Share your tips and tricks for saving on your energy bill with ESB Energy - £200 voucher to be won

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During the winter months we tend to use more heating, hot water and electricity to combat the cold and the dark. This year, with many of us working from home the energy bills are likely to be higher than ever. Luckily there are many simple changes we can make as a family to reduce our energy bill, and with this in mind, ESB Energy would like to hear your tips for cutting down on your energy usage.

Here’s what ESB Energy has to say: “We know that as a parent you have enough to worry about. At ESB Energy we pride ourselves on our excellent customer service, we have a 4.5 rating on Trustpilot, so with us you can be assured that your energy is being taken care of. We also offer 100% renewable electricity on all our green tariffs – these are our cheapest tariffs –so that you can save money, while doing your bit for the planet. What's also great is as soon as you become an ESB Energy customer, for every friend you bring over with you, we’ll give you both £50 bill credit each. That’s £50 for you and £50 for your friend. You can bring as many friends with you as you want. Bring two friends over, we’ll give you £100. Bring ten and you could get £500 off your bill! Another top tip to save money on your energy bills, by switching to ESB Energy.

Switch to us today to start saving on your energy and we’ll automatically enter you into a draw to win a £1000 Amazon voucher”

Do you take the old school approach and layer up with thermals and a wooly jumper instead of turning the heating up? Have you challenged your family to swap baths for showers or set forfeits when people leave the lights on? Or perhaps installing a smart meter has made all the difference in your household.

Whatever your tip for saving on the energy bill is, all who post on this thread will be entered into a prize draw where one lucky MNer will win a £200 voucher for a store of their choice (from a list).

If you’re considering switching energy provider you can request call back from ESB Energy to find out more here. Plus, you’ll be entered into a prize draw to win a £1000 Amazon voucher if you switch to ESB Energy.

Thanks and good luck with the prize draw!

MNHQ

Insight T&Cs apply

I have finally turned into my mother..

• Telling folk to put a jumper on if they are cold, rather than turn the heating on!
• Shouting 'DOOR' whenever anyone wanders into the lounge & leaves the door open so all the warmth leaks out.
• Going through a series of measures before relenting & putting the fire on.. including extra layers, hot water bottle, dressing gown over clothes &/blanket.

I moaned at her as a child for always going on at me.. but it's a very different experience when you are the one paying the bills :) I'm also very hot on switching plugs off when appliances are not in use, turning lights off whenever leaving a room, turning microwave off when not in use (I heard having the microwave always on & the clock displaying uses more energy - not sure if that's true?), not leaving TV on standby - always fully off.

We have an old house which is quite cold in the morning, but does seem to retain the heat after a couple of hours, ill fitting doors are my annoyance, so I have door curtains over the front and back doors, draft excluder tape around the door frames, and a sausage dog draft excluder by the living room door.
I have a smart meter so can monitor what is on needs turning off, we leave nothing on standby, and have replaced all my light bulbs with the LED versions.
We have received a grant for loft insulation, and I feel that has made a big difference to the bedrooms.

A smart meter has made all the difference for us

Our son loves monitoring the smart meter. He’s a big David Attenborough fan which has made him very environmentally aware

A couple of months ago, following a thread on MN, I bought a dehumidifier mainly to help dry laundry inside instead of using a tumble drier. It does that job well but also takes moisture out of the air, so the temperature in the house goes up a degree or two. This has meant that the central heating has been on less - I have saved over £100 on my quarterly electricity bill.

always phone at the end of the year to renew. Otherwise the cost will go up and up each year

A nice warming meal like stew or a casserole with a hot drink makes us feel warm from the inside out😍

So simple - but slippers and layers have really helped reduce the hours we need our heating on for - as well as overall temperature.

Some soft snoods are also great for keeping the back of your neck warm - without wearing a big scarf and looking like you're about to run out the door!

We always wash up in the sink bowl rather than having the hot water constantly running. We have draught excluders at the front and back door to stop any draughts and we take more showers than we do baths

Like Gufo socks, blankets, hot water bottles. I also ‘save up’ dishes to wash in one go & try to use the outdoor line as much as possible to save putting the water heater/radiators on.

I have to be careful when cutting back on things though as due to an abusive ex bf I can survive on barely anything - and it is really important to my mental health that I remember that I can have showers, hot water, heating on.

When my DC was away I used so little it shocked me when he came back - bloody lucky though as it was before lockdown & with DC here now, no work, no visiting and the cold weather on top - the money I saved then got just used up by this Christmas & my d/d has increased considerably.

In NI we’ve less options to shop around so I’ll be trying to scrape through but lots of good ideas on this thread!

Recently I added curtain wire/hook sets with blankets or old curtains on most of our doorways. I do prefer to shut the doors but the cats like in and out esp of my room so a heavy curtain is a good compromise and fun to make an entrance/exit with a good cape-like flourish 😂

Ah maybe that’s another key ingredient - choosing when possible to have a laugh and find fun in the ways to save, like PP sending their DC on an ‘energy’ hunt to turn off items.

I wear thermal base layers on really cold day including socks then slippers especially as I'm sitting most of the day on work calls not generating any heat. Plus electric blanket at night to stay warm without having to have heating on all night. I've noticed thermal curtains in my room also help because it's so hard to what with a tiny radiator in a large room.

Always layers before heating, but that's more because not everyone is necessarily cold

We have a sort of fining system in place, if you are found to have left something on, or are sitting with the TV on but concentrating on something else etc then it's 20p from pocket money. It's really reduced that happening, 😂 rare I get any money these days! They also remind each other if they notice before I do

The money went back to them anyway, once the jar was full we'd get a takeaway or something, but I usually pay for that, so they may have got an extra takeaway or I may have got them one anyway, no way of knowing really as we don't have them regularly

We have a thermometer in the sitting room and kitchen (the most used rooms in the house) and only switch the heating on if it falls below 18oc (other than for an hour in the morning/evening on the timer). If anyone is cold and it's above 18oc they have to put on another layer. As we are at home a lot of the time now - the chances are if we get the house too warm to often we'd get used to it.

Have switched upstairs heating to really really low and just do not go up there as can eat, sleep, live downstairs only and no visitors coming to sleep upstairs. Should make a good difference we hope!

Make sure your with the cheapest provider and turn the radiators down in the less used rooms

Throws on the sofa , fluffy socks and warm jumpers on in the winter xx

An extra layer and cuddly quilts or throws on the sofa to keep warm and toasty

Get the kids involved and explain to them about saving energy and the things we can do. Make a game, chart, competition on who can help to Save the most energy a week.

Embrace Hygge - Have lovely candles burning (scented if you like) and colourful blankets folded on the backs of sofas, all ready to snuggle into when the temperature drops.
We also turn down the heating for the rest of the house and use the gas fire in our living room so we are only fully heating the 1 room in which (during lockdown anyway) we spend most of our time!

i always go for heavy curtains that are lined to keep the heat in and always make sure the curtains go behind radiators to let the heat out not in front as this will stop the heat

I close doors on rooms we don't use often and have thermostats on all the radiators so we can turn them down in unused rooms. I also put big sheets of bubble wrap up on non-double glazed windows. A quick spray with water on the glass and it clings easily...saves so much on heating!

We have two woodburners so often use those, and recently bought heat powered fans to sit on top of the fires to heat the room

Lots of layers, snuggly blankets on the sofa at night and making sure everyone is on board with switching lights off and not spending too long in the shower

Put a cardi on before turning up the heating and turn all gadgets off at bed time instead of leaving them on standby.

Keep the doors closed and turn the thermostat down a little... and don't bother doing any ironing... there's no-one to see the creases anyway