Holy moly my smart meter has hit 10 pounds

[Eyedropeyeflop]

I’ve never seen my smart meter hit 10 pounds in one day.

We are a family of 5 in a standard 3 bed house. The heating has been on today from 3-7pm (and not on full).

Couple of showers, 1 bath. I cooked sausages in the oven, veg on the hob. Nothing too extravagent.

Few cups of tea.

Looking forward we will cope, but we will not have hardly any surplus.

Anyone else want to share their smart meter readings today?

Im on prepayment electric too and ive not noticed a difference yet. I had £70 on Friday and its £60 today. Thats normal for us. 4 bed stone cottage, done a copy of washes, console on by DS etc

@TimBoothseyes

I'm on prepay so am able to see how much I've spent, without needing a smart meter. I topped up both the gas and electric on Friday. There are 2 of us in a small bungalow. I have just looked at the total on both...We cook with electric and have gas central heating. Oh and I did 2 loads of washing on Saturday. How on Earth are people getting to £10+ a day?

I'm pretty frugal with energy now but I can see it getting to £10 a day, there are more than 2 of us and we don't live in a small bungalow so of course we use more then you do. It's nearly 75p just on the standing charge every day

£4 yesterday on the gas - doesn't sound much but I didn't have the heating on at all and didn't use the oven, so it's just a shower for me and a shower for my son. We really can't keep living like this, I got into bed at 7.45 tonight just so I didn't have to put the heating on and its April, God help us when the cold weather comes round again :(

I never look any more. When I first got it, I did. And I freaked out. Fortunately the bills didn't match it! I don't understand as it appeared to be in the correct tarrif etc, these days I choose to ignore it!

@DinosApple

I boiled a half kettle this morning and had two cups of tea and put some in a thermos.

It just saves reboiling it again and again through the day. If I was really flipping on it, I'd get up and boil it at 5.55am as were on economy 7 so get a cheaper rate during the night (mostly completely useless!)

But you've used the same amount of energy.

It costs the same to boil 3 cups of water in 1 go as it does to boil 3 separate cups of water. As it uses the same energy.

The best advice with kettles is to just boil the water you need.

My meter only gives the reading for yesterday, today's will be available after midnight. £1.68 yesterday,

Yesterday was 2 wash loads, 4 tumble dryer cycles, 1 dishwasher load, central heating on for most of the day. Tv most of the day, 2 Alexa during the night playing music, 5 min shower x 2 🚿, electric fire for 3.5 hours. Oven for 1.5 hours.

(For context I live with incontinence and use protection on the bed that holds fluids and so takes a while to dry. I go through several changes of clothes a day)

Baths are expensive, so is the heating. It was something like 90p an hour before. No idea what it is now. Ovens use a lot because they have to heat up before cooking. Definitely air friers are better. Kettles are high energy usage and showers need to be kept to a few minutes.

It's shit.

@NotanotherboxofFrogs

My meter only gives the reading for yesterday, today's will be available after midnight. £1.68 yesterday,

Yesterday was 2 wash loads, 4 tumble dryer cycles, 1 dishwasher load, central heating on for most of the day. Tv most of the day, 2 Alexa during the night playing music, 5 min shower x 2 🚿, electric fire for 3.5 hours. Oven for 1.5 hours.

(For context I live with incontinence and use protection on the bed that holds fluids and so takes a while to dry. I go through several changes of clothes a day)

How on earth does that come to £1.68? I’m currently on 9.38 for the day and I’m still showing as running at £0.54 per hour. That’s two lamps on, two fridge freezers, ds1 on the PlayStation but not online, dishwasher just coming to the end of the cycle.

@NotanotherboxofFrogs

£1.68 for gas and electric? With all that? Oven for 1.5 and heating and showers and tumble dryer?

What is your standing charge and your rate per kw? And your gas. Because that sounds impossible.

[quote deadlanguage]@Paddingtonthebear depends on how long you are in the shower, whether it’s an electric shower, the shower flow rate and bath volume but on average I think a shower is about half the cost of a bath. You can cut the cost of showering further by getting one of those water saving shower heads as well.[/quote]
Agree with this - we were being told back in the nineties that showers were far more fuel & water-efficient than baths. In the summer if you switch off the shower while shampooing and soaping up, and back on to rinse off, that saves a huge number of litres of hot water too - important if you have an old immersion and limited hot water on tap.

For those who were wondering about my figure from Sunday, £1.68 and Monday is now available. £1.67

No gas available in my area. Central heating is oil but needs electric to run it. Fire in the living room is electric heater.

I'm in Northern Ireland on a pre pay meter.

No discounts on that bar getting £1 free credit if top up £51 in one go.

How do you manage to wash such a large duvet?

This made me laugh. I have a 14.5 tog duvet too. You don't wash them, ever. Duvets have covers, you wash that weekly. You buy a new duvet in 20yrs time when it's gone tatty. You don't get killed by germs in the night

I've no idea what my energy cost is. I don't have a smart meter and won't be getting one. I use what I need, I've always been frugal, but I need what I need. I have a medical condition that flares up if I get cold. My heating is on for about 12hrs a day in winter, off through the night, only heating the living room, the bedroom an hour before bed, bathroom heated before use and half hour after to dry the towels and condensation. The radiators have individual thermostats so I can turn the ones I'm not using onto the frost setting. I'm ok financially, luckily, but nobody knows what the future holds. If I ever end up in a situation where I can't afford utility bills that'll probably be the end of me TBH.

