Energy to go up 64% in October

[ToastedWaffle]

And 4% in January.

Fuck sake!
I dont even have an AIBU, this is just fucking ridiculous.

My point was that with my usage savings my bill has increased by only £22. Yet my energy supplier wanted £300 which I simply couldn't have afforded on my very limited budget

People do need to know their energy consumption and see what steps they can take to reduce it. It would be interesting to see how your annual usage has changed in KWH

So our bills went up to 230 a month because bulbs are twats. Just checked now and they're suggesting we put it down to 170 a month because we need not using half as much. Should we do that or keep it at what we're paying now ? We're £230 in credit

Yes it's something I need to check. My point was simply that you do need to know your usage or find ways to reduce it, not just blindly accept an energy supplier telling you you need to increase your direct debit to more than your mortgage. Know your usage, pay for it what you use, take steps to reduce. We are no worse off for doing those things.

Yeah, let's make the national finances collapse to stop the French using less energy than they do now.

But don't worry, they'll still get blackouts as their nuclear fleet is basically old and decrepit and falling apart.

I think you pay for what you use.

Our fixed dual fuel tariff ends next month and is due to rise from £210 to £280 a month so will rise in Oct to £460 totally wiping out DH’s hard won pay increase that had been negotiated for a year! Luckily I WFH so that reduces fuel
costs but I’m going to have stock up on fingerless gloves and wear a coat at my desk this winter!

I thank god our DC are all older now, I’m working again and we have no childcare costs. I feel awful for the many families who are working in necessary but low paid jobs and need UC top ups. The government won’t be increasing them to cover the cost of living increases, not only energy but food and petrol.

Not going to complain about the hot weather coming this weekend that’s for sure.

Ours works out at approx 270 per month, for gas and electricity. £400.00 is not great, and I worry for the elderly and vulnerable on low incomes. Something more is needed.

It's not just the cold in autumn and winter but the damp if you don't put the heating on and open windows. Well in our old house it is.

Not going to complain about the hot weather coming this weekend that’s for sure

In the future, a lot of the energy during the hotter months will be captured and stored for use during the colder months.

But that's the future.

I do think we have to change the things we can change, and protest to our MPs about what we can’t and the most vulnerable.

We all have got used to quite an inflated quality of life, using a lot of energy, cars etc and in a way the sooner we cut back the better. We don’t need to all shower twice a day, have multiple cars, put a daily wash and dishwasher on.

I’m not talking about those that can’t, elderly on low incomes and a pension, some are not using too much at all and are stretched to the limit, I would be protesting about pushing those at poverty level deeper into poverty especially when winter hits. But I think a large amount of us, who are more privileged, including myself, could cut down.

So that's 64% on what we are now and another 4% on what we will be on in January.
I don't even know, percentagewise, what was the April increase (40%???).

I can't do the calculations properly. But somehow in less than 1 year our energy charges would have well, well over doubled or tripled.
And I never understood the reason for the April increase. It was talked about since last autumn and has nothing to do with the war in Ukraine.
How are we getting in such a situation? I can't see a way out unless energy producers and brokers reduce their profits.
They'd never do that,

It was 54% in April. As I understand it, the hike in prices was to do with supply and demand after the pandemic and energy companies buying gas when it was cheaper and hedging their fixed prices. But as demand went up after the pandemic they were selling at a loss so smaller energy firms who couldn't absorb the costs went bust. The war in Ukraine has exacerbated all of this.

Hope someone comes along with a bit more knowledge though.

The standing charges have increased massively.

We call that the ocean, and it's having a ball using that stored heat to get rid of that giant ice cube that regulates our temperatures up north.

It’s disgraceful.

I remember many, many winters ago in our student house. Old terraced house, fuck all insulation, damp issues, single glazing (the usual for cheap student lets). Our boiler broke and it took a few days for it to be fixed, unfortunately, this was when it was snowing outside and really cold for the UK.

I never felt cold like it. I went to bed wearing two pairs of socks, long sleeved/legged pyjamas, a fleecy onesie, a hat and gloves, a duvet, blanket and a throw over my bed. I slept underneath the covers so that the warm air I exhaled would warm my body. It was absolutely horrendous.

Our group of friends “joke” about those few nights but it’s so fucking heartbreaking that what we used to see as a “joke” will now be the daily reality for so many people.

We have small children. Luckily in a “small” new home with good insulation and a new boiler with split heating across floors, but we’re still just going to have to wrap up warm and limit when heating is on and try to keep it for only “essential” parts of the day. It’s actually so fucking ridiculous that with rising fuel prices as well you can’t even try to spend days where you’re all at home out of the house to save on heating it, as fuel is through the roof too.

