To think my mums landlord shouldnt install heating she cant afford

[Worriedaboutmum1]

This is completely identifiable but really need advice.

My mum lives in sheltered accomodation and is in relatively poor health (rarely able to leave the house without support). She is a pensioner & on a low income.

She rents a studio from a charity. There is no gas in her block and they need the agreement of all residents to install it, which they cant get. The heating was utterly inadequate - previous winters she'd ended up staying with me during cold spells as you could see your breath. So I totally understand they had to do something.

They installed a new electric system in November & my mum just got her first bill. It looks like its costing her £60-£75 a month extra just to heat her studio flat. Her total bill is similar to mine for a 4 bed house - and she's so energy conscious.

Her health conditions mean she has to have a very specialist diet, which is not cheap and she pays for support for herself like laundry & cleaning. She already leads a very low-cost existence & will now be facing a choice between heating & food or the care she desperately needs. She wont stay with me anymore as shes losing her sight and I have lots of funny level changes. I cant currently afford to pay her heating.

Her electricity supplier have been kind but there isnt much they can do long term as she is genuinely using that electricity. Her landlord as usual are ignoring us.

I just think its irresponsible to put heating this expensive in sheltered accomodation?

You have right to worry OP , can I ask does she wear a woolly hat indoors as that would really make a difference to how cold you feel . I'm an ex nurse and was a great believer in wrapping heads if patients were chilly overnight ( got laughed at a lot but it really works) .

I can't believe that people are saying she should just turn it off. That isn't a humane response to the fears of an elderly person who has just had their heating system changed for one that costs more to run. If you're all about the dollar, put simply, the NHS end up picking up the tab for poorly heated homes in admissions for illness (and worse). But that ignores the suffering. If her landlord is a social housing landlord, ask them to send someone round to discuss this issue. The installer should be able to provide guidance on operation. If the house is poorly insulated, ask social landlord to prioritise as a matter of urgency. They have funds for energy efficiency measures in homes. Alternatively, call the electricity supplier. Explain that it is likely your mum would be classed both as fuel poor and vulnerable. They have an obligation to provide energy efficiency measures (including insulating homes) which I think is free for those classifications of customers. By the way I definitely do not think you are being unreasonable. Time to get pushy on her behalf.

Not sure about modern storage heaters, but the ones we got rid of 11 years ago (which were 12 years old then) had 2 settings on them. One regulated how quickly the heat was discharged - the other needs to be on maximum at night to get max charge . Most people seem to struggle with storage heaters and don't operate them effectively. We also found that keeping internal doors shut helped the heat last longer.

Does she live in Scotland? Does she get the winter fuel payment? I think it can be up to£300

Night storage means she must have the appropriate meter and tariff. Does she?

From 1 April 2018, it will be illegal for landlords to let properties that have an EPC of less than E. Do you know what the current rating is? You can check online on the register... better insulation might help a lot. Also, can your mother get thicker curtains (if losing heat through windows) and rugs (if losing heat through the floor). The problem with night storage is that the heat isn't necessarily when you want it, or predictable. Check the rate per unit that your mother is paying too - it should not be more expensive to heat a studio flat than a house.

I used to have night storage heaters many moons ago, and on max input, turned down to min output overnight/during the warmer part of the day, they'd still be kicking out heat til about 9.30pm. I think it's unlikely that modern ones work less well, so I think this is a case of your Mum having to fiddle around and get the settings right for her.

I'd suggest that you go through it with her, as they're tricky to get the hang of. Things I'd suggest is

• making sure that she switches the ouput off overnight whilst she's in bed.
• keeping the output lower during the day (as long as she's warm enough) so that it keeps giving out heat during the day.
• avoiding putting the boost on - as this is expensive
• checking that she's on an Economy 7 tariff, so that she benefits from cheap electricity overnight.

Overall though, since it seems she's been billed an additional £450 for the "cold" 6 months of the year, that may simply be what having heating costs as opposed to not having heating. The next six months won't be nearly so much as it's over the summer months. I know some older adults are resistant to this, but setting up a direct debit might help by spreading out the costs over the year, plus there's usually a discount for paying by DD.

For Christmas, you might want to consider buying her one of these. I have one, and it's super snug, and cheap to run.

Unfortunately electric heating is expensive to use unless you are using the night storage heaters effectively.

Using the boost on the night storage heaters is extremely expensive and should only be used very occasionally.

The night storage heaters can be set to "collect" different amounts of heat overnight, if they are set to the maximum then the heat should usually last all day.

Are you sure that they are set to "collect" the maximum amount of heat overnight??

This may sound strange that I am saying to use more power to save money but the electricity that she uses at night is so much cheaper than the electricity that she uses in the day.

Hi Worried

I'm just jumping in with a sideways thought, you mention your mum needing a specialist diet and getting serious chest infections as part of your concern

I also need a specialist diet (coeliac) and used to suffer from frequent severe chest infections which happens with some sufferers due to an immunodeficiency.

After a hib vaccine I stopped getting infections, it may be worth checking getting your gp to check if your mum has an immune system problem

As above it's possible she's not got the system balanced properly? could you pay for an heating engineer to come out and make sure it's set up correctly? We had storage heaters in a cold house and it was lovely and warm all winter. You must make sure you check with the engineer that they're familiar with that system beforehand though.

Night storage systems are usual,y cheap to run. Can you check with neighbours and see if she's set it right? It may be on the wrong tarif or she may have the boost set wrongly.

Another one here saying she must have the settings incorrect.