BBC advice - @Before you crank up the thermostat, try these tips to keep you and your home warmer for longer" - AIBU to be sceptical about the "tips"?

[nepkoztarsasag]

Just posting this here without comment.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cqr7yeed1ed7o

What fun it is to ridicule until it's you needing the tips. Of course they work most heat is lost through windows, some mattresses are drafty just springs and a few layers of fabric, if you add a fleecy blanket under it removes that draft.

Hopefully you won't be hit with the same poverty some people are who need to use these devices to feel more comfortable at home.

Talk about stating the obvious! Wear layers? Move more? Have a fire on? Stop draughts? Uh gee, who’d have thought!

I lived in Melbourne and we had to have blankets pinned over the windows all through the winter every year. We had yellow so it was less depressing. It definitely makes a difference. It wasn’t enough to just have curtains. I do think that it’s something people probably don’t know about, especially as it’s quite drastic. Not being able to see outside for months on end, or taking them up and down every day which we couldn’t have done because we were using drawing pins.

I dunno - I get that some are obvious and some sound odd. But everything is obvious if it's normal to you. With the cost of living, surely the BBC has a responsibility to offer advice people might not have thought of or are not commonly done anymore?

Its like all the threads about the government's preparedness advice. Even when I've been at my skintest, it wouldn't occur to me not to have 3 days of (cheap) emergency food and candles in. Growing up in the countryside, power cuts were common in winter. Getting snowed in happened every couple of years. Doesn't mean people that have moved to the UK from somewhere warmer or live next to a city corner shop would know what works in a harsh winter or power cut situation.

Have they properly fitted it? The previous owners of my house fitted double glazed sash & cash windows but the company failed to add the buffers (don't know what they are called) at the ends to insulate where the windows met the sill - massive open gaps left, it was freezing! Home made draft excluders (rags stuffed into tights) worked well till we got the windows refitted.

My DC are renting privately in London. Most of the available properties just have single glazing.

LL have no vested interest in paying for double glazing. They aren’t paying the energy bills.

Some good tips on here already

BRUSHED COTTON duvet cover and sheets make a massive difference.

I have Dorma ones which dont pill/go bally (bought them in Christmas sale for 50pc and 70pc off)

We have single glazing. Victorian house, sash windows. I've actually never lived in a house with double glazing.

We were in Berlin after Christmas last year and all the restaurants had a big thick curtain behind the main door. As we weren’t used to it first time we all
piled in to get out of the cold and got a bit tangled in the curtain. Did work though.

Additional BBC Tips.

If you have a kingsize bed you can invite your family or neighbours to get into bed with you. Pile all the clothes on the bed.

Eat plenty of green, gassy vegetables like Brussel Sprouts.

Communal fires. See if there is a community fire (often in a dustbin) in your area. Bring a bottle of Vodka / Cheap supermarket brand cider with you to share among your community.

Camp out Spend time in your local warm IKEA store. They have work station areas where you can plug things; TV, toaster, curling tongs, air fryer...

Wrap newspaper under your clothes. If you live in a large city like London, you will have easy access to free newspapers; Metro, Newshopper; City AM, The Evening Standard on Thursdays, etc.

But seriously, it breaks my heart that people have to live this way now. Heating Bills due to increase by 16% but no mention of the millions of pounds in profit that these utility companies make:

Centrica has added a further £497 million to its adjusted operating profits, taking the total made by British Gas and its successor company to more than £56 billion in the forty years since privatisation.

The results, published on Thursday (23rd July 2026), come two days before the fortieth anniversary of the Gas Act 1986 receiving Royal Assent, with new analysis for the End Fuel Poverty Coalition showing the firm has averaged £1.4 billion in profit every year since British Gas was sold off.

Around £9 billion of that total has been generated since 2020, as households faced rising bills driven by the UK’s exposure to volatile gas prices.

After a prolonged period of high bills, an estimated 5.5 million households are now spending more than 20% of their income on energy, meaning they are in deep fuel poverty.

And our useless, overpaid politicians do nothing about this.

What a strange thing to be so sceptical
and scathing about. Sometimes having seemingly obvious advice repeated is useful, because it helps the stick. I find “heat the person not the home” a really useful mantra and I don’t think it ever hurts to be repeated.

But people should be allowed to heat their homes to t shirt weather in winter affordably and if they can't do that it's Not Fair and The Government's Fault. Or something.

A wool blanket under the main duvet does wonders, sheep are out in all weathers for a reason.

I agree that was a disappointing article. A mixture of stating the obvious, and dubious tips. Why did they decide to quote random people rather than an expert who might actually share something useful?

The tip I'm always sceptical of is using the oven to heat the house. Of course it will work, but it's probably more energy efficient to use the heating?
Also, if I leave the oven door closed, all the heat still enters my house just more slowly.

