Bloody hell! Energy Bill £220!

[popcornfrenzy]

I've been quite frugal with gas and electricity this month but it's still £220! Help!

^ taking that into account, your direct debit of £156 would be £55 short of your monthly average use, if your credit balance was zero.
When's your payment due to be reassessed @NeedAHoliday2021

@NewBootsAndRanty I’m wondering if they’ve taken the government payment off and lowered our payments? It was due to be £252 which is why I was baffled. Even then, compared to others it sounds quite reasonable - unless you all have massive homes.

Dh thinks it’s because we’re about £900 in credit - assume they have been taking too much for a while. I do all our backing apart from energy as dh took that job on. He’s not very aware which is why I’ve started quizzing him that our payments don’t appear enough.

Your DD sounds about right in that case, I'd assume it'll go back up again (and more) once the price increases next year and the govt. support stops.

Whole thing is insane. We are still on a fix until spring but no idea what we'll do next winter. Two disabled kids so can't cut our usage further. On the fix it's manageable: actual cost per readings for this month is £220. On the new rates from Jan, if Govt support/ capping disappears, that same usage for one month would cost around £800.

With our annual usage sorrad over the year evenly, it'll be £550 per month. Yeah, sounds really reasonable. 😒

*spread

The worst bit of this is people thinking that its okay as when it gets to March next year it will be less which currently just isnt true. The government are capping what the cost is so it should actually be higher than it is. That cap ends in April so for the summer months when you use less with no cap our Bill's could still be just as high as they are now. It's just unsustainable.

Ours is £450. Just terrified about it all 😢

My usual daily gas usage in Nov/Dec is 48kwh. Over the cold snap, it's nearer 100kwh per day. Two hours heating in the morning was only just getting the key rooms to 15 degrees, normally they're up to 20 degrees, so the heating was on for longer.

We've just changed supplier and off a prepayment meter as I was spending £200 in electric alone. It's now costing us £206 for gas AND electric. Not money I want to spend but it's 20p cheaper per unit on our new supplier

£178 for both so far this month. Would have been much higher but I have a log burner now, which has reduced my gas consumption quite considerably.

Unfortunately - and I don't know how many people realise this - but it's winter that most of the gas is used for heating, and so DDs won't take into account the cost for next winter when gas use will be high and the price of gas will probably be much higher than this winter as the energy guarantee will have gone and the £400 won't exist either.

There is going to be some tough political choices to be made over this

My gas rate is 16.87p per kWh and electricity 66.38p. Yay for being with a green energy provider to whom the price cap doesn’t apply!

I was with a green energy provider, it was affordable before as we have low usage but we switched to Octopus in February when the rates had already skyrocketed.

I had to phone to switch as I couldn't online, and explain a couple of times that I was with a provider not subject to the cap so yes, it was worth me switching! Got £100 credit shared between me and my family member as I used their code. If anyone wants an Octopus code please PM me!

Wow!

I thought everyone got the price cap.

www.energylivenews.com/2019/08/01/ofgem-confirms-permanent-energy-price-cap-exemptions-for-three-green-suppliers/
Old article but explains it.

Mine was £276 gas and £156 electric. Everything is electric apart from the boiler, and heating has been on about 7 hours a day during the cold spell.

It actually looks like the price guarantee should apply for green energy now, but only up to the maximum reduction allowed, same as those who fixed above the cap. Do you have any deductions on your bill?

@whirlyhead These are Ecotricity's rates for example.

People are worrying about next year but the price should come down before next winter and we will have more gas storage capacity by then too.

Not a comfort to those struggling even with the £66 payment I know but it will be better for most of us.

@BorgQueen Won't that only save the government money on the price guarantee? As that will be set at £3000 for average usage from April?

October Dual costs - £138
November Dual costs - £250
December Dual costs 1st-22nd - £272

This time last year I was paying 3p/KWh for gas. My monthly direct debit was £100 & when my fix ended at the end of May 2022, I was 49p in credit!

But..

The price has been subsidised - and there is talk of reducing the subsidy.
So whilst the price cap has gone up, people haven't seen that effect because of the price guarantee.

Next winter - who knows what the price cap will be but I don't think the price guarantee will look like it is now. Nor will there be £400.

This is why I monitor my usage carefully and ensure that I know exactly what the price per kWh is and try and when the price cap changes, I try to see exactly what the new cost per kWh is. Especially as the bulk of my costs in winter heating.