I remember living in a house without central heating as a child. Permanently freezing in winter. Never washed in the morning just too cold. Put next days clothes under the duvet all night to keep them warm and got dressed under the duvet before getting up. Chilblains itching incessantly and the swellings making my toes wider than they should be, having to stuff my swollen feet into my shoes and walk to the bus stop for school in pain every step of the way. Fingers numb and white from Raynaud's disease. Wearing smelly school shirts because they were washed once a week and I only had 3. Regular colds and tonsillitis every year from being run down. Getting burnt from getting too close to the fire, on those rare occasions when I was allowed to put it on. Bathing in scummy water 4 other people had already used 🤢. It was bad enough back then, when I was a hardy child without the condition I have now. If I had to be in agony every day now because I was too cold, I couldn't bear it.

I'm not surprised to read here that the elderly sometimes died of hypothermia back then either. Shocking really, we're supposed to be a "rich" country in general terms, yet we have people dying from poverty.

How on Earth are people's bills so high?

My usage yesterday was £2.78 - gas and electricity.

10min electric shower, thermostat set at 16 and then 18 for 3 hours in the evening. Oven used to cook food, on for about 25min. Lights, computer in use, normal applicances plugged in.

My standing charges add up to £0.96 a day, so the rest was usage.

How on earth are peoples bills so low is my question.

Yesterday we had no washing but the dishwasher was on. Four computers running but not doing anything which gobbles energy, WiFi router, 3 x WiFi boosters, two phones on charge, lights, expensive cooker (everhot but that is a known £4 a day). Pond pump. Heating on for two hours but it’s oil so the electric usage is minor. Two fridge freezers.

£10 (so £6 ignoring the everhot)

I would never recommend anyone purchases an everhot now but it’s done so we have to live with it.

@User76745333

How on earth are peoples bills so low is my question.

Yesterday we had no washing but the dishwasher was on. Four computers running but not doing anything which gobbles energy, WiFi router, 3 x WiFi boosters, two phones on charge, lights, expensive cooker (everhot but that is a known £4 a day). Pond pump. Heating on for two hours but it’s oil so the electric usage is minor. Two fridge freezers.

£10 (so £6 ignoring the everhot)

I would never recommend anyone purchases an everhot now but it’s done so we have to live with it.

You need to know the energy usage of those devices - the pond pump seems potentially expensive.

Say it was 200 watts - that's about 6p per hour assuming you are on the standard energy cap

This is why a Smart Meter is useful as it lets you monitor devices and energy consumption

@User76745333

How on earth are peoples bills so low is my question.

Yesterday we had no washing but the dishwasher was on. Four computers running but not doing anything which gobbles energy, WiFi router, 3 x WiFi boosters, two phones on charge, lights, expensive cooker (everhot but that is a known £4 a day). Pond pump. Heating on for two hours but it’s oil so the electric usage is minor. Two fridge freezers.

£10 (so £6 ignoring the everhot)

I would never recommend anyone purchases an everhot now but it’s done so we have to live with it.

If the computers are desktop computers rather than laptops that could be a significant energy consumption. Most people don't have 4 and not on for an extended period. Laptops generally use hardly anything.

Most people don't have ponds or a second fridge freezer.

With all that, I'm not surprised your bills are high and am probably surprised they're not even higher than that.

There’s only one desktop (dh). I use a laptop and the dc are both using laptops for revision (exams for both straight after the holidays)

Most people don't have ponds or a second fridge freezer

I missed the second fridge freezer....

That won't help

You can get plug in monitors so you can see how much energy a device is using directly. About £15. Just plug it into a socket, plug the device into it and then monitor it.

Useful when you're not sure. Especially with things like fridge freezers

It won’t help No but a significant number of people do have a chest freezer in the garage. It’s not that unusual.

There are obviously things we can cut out but I’m still astonished at people using less than £2 a day

@User76745333

It won’t help No but a significant number of people do have a chest freezer in the garage. It’s not that unusual.

There are obviously things we can cut out but I’m still astonished at people using less than £2 a day

We did that yesterday. But it's a small flat and it was unoccupied for most of the day - just a short shower and heating on for a few hours in the evening.

@NotanotherboxofFrogs

My meter only gives the reading for yesterday, today's will be available after midnight. £1.68 yesterday,

Yesterday was 2 wash loads, 4 tumble dryer cycles, 1 dishwasher load, central heating on for most of the day. Tv most of the day, 2 Alexa during the night playing music, 5 min shower x 2 🚿, electric fire for 3.5 hours. Oven for 1.5 hours.

(For context I live with incontinence and use protection on the bed that holds fluids and so takes a while to dry. I go through several changes of clothes a day)

I'd be getting that checked, there's now way with standing charges that the cost could be so low unless you're on an incredible fixed deal

I had an energy monitor years ago, I'll have to dig it out and use it (it runs off batteries). We have a three bed house and heating is on 5 hours a day though I turn some radiators off and the thermostat down when it's milder. DH feels the cold more much than I do so if I switch the heating off anymore he'll just use other heaters! Hot water is on two hours a day (we don't have an electric shower).

I think a lot of people waste energy charging items that are already full, but I don't know whether it amounts to a significant cost or just a few pennies a month. Obviously if every penny counts it's worth checking if you're leaving things plugged in.

NotanotherboxofFrogs
Presumably you have oil costs to pay for.