My energy bill will still quadruple even if I put a jumper on?

[verdantverdure]

AIBU to think that even if I participate in this weird new “wear warm clothes in wintertime” trend, shut doors, buy draught excluders, buy Oodies, buy thermal curtains, and buy a £300 air fryer my energy bill will still quadruple.

Especially as most people wete already doing all or some of that.

Nothing short of turning the heating off is going to make much difference is it?

(Although of course I'm trying.)

After all, the money saving expert himself, Martin Lewis, says this isn’t something individuals can fix on their own , and it would be pretty arrogant to think I know better than him.

The "Put a jumper on" advice doesn't help British businesses at all does it?

What do you think?

I'm not great at maths, but once prices have quintupled from what they were last year, I think avoiding a quadrupling of bills will be fantasyland for us.

There are just aren't the reductions to be made and still live a normal British twenty first century life, with cooked meals, coats only needed out of doors and bodies and clothes cleaned to modern standards.

@Sporty2022 Sorry, that sounds difficult. Guessing no option to work fewer/longer days to either avoid a day of childcare or bring in more money?

Well yes. If you were wasteful in the past then you can make savings. Many can't.

But even if you half your usage (and that would mean you were being very wasteful) you bill will still be more than last year.

The thing is - it just takes a few changes to have an impact.

In our house, the main contributors to the energy costs are showers, baths and heating. So by reducing shower time, baths and lowering the heating, I hope to see a large reduction in my energy usage.

Obviously my bills will go up - but I have modelled the rise, I use a spreadsheet and my smart meter - and I have a good understanding of physics and maths, so should be prepared.
^^^^^^^

We have solor
Double glazing
Economy 7
Showers have always been in and out 1-2 units. (Long enough to get clean.
No baths.
LED lights through
Cavity and roof insulation
We are lucky and very thankful
BUT there is nothing we could do that would really impact x 4 bill except turn the heating off
Even not using the tumble , which I may have ti in winter will only save a few hundred pounds - yes it's there but that's about 2 weeks worth.

There are just aren't the reductions to be made and still live a normal British twenty first century life, with cooked meals, coats only needed out of doors and bodies and clothes cleaned to modern standards.
We've only had a normal twenty first century life since DS was old enough to be latch-keyed. Didn't think we'd be going back to our old life though 😪.

The people we bought our house from never bothered to get it insulated. We had ours done when it was free, so God knows why they didn't. We can't afford to get it done.
Maybe that could be one way the government could help.

I am not the greatest at maths, but when prices quintuple in January to keep our bills the same as they were last winter after the first price cap rise we would have to reduce usage by 4/5. (In October prices merely triple from last winter so we "only" have to do away with 2/3 of our usage.) We do not have that much slack in the system. Nobody does. That's why Martin Lewis has been shouting about this since at least April.

It does feel like a massive step backwards doesn't it?

In normal times, if children say at school that mummy doesn't cook dinner any more and they just get a sandwich, and it's so cold in the bathroom when mummy makes them have a strip wash at the basin with cold water, and they have to sleep with their brothers and sisters in one bed with their coats piled on top the school might think about getting social services involved, but with these energy prices is that going to be normal British life?

People got so annoyed with Insulate Britain last winter but we'd be better off if we'd done what they said, wouldn't we?

They were hypocritical twats though.
But yes, insulation of course makes difference

I'm sure they also told us things like food and energy would be cheaper after Brexit. We were definitely promised things would get better, weren't we? Instead they just seem to get worse and worse.

I know nothing about Insulate Britain @Bubblebubblebah except that they wanted the government to Insulate Britain" so I guess they got their message across to me.

@verdantverdure that’s my point. I’ve already cut everything to a point that’s survivable, though unpleasant, and cut my bill by only 20%. I still need to earn an additional £3000 a year to pay for the increases on that absolutely minimal usage, not including additional price increases (because everything uses energy and thus everything will increase in price also)

What percentage of people earn less than £3000 a year more than they spend and have less that £6000 in savings? A not insignificant number of people are facing a budget deficit even if they are prepared to be unpleasantly cold and grubby.

