Our electrics gone from 28 a week to 70.

[Fluffycloudland77]

It’s been like this for about 18 months now, any ideas?.

That's a lot! Is there any chance someone else has tapped into your supply? 18 months is a long time to leave it though. I think I would be calling an electrician out in the first instance to have a look at things.

Are you doing meter readings? Is that what you are using or paying?

Have you checked your usage back then to now? Were they basing the old payments on estimates? Are you providing regular meter readings? The best thing you can do is try to find an old bill, or even better an old annual statement, and compare it to current. Also, change your supplier whenever a fixed rate ends, you don't want to be on variable.

I change suppliers every year anyway. Regular meter readings given.

I can’t see any tampering on the meter, no new cables have appeared...

I’ll dig out old bills off the iPad and see. I thought the tumble dryer would add to our bill but it hasn’t 🤔 which is odd. An increase of 6 units a day would be me using it 3 x a day, 3h x a week on a 2kw device is 6 kw max.

Today we’ve used 1kw in 4 hrs, that’s dw cycle, 2 x toaster, 3 kettles of water and background use of fridge etc.

I immediately thought someone is tapping into your supply. You need to get your provider to investigate.

Can you turn everything off for 2 hours? Keep the fridge and freezer shut and they'll be fine. Take a pic at the start and at the end.

We're you locked in previous to this on a brilliant rate? As the amount is very high, but it's just over doubled from last time- if you locked in to a supply for a long fixed rate, say 2-3 years, and it expired, I could see the prices go up that much!

Are you all electric or gas too? Could be price increase rather than usage. Check if you are using more electric or whether it's just more expensive

18 months! What are your energy companies saying?

Chargers plugged in but not used still use a lot of electricity. The laptop the same.
What about all the electronics that have creeped in over the years and charging them.

£280 a month for just electricity? Wow.

I wasn’t in a long term fixed rate, I switch every year 49 days before my tariff ends.

I can’t switch everything off while dh is here so I’ll do it before I leave for work on Tuesday.

No new wires and meter looks ok 🤷🏻‍♀️ I wouldn’t mind if the house was filled with halogen bulbs but even my fridge has an led bulb!.

Trying to pinpoint the date of increase on old bills.

I'm confused, have you gone from 28 to 70 kilowatt hours per week, or 28 to 70 pounds per week? The first is not as worrying as the second!

Again; what are the energy companies saying?

The energy companies say that’s just how much I use, it’s gone from 28 units to 70.

When we lived in a flat using 1000s of units in a quarter they said the same. That was 13 years ago, they swore blind we used £900 a quarter being out all day at work.

It’s odd the tumble dryer hasn’t made a huge difference. I was expecting it to.

Ah units not £.

Hmm....Ok. what new electronics have you purchased within the last 2 years? Everything from a fan to a dishwasher

70 kilowatt hours per week is actually average for the UK, it's really not that big a deal.

Literally spent the entire thread thinking you meant pounds.

I would suggest your usage was wrong at 28 per week and 70 is more realistic.

Well I fitted a new dw but that uses less, it averages 900w per cycle (I know because it tells you how much energy you used per cycle).

New dryer in January but the bills not moved 😮.

In 2016 we used 1839 units, in 6 months I’ve used 1416.

Neighbour who was dodgy af moved out 2018, no one here would be surprised at anything he did. I know they fitted a pre-pay meter to his house, he was yelling at them while they did it so I don’t think he requested it.

But your 70 units is way more realistic than 28. The former was probably the error.

Have you had a Smart meter fitted in these 18 months, OP ? I've read that this can sometimes really bump up the bills, through faults...

It started between Dec 16 and July 17. No dryer back then, didn’t use the extractor fan back then or have lights on the garage. New dw was 2015.

So, new appliances.
Garage lights. 20w for 4 hours a day in the winter. 80w a day
Extractor 30 mins x 150w = 75w but I don’t use it anymore.
Vestibule light 3w 5hrs in winter = 15w.
Hydronic heaters 2, 50w per hour 4hrs a night in winter 200w.

So 370w a day extra, doesn’t account for 3-4 units a day extra. That’s only 10% increase.

We do have an immersion but it’s switched off at the wall & at the circuit board in case dh wonders what the red switch is for and turns it on.

The meters a smart meter but I lost functionality when we switched tariffs after moving in. Kinda wish it still worked.

My problem is we’ve gone from spending £40 a month g&e to ovo telling me we need to up the dd to £90 a month. I did an mse comparison and it said my bill would be £43 a month.

stillmoving Do you really think so? I’m so frugal with my useage. 10kw a day is a huge amount to me.

I don’t think it’s a mistake, we had the house from new and the meter readings are all there.

Maybe I was stealing someone else’s 😀 for the first 4 years.

Your 70 units a week is not high. It's quite normal.