energy prices decreasing at the moment?

Martin Lewis saying current predictions are up 73% in april, then down 15% in July 😯😯

So, I thought that energy costs were going to be less of a worry than the mortgage.

Thanks to this Cluster-F they’re both going to be through the roof now 🤬

All energy is free, unlimited and omnipresent.
The real question is how long are you mugs going to continue paying? When your monthly bills are £600? £800? £1000? What’ll be your breaking point? The price of oil or whatever has not significantly gone up, neither are the companies making hideous losses. Someone is being had. Or am I just a conspiracy theorist?
Say no and take what is rightfully yours.

All energy is free, unlimited and omnipresent.

…if you can tap into your neighbours leccy supply!! 🤣🤣⚡️💡☠️

All energy is free, unlimited and omnipresent.
The price of oil or whatever has not significantly gone up, neither are the companies making hideous losses. Someone is being had. Or am I just a conspiracy theorist?
Say no and take what is rightfully yours.

edit: I note @veganrider joined a week ago, to post on the conspiracies theory thread.