And we are below average users, so that’s not even a worst case scenario. Yes, people should cut waste. Perhaps they should cut luxuries and lower their standards. But you can’t reduce your usage to keep your bills to current levels unless you are prepared to live an pre-electricity lifestyle. And that’s not really even possible if you live in a wider modern society, is it?

Nothing stopped people to insulate houses they own. The only thing gov should be insulating are council owned houses. There are already grants for insulation as well.

This is the reality of the situation for most of us I expect. I don't have a dryer but I do have a heated airer which is needed in normal winters for large cotton items etc so it will definitely be running if we can't afford to put the heating on.

The thing is - it just takes a few changes to have an impact.

In our house, the main contributors to the energy costs are showers, baths and heating. So by reducing shower time, baths and lowering the heating, I hope to see a large reduction in my energy usage.

We never had our heating on high for an excessive amount of time. Thermostat has always been on 18. Last winter we pretty much halved the amount the heating was on - and bear in mind we both work from home.

I've not just had quicker showers, I've reduced the number of showers I have.

I've done the maths for October, I make it to be an extra £100 a month (£140 to £240).

I can't change jobs - even if I could get something paying more I'd be unlikely to get something with the flexibility and trust my current job gives me (trust that I do my job in difficult home circumstances). The only other option is DH changes to something with a steady and reliable income, but if he's working out of the home I can't do my contracted hours with a school refusing 9 year old.

And at the moment we get no help, our savings are too high, though an easy solution to that is to get a new boiler.

Then we are ok the same page @Eeksteek. That's pretty much what I think too.

Yes, the bill will be higher - but cutting shower times, reducing bath numbers and reducing heating will have a significant impact on the price acceleration.

Wasteful is a subjective word - is a 6 minute shower vs a 3 minute shower wasteful? 2 baths a week? The temperature at 20c vs 18c

I'm not great at maths, but once prices have quintupled from what they were last year, I think avoiding a quadrupling of bills will be fantasyland for us

Well - last January, gas was 4p per KWH - now it's 15p per KWH this October
Electricity was 21p - now it's 52p per KWH

Gas may quintuple - but electricity ?

No Insulate Britain are a bunch of terrorist twats. Peaceful protest is one thing but blocking ambulances and hgv trucks delivering goods is the works of a grade A cunt.
I don’t agree with that at all.

If "peaceful protest" achieved anything at all then direct action, strikes etc wouldn't be needed. But it doesn't.

The price cap started rising in October 2021, it had been around £1100 since inception, but then it went up 12% to £1270. Then in April 2022 it went up 54% to £1970, in October it's going up 80% to £3549, in January it is predicted to go up a further 52% to £5387. No one's sure what will happen in April but the current prediction is for a further 23% rise to £6616.

In short, quadrupling is happening. It's just a case of when.

Grants that not everyone is entitled to.

Not sure how I'm supposed to insulate my flat though. I've replaced the doors and windows but it's solid brick walls and always cold.

If you think about it - and look at the ACTUAL cost per KWH, then gas has already gone up from 4p to 15 p per KWH - so that has almost quadrupled.

But electricity has gone up by just over double.

It's much more helpful to look at the actual cost of energy instead of the price cap.

That’s just it. You won’t. You might reduce usage by 15%. So your bills will ‘only’ increase by by about 300% instead of 400% or 500% (being generous)

In real terms, you are STILL looking at increases of thousands of pounds a year. I have done it already. All the hacks, all the small changes. And I still need to earn another 3k this year to cover it.

Thats why the ‘put a jumper on’ advice is unhelpful. It’s implying to people that this is completely manageable with a few small lifestyle changes. It’s not. The stark reality is to keep your bills roughly the same you would need radically adjust how you (not) heat your house or use hot water (at all), eat mostly cold food and use very few, if any appliances.

I’m still gathering data, but I think I could end up in a position where the only way to keep my bills comparable to 2021 would be to only pay the standing charges. So I absolutely CAN thrift my way out of it. By using no energy at all. Jumpers are not even in it.