Electricity usage seems crazily high

[IndyCymru]

Hi! I’ve just submitted a meter reading (which I have been pretty bad at doing over the past few months) to our supplier, Bulb, and it’s dawned on me that we’ve used over 10,000kWh electricity since mid-August 2020. We are a couple with a small child living in a reasonably large but quite well insulated house. We’ve obviously been in a lot over the past year but this usage seems insane?! I don’t know how we’ve managed it.

Does this seem reasonable in any way to other people? I don’t have much to compare with but out gas usage hasn’t changed much and is pretty normal I should think (around 500kWh).

What is that in monetary terms?

I'd think possibly you've entered a wrong digit, or zero in the readings at some point.
Log into your provider, and have a look thru the readings?

It’s about £1600 a year (+ £600 gas). Unfortunately the readings are correct, no extra zeros. I like to think we’re reasonably careful with energy use so I’m mystified.

Have you left an immersion heater on constantly? When we moved house last year it took us a surprisingly long time (a few weeks) to grasp that that was at the root of our high electricity bill (also with Bulb, coincidentally). In our defence the whole heating/boiler/hot water set up was old and confusing.

Underfloor heating? We had this not long after we moved in. It took me ages to realise the kids had found and whacked up the control to the electric underfloor heating in the bathroom!

It was belting out while we were away as well.

For comparison we have a 4 bed house, 2 adults 2 kids, electric oven, kettle, microwave. Our annual is 3,000kwh for elec and 10,000kwh for gas (gas central/underfloor heating & HW). We have all LED bulbs, no immersion, newish energy efficient appliances/TV. I attempt to enforce switching things off when not in use (not at the wall!).
Recently switched to gas hob kettle (gas is 4p/kwh, elec 20p/kwh now).
So yes 10000kwh for elec is high unless you have elec heating or an elec car. Do you tumble dry a lot with an old dryer? Plasma TV? (more elec than LCD).
If you have a smart meter you can see your instant/hourly/daily etc consumption which can help spot where it's going.

So about £130 per month?

We are in a 4 bed house, 3 adults. We used to pay that (no gas here) when we had an oil boiler. We now have an ASHP so our electricity use is higher.

Things that push our bill up include

• electric shower
• immersion heater in summer
• one adult in house had to wash and dry uniform between 6pm and 8am the next morning as only has one set, which often means tumble dryer is used.

first thing is to change company...Bulb are now very expensive...you can even getter a better deal with the large companies if you do a price fix...i just did a 3 year fix with octopus...but prices have gone up.

@ForestDad

For comparison we have a 4 bed house, 2 adults 2 kids, electric oven, kettle, microwave. Our annual is 3,000kwh for elec and 10,000kwh for gas (gas central/underfloor heating & HW). We have all LED bulbs, no immersion, newish energy efficient appliances/TV. I attempt to enforce switching things off when not in use (not at the wall!). Recently switched to gas hob kettle (gas is 4p/kwh, elec 20p/kwh now). So yes 10000kwh for elec is high unless you have elec heating or an elec car. Do you tumble dry a lot with an old dryer? Plasma TV? (more elec than LCD). If you have a smart meter you can see your instant/hourly/daily etc consumption which can help spot where it's going.

Thanks for all the replies. This one in particular is interesting: I really can’t see why we’d use x3 times as much electricity as your family. We don’t have a tumble drier, plasma tv or immersion heater, and the electric shower is used perhaps once a week. We have electric underfloor heating in the kitchen, which no doubt contributes, but it’s been switched off since April and is only set at 17 degrees for a few hours each day over the winter. Hmm!

We have a smart meter which is switched on but it’s from a previous supplier so I don’t think it gives a meaningful reading…?

I’ve looked at switching but Martin Lewis’s website couldn’t make sensible suggestions as 10,000kWh doesn’t compute! 🤪 We’re about £1,000 in debt to Bulb and paying £300 a month to clear it - usage is about £184 per month according to Bulb, but it keeps going up. Argh.

Oh and gas heating and no electric car.

Thank you for starting this thread. I'm in a similar state of mystification as trying to find a fixed tariff and have confirmed day rate is 4,288kwh and night is 9,450 kwh. (Elec only here). At 13738 total for the year, that surely puts me in mansion or pot farm territory? I've got the same issue - smart meter but not for currently supplier so I'm questioning accuracy. I'm going to investigate immersion and under floor heating too

What are you all paying per kwh? Are you out of a fixed price period and onto the high standard rates?

Have you run it through a site like Compare The Market to see if you can get it cheaper?

A high user in the UK not using economy 7 is around 4600kWh per year. I'm in a 4 bed detached in Scotland with 2 adults and 2 teens and we use 5921kWh per year according to my bill with Octopus so we are considered high users.

10000kWh sounds like a problem either with the meter or with the way you are using your appliances

Try switching off your appliances one at a time to see and checking the smart meter between each one. That might give you some idea.
Is it possible that you are a victim of cryptojacking? I understand that will put your electricity usage up, though I don't know a lot about it.

Our smart meter is from a previous supplier so the billing (£/p) info won't be correct but ours will display current wattage load and history.

Could your neighbours be stealing your electricity to mine bitcoin/grow weed?
Other than that it must be an error somehow surely if you're 3x normal.

you say you turned off the UFH in April.

Is the average daily usage after April noticeably lower than the average daily usage before April?

What does your electricty meter look like? Does it have a small red flashing light?

What does your consumer unit look like? Does it have a row of switchable breakers labelled things like "upstairs sockets" "electric shower" "cooker" "heated swimming pool" "garden annexe" "orangery?"

Photos will be useful.

Take regular meter readings. Monthly is usually enough, but if you do not have good records, start with daily and let us know.

If your problem is excessive use of electricity, changing suppliers will not fix it.

I’m resurrecting this thread because despite all the useful suggestions I received, I never got to the bottom of our electricity use. I started taking very regular meter readings, switched appliances and fuses off one by one, but couldn’t for the life of me work out why we were using so much electricity.

Now that prices have skyrocketed, Bulb have finally allowed first-gen smart meters to automatically take readings, so I’ve got a few days’ detailed data. I’ve attached a photo of our reading for Saturday. Does this seem strange to anyone? Are minor spikes throughout the night normal? I tried switching off the central heating overnight and the pattern remained exactly the same, so I don’t think the boiler’s on the blink. TIA!

Have you got any idea what caused the spike from 6am-12pm or 6pm? Could the 6am-12pm spike be due to the underfloor heating?

You can get special plugs to check the energy consumption of an appliance, it might be worth it to get to the bottom of it. Or turn all the other appliances off and try them one by one whilst looking at your smart meter.

www.amazon.co.uk/Monitor-Backlight-Electricity-Consumption-Analyzer/dp/B085S7Q1T4/ref=sr_1_4?c=ts&s=diy&ts_id=1938287031&keywords=Power+Monitors&tag=mumsnetforu03-21&qid=1649685125&sr=1-4

What is your base level of electricity usage? Without washing machines, TVs, electric shower or underfloor heating etc.

I am with Bulb too. I had a bill today of £294. I am an unpaid carer and I do use the washing machine every day. Not sure if this is the cause. Fortunately (or unfortunately) we were £1000 in credit with Bulb, so they have just taken it off there.

Older fridges / freezers can consume 1,000 kWh per year.

The minor spikes through the night are probably the fridge and freezer as they do cycle on and off. Did you use anything heavy on electric like a cooker or dryer on the large spikes.

I also use the Tumble Dryer. I think this might be the cause of huge bills. I asked Bulb to pay us back the £1000.00. All I got was tumbeweed.