To not understand my energy bills

[energyhelp]

Our energy bills are stupidly high and I'm not sure if they are reasonable? Our house is large (approx 10,000 sq ft) and we have a heated indoor swimming pool, underfloor heating and 6 bedrooms. Therefore I expect them to be high but I'm not sure if they should be this high and don't really know if there's anything we can do to become more energy efficient. I'll be honest in that I don't really understand how it all works and what appliances are using what energy... Currently we are paying approx. £2k/month for gas and another £2k/month for electricity - so £4k a month just on energy bills (gulp)

What I'd really love is for someone to come out to survey the property, explain what is using the most energy and maybe advise us on how we can become more energy efficient. Does anyone know if such a company/person exists?! If anyone has used anything like this before I would much appreciate your input. Thanks for any help!

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/utilities/how-to-work-out-energy-usage/

sounds about right though tbh
you have an indoor pool & under floor heating both cost a lot to run

Plenty you can do to be more energy efficient and I think it is pretty obvious that a heated pool and underfloor heating will cost more money to run than a fridge and air-fryer.

This may not go well...

You’re lucky there’s a ton of steps you can take to reduce your energy use.

Switch the pool off.
It’s only September, do you really need the heated floors? Turn them off for another 10 weeks or so.
You sound like the kind of person who might have air conditioning. Turn it off, open the window instead.
You’re only in one bedroom at a time, so switch off the lights in the other ones. No need to have more than one lightbulb on at any time, and none at all during daylight hours. That includes the acres of under cabinet lighting in the kitchen.

It will be heating that accounts for the majority of costs. An Energy survey can provide the information you need. Just put that into Google and look for suppliers in your area

Thank you - this was actually quite useful - we are on an Economy 7 meter and our night usage is much less than the 40% they recommend so changing that could be the first step to reducing bills! Just looking into all the different tariffs now - does anyone have an energy company they recommend - we are currently with EDF and the customer service has been shocking so far

Do you have an electric car too?

Diamond shoes too tight, as well?

It will be the pool and underfloor heating- both are very expensive to run. Not much you can do other than turn them off.

Underfloor heating isn't on at the moment - but it's some fancy system that is set to come on automatically when the temp outside falls below a certain level. Tbh I hate it as I feel like I have no control. We inherited all this when we moved house - give me simple radiators any day!

We do have air con but don't use it. I try to make sure lights are switched off but my 3 young kids can be a nightmare - think I'll start charging them! That might incentivise them to switch them off when they leave a room!

Pool is heated as it's indoor and used all year round... although not sure it's used enough to justify the cost now that the novelty has worn off. We'll probably turn it off over the winter, maybe sooner.

Thank you - appreciate everyone taking the time to reply

This is what I've done but nothing really comes up? A company called Furbnow came up who are based in Birmingham (a couple of hours away) - have called them and left a voicemail. Is anyone familiar with them/used them?

Yes we do...

Have you considered solar panels? It’ll cost you money upfront but long term you’d get some of it back and reduce your bills

Switching lights off won't really make any difference. It's your heating and hot water you need to look at. As you say, you need to wrestle some control from the 'smart' controller. May be worth paying an electrician to give you an opinion, given how much you're paying. It's astronomical.

Do you have an EV tariff that you can use to maybe reduce the bills? Do you charge the car at night ?

Well your car will be another £200ish a month unless you are charging it overnight on a cheap tariff. Get everything you can on a timer and run it when it's cheaper. Our car costs 7p/kwh at night. Do washing machine, dishwasher, pool heat if electric.

Seriously what do you expect with a house that size??? Do you really need to have your swimming pool and underfloor heating??? Turn off all the sockets you aren't using. Same with the fancy gadgets. Get in the habit and your bills might drop!!! Your monthly bill is the same as my yearly one!!! 😳😳

It costs my friend £50 / day to heat their pool

Yes I imagine it is. But can I ask a really stupid question... are these not being heated by the boiler - so is that not gas and not electric?? In which case I would understand the gas bill being so high but why is the electric so high?! Or do these also use electric - this is what I mean about not really understanding how it all works - I know I sound really stupid right now! And when I've googled costs of running a pool they are nowhere near as high as our bills so that makes me question it too?

Get a smart meter or start looking at it and see what's going on when the KW/h are mounting up.

Is your hot water on all the time/immersion?

You could try Octopus Intelligent if your car or charger is compatible. It gives cheaper energy at night so you can charge the car and preheat the pool and run underfloor heating then so that there is less to do at full price in the day. Our house is half your size and we don’t have a pool but it is old and draughty, we have an electric car and our bills are miniscule compared to yours.
Even if your heating works on an exostat you can still control the temperature and when it goes on and off. Turning down the heating by a degree or two and making sure the water isn’t on continuously or heated to too high a level will help too. Get someone in to teach you how the system works or to adjust it to be more economical. If you really want to save money turn the swimming pool heater off.

If you know how to read the meters try turning off the likely candidates one at a time for several hours and see how much your usage goes down. Lights shouldn't be much of a problem these days with the low wattage bulbs we have now.

I agree the underfloor heating and swimming pool will be a huge contribution to your bills. It's a big house so will be expensive to heat if you heat all the rooms.

Use your night time cheap electricity as much as possible, run the washing machine and dishwasher at night. I assume the underfloor heating is electric, you could give that a run early in the morning while still on cheap electric to pre-warm the house. Is the pool well covered to conserve heat? I expect the initial heating is very expensive, but if you can insulate the surface well it won't lose so much heat.

I assume you are fully double glazed and with the full depth of insulation in the loft and make sure your boiler is running efficiently.

We have gas underfloor heating throughout downstairs and it's no more costly than our old rads, but electric ufh is extortionate unless you have solar panels so worth knowing about which one you have! I presume you don't have rads as well?

But pool costs are just eye watering so I suspect it's mostly that! Presume there is a pump that uses lots of electric?

Yowsers that's a lot! We have an old five bedroom house but without the pool or underfloor heating. In winter we pay about £200 a month for electricity and probably the same again in oil (although that's difficult to judge as we buy 2-3 times a year and the price fluctuates wildly). So that's about a tenth of your monthly spend on a similar size house.