We were looking to buy a bigger home soon, but we’ll be staying out for a few years, now. I’m just so thankful we bought our home when I found out I was pregnant, as it meant we only bought a house we could afford while I was on (shit) maternity leave pay. If we had bought before that, we’d be sitting with a mortgage we’d likely struggle to afford and a house we absolutely could not afford to heat.

And this is with both of us working in management roles which luckily work around each other so we don’t need to pay for childcare. What a fucking joke.

I dont have any choice but not turn the heating back on in the winter. Invest in heated throws now I think. Get as ready and prepaired as you can in summer. Same for the car and fuel costs. If you cant offord it's you can be quite creative when theres no other choices. Shit but true unfortunately. Look up the kw uses on the washing machine for example per cycle type. Amazing what get clean on a 30 quick wash

The govt actually does not give a shit about the health and our elderly, I grew up in NZ, there are high rates of asthma and respiratory illnesses in children over there because they grow up in cold homes as there is no such thing as central heating over there (most ration electric heaters or rely on fires that only heat the living rooms). This is what will happen here in the UK, more hospitalisations with children suffering from respiratory illnesses if they are freezing, same goes for the elderly.

When I was growing up we only put the fire on in the evening, and some shitty fan heater in the morning before work / school. Every winter my asthma would flare up. To keep warm we used to keep the oven door open after cooking dinner, put newspapers in the window sils of the bedrooms, door stoppers, hot water bottles, umpteenth blankers, wolly socks etc, and I will probably be utilising those tricks this winter. It truly is a miserable existence.

No idea what we are going to do, we will be in for a cold winter, we both work FT yet can barely stay afloat. I will probably put the heating on in the evenings before the children go to bed. Then rug them up with lots of blankets and warm jim jams. DH and I will probably sit in the cold until we go to bed. DD1 has asthma so that is a big concern.

*health of children and elderly (well all of us, but especially those as they are most vulnerable).

Am I right in thinking this is a Uk/ Europe specific problem caused by our falling out with Russia?

I am in the USA and our combined monthly gas and electricity bill is $250 for a very big house.

Remember when the Poll Tax was brought in and people just didn't pay it, in vast numbers?
This is what is going to have to happen.
Private energy companies are terrified of a mass non-payment because they know they can't enforce anything in large numbers.
It isn't even a protest anymore, huge swathes of voting households will be unable to pay the exorbitant bills of profiteering companies.

I’m the same re the old house and level of cost. I’ve been in the fortunate position of not having too many worries up until Covid but being self employed we have had to live off our savings. Now we have a DD going to uni in London, and then all the hikes in costs and we are at the end of the road.

I’ve sold my car, so that’s £4k to put towards the £12k energy cost. But I am lucky I’ve got things I can sell, some people have been in a dire situation for a long time, how will they cope? . There is going to be loss of life this coming winter, not just through lack of basic food and warmth but through people losing all hope. It’s the first time I’ve been properly scared about the outcomes for people , even those who would never have thought they’d be struggling this much already.

The anxiety people are now facing and agonising choices between heating and eating has been the reality for people on benefits/low incomes for years. Especially the disabled.

And yet people still voted that them in. Turkeys voting for Christmas

It will be like life before the 80s when the only heated room in a house was the living room, even that room wasn't warm enough to sit in wearing just a t shirt. Seriously it is time us Mums took the streets and told this Government that we will not let our children go to bed cold.

That is how many of us live in NZ. I really don't understand this need to heat all the rooms in the house. I literally could not be warmer in my bed (and I feel the cold) with a blanket, a feather/down duvet, and a hot water bottle. I don't remember being cold as a child, and we lived near the mountains and winters were even colder than they are now. I have no desire to sit in my living room wearing just a t shirt - that is just ridiculous. I am as warm as toast at the moment, with the heat pump going, but I am still dressed in winter clothes. Wearing summer clothes inside in the winter is just wasting energy.

@onlythreenow I totally agree! Im a kiwi living in the uk and we have turned all the radiators in the house off apart from the basement that needs heating to dry out. If we didn't need to do that in the winter I'd have turned that off too! We have a lovely log burner that is on day to day but in nz we never heated anything other than one room!

@DillonPanthersFNL - yes! The rest of my flat is cold but I'm only in the other rooms for a small amount of time, so what is the point of having them heated? Surely if people want to reduce their electricity bills in winter then they need to heat less rooms?

I have just compared this month’s bill with the same month for 2021

12% LESS!!! Why? Because I have been so much more thoughtful with turning lights off and hot water etc. It’s been no hardship and better for environment.