It's sad to see how many people are mocking the tips and are not angry that we are going backwards to a time when these things were a way of life

Heating oil for us who have no access to gas has trebled, it was 52p a litre last year, 120 this . Where as past years I would have ordered 1000 litres to get us through to Easter, its 500 this year to last the same time , heating is rationed to two hours a day . Electricity here is also very expensive , my EV rate is 36p day and 15p night

I grew up in a house where we woke to ice on the inside of the windows , where we used coats on the bed , just one gas fire to heat a 3 bedroom house , and yes we used thick curtains over doors and windows , made draft excluders , sat with lap blankets and hot water bottles and now 60+ years on, here I am worrying about the cost of heating and am sitting in a house that isnt as warm as it should be and looking out at the wreckage of our garden that Storm Boelo has caused

Opening the oven door after cooking, once the oven is turned off, does a good job at getting the kitchen area toasty. But heating the house with the oven would cost a bomb.

Simple things for us are closing the door to the office when WFH. The screens heat up the room pretty well! We also use heated throws rather than turn the heating on when WFH. We both have walking pads too so you don't sit there like a solid block of ice.

That means we can put heating on for 20 mins in the morning and an hour at night to take the chill off DC's rooms.

It’s more economical and efficient to have your heating on low to keep your house slightly warm all the time than it is to switch it off then crank it up for an hour or so. Have blankets in your living room and put them on your lap when you sit down. The BBC advice to only heat the room you are in is inefficient and will lead to damp in the unheated rooms.

Even if your windows are double glazed they will still benefit from adding a layer of extra insulation from the plastic skrinking stuff. You can add it to each panel, so you can still open them to air out the room. I’m pretty sure Aldi are selling it at the moment. If you put it on carefully it’s barely visible, but it will reduce condensation and the chilly waft from the glass.

Lots of other ideas; if you’ve cooked something in the oven, leave the oven door open a bit to let the heat out once you’re done. Curtain over/just inside the front door, rugs and slippers if your floors are cold, and my personal favourite, a large dog on your lap!

Whilst to most of us it may seem obvious to ‘put a jumper on’ it’s amazing how many people don’t, I know several people (men…..) who complain they are cold, but are pottering around the house in November, barefoot and in shorts & t-shirts.

Draft excluders!!! What happened to those!? I'm in my late thirties but when we were kids, everyone's Gran knitted stuffed draft excluders. Or, as you say, old socks stuffed into old tights in front of the front door and or windows. I guess it was before PVC doors and windows became the norm. I can absolutely believe that no one under the age of 20 has every seen one and a helpful BBC article with some mention of the possibility would be be a good thing :)

I’m a fan of bubble wrap!

I have two side windows in my kitchen extension, as well as patio doors and a window that looks onto the garden.

The two side windows get no sun and have privacy glass. They are cold to the touch and blinds did little to keep the cold out. Last year I bubble wrapped the glass and it did make a difference. The bubble wrap wasn’t cold, so it didn’t transfer cold into the room.

‘Open the curtains during the day and close them when it gets dark’ Really??

I’ve never thought of putting bubble wrap on windows, and how many people have enough of it lying about to do that anyway? Wouldn’t you buy some of that double glazing film rather than a ton of bubble wrap?

ETA: although I see @NoraButty does use bubble wrap!

This. It is a disgrace, that there is no real help for people, when it comes to gas, and electricity prices. Yet the companies keep making staggering profits, year, after year. The so called 'help' from the Government, regarding the removal of VAT on electricity, for six months, from the standing charges, is an insult, as it really won't do anything at all to help people financially.

Oh yes I do this too. Forgot I had done this as it has a mattress protector on top!

People don't eat seasonally anymore. People aren't cooking the same as we did. Stews, soups, potatoes, all fell out of fashion. People are wearing fashion clothing not fit for our weather. Not everyone has someone to pass these tips on. If you come from hot countries, then have to rent the cheapest housing you can, you'd need these tips. If you've grown up in supported living, you aren't used to being cold, you might not have been taught to cook. These tips aren't for the average MN user. They are tips we learned, by example, growing up in the 70s. I had the misfortune to rent a open plan house in the 80s. I had to hang blankets, to cover the stairs etc. We used to have door curtains. My DD needed them in her 1920, built house, that for some reason every landlord knocks through, but she didn't like the look of one, so shivered. The fashion for open plan/knocking through doesn't work in old houses. When I babysat I took my portable electric heater and topped up her meter. Watch old episodes of Eastenders, people had door curtains, even on the stairs.

They are back. Home bargains and B&M, as well as the range do seasonal ones. I hate the sneering on here because we haven't all grown up the same. Posters need to check themselves.