When the electicity bill comes, I usually phone up to give a meter reading. They use an estimated reading, but I like to keep it accurate in order to avoid any surprise charges at the end of the year. Last July I decided to jot down those readings myself in a spreadsheet, and take my own reading every few weeks just to keep track of how much electricity I use.
The reading is in kWh (kilowatt-hours), which is to say that if our house were to use 1kW for an hour, the meter would go up by 1 unit. In my spreadsheet I’ve noted the date in column A and the reading for that date in column B. On each row I’ve calculated our average power consumption for the period since the last reading, so cells in column C have a formula like “=(B7-B6)/(24*(A7-A6))” (kilowatt-hours used divided by hours between readings).
When I started, the average electricity usage for our household was 403W. In the last month, this has gone down to 312W (or 2,734 kWh in a year).
What’s the average power consumption of your household? I tried to find out the average UK domestic household power consumption, but got lost in a maze of statistics. At one point I wrote down that it was 3,300 kWh/year, which works out as 377W. I didn’t save the link though, so I don’t remember where that came from.
Comments
70 responses to “Watching the electricity meter”
We use 3300KWh/quarter!
Wow! Try turning off the lights at night? 😉
I will have to check ours.
More interestingly, I recently went to take a GAS meter reading (prompted by the gas company asking me to take a reading, since they have been “unable” to get one, despite the meter being outside, unlocked, and easily accessible – grumble grumble). Noticing that it was significantly different to my last bill, I then discovered that it had a different serial number. Upshot being that we have been charged for the wrong flat’s gas usage for ~3 years.
This is going to be fun.
How did *that* happen?! I wonder whose meter — if any! — was used for billing the other flat.
That’s going to be a nightmare to sort out. Are you friendly with the people in that flat..?
Hello Tim,
A 2 year old contract shows me a bit over 2000 kWh per year
for our 4 person household for electricity.
For heating I have also some data here: House with 7 households, 21 people:
13800 kWh. So about 2000 kWh per household. Relatively new house.
I’ve just read that in Germany you then calculate this
as kWh per square meter. New houses should expect
about 64 kWh/m^2. If you get below 15 kWh/m^2 you
can call it a “passivehouse” which does not need much
additional heating.
regards,
Florian La Roche
That’s really impressive.
Hi,
I thought we were reasonably efficient (all cfl bulbs etc) but a check showed a consumption in 2005 of 9,700kwh/annum.
It is a 4 bedroomed house with 5 people and I run a business with a fair amount of computer equipment, some of which runs 24/7.
Anyway I invested £14 in a socket meter to find out where all the juice was going. The result of doing some jiggling of stuff and a ruthless turning off of stuff not being used has reduced it to around 5,500kwh/annum. That is still living and working the same lifestyle.
While I was impressed with that – a check back shows that was our consumption back in 1993 (the year of Kyoto). It had crept steadily upward ever since – multiple computers, TVs etc.
So nothing to brag about. One of our two fridge/freezers is very inefficient. I reckon I could save £60/annum by buying a new one for £180. But it isn’t very green to landfill a working appliance is it?
Tim,
The 3,300kwh figure came from Ofgem in 1999 and has been widely quoted. I can’t find how this was calculated. There is a much higher 4,600kwh based on 2003 consumption – which was total UK domestic consumption divided by households.
Some, but surely not all, can be explained by rising consumption.
The 4,600kwh figuren will include electricity used in night storage heaters etc which may not be included in the earlier estimate. Average in electricity consumption between homes that are not on the gas grid and those that are is not that meaningful.
Either way I’m a bit of a power hog atm.
I need to take a look at our electricity use again now that we’ve moved house. This place has loads of ceiling spotlights and that can’t help.
Stuart: those socket meters are great for finding badly behaved applicances aren’t they? Our Virgin Media set-top box was a real power hog. For about £80 you can get a “whole house” meter that clamps around the fuse box supply and transmits information wirelessly to a hand-held device, but you may as well just spot-check the meter reading I think.
Yes, like many other people had been adding halogens to undo the good work of CFL lamps.
I’ve started replacing them with LED lights. 1/2w a lamp makes CFL look an energy hog! Problem is the output and colour at a reasonable place. Best I have found are GU10 (240v) at reuk.co.uk. Even so thay make be weaker than 20w halogens and cooler. But much better than the TLC-Direct & Maplin equivelents.
For the 50w GU10 halogens I’m going to be trying the 11w cfl from TLC. They will project out so there may be aethestic problem. I don’t see a replacement for MR16 (12v). Maybe converting them to 240v GU10 may be an option or just wait for LED technology to evolve.
Thanks for the link to reuk.co.uk, good stuff. Have you tried these?:
http://reuk.co.uk/buy-240V-LED-SPOTLIGHT-BULB.htm
I’m thinking about replacing the GU10 50W halogens in this place one by one, as they go. But a colour temporature of 6400K still seems like it might be a lot “bluer” than the halogen bulbs will be, at least according to this chart. 🙁
Tim,
Yep I have 5x 20,000mcd GU10s. I have 3 on an IKEA track in the lobby outside the toilet. They are just sufficient to light a small passage. I don’t think they are as strong as 20w halogen but that may be because they are still a ‘very cool’ light. But I agree not bluish like the weaker TLC & Maplin GU10s. Elsewhere I have halogen & LED side by side and the difference is dramatic to LED’s disadvantage.
If you need 50w worth of light – cheap LED is nowhere near (yet). That’s why I going to try the 11w TLC cfl GU10s as an interim solution.
Sympathise with your new house problem. Our living room was halogen ceiling lit. I’ve put more table cfl lamps which are more romantic. It has dramatically cut down the use of ceiling halogens and … 😉
Hi All!
I changed electricity suppliers from British Gas to Npower as the sales manager assured me it would be cheaper than the £40 per mth I was spending on my pre-payment meter. She suggested I set my dd up for £33 per mth and that I would probably be in credit after this. I swapped to n power in June and have recently recieved a statement saying that I owe them an additional £400 what a SURPRISE !!!!!!!!! There is no way through the summer that i can possibly have used that much electric for 3 bed house??????????? Jokers aren’t they??
kasia: I’ve heard similar stories from other people, and I think in those cases it was to do with the new supplier not reading the meter when you switched. Does your final meter reading from British Gas match up with your first meter reading for nPower?
Hi Tim, Yes all readings match but dug out my old electricity bill for 6 mths with British Gas and it was around £240.00 from Oct 06 to April 07 and compared it to N Power for 6 mths usage from April 07 to October 07 which was a whopping …….. £600 and it was the summer!!!!!! The reading when I left B. G was 1167 kwh and at this moment is touching 8000kwh now unless I am powering the whole street God knows whats going on. I have contacted N power again and need to take readings for 1 week but finally spoke to someone that actually seemed concerned with the enormous increase and didn’t just put it down to my appliances which by the way are exactly the same as they were last yr.!!!!!
P.S. sorry the first figures I origionally posted were not that acurate as have had all bills and statements out today so all figures including the previous post are all correct.
Will let you all know what happens with my war with N Power!!
I have had problems with n-power too!
We moved house and kept with n-power. The meter was being read regularly but I had neglected to note that all n-powers bills were estimated! This I eventually found out was because the readings were not being read in the 7day period where n-power prepared the bill. They did have all the readings but no-one had thought to look at the previous reading before estimating the next bill. this went on for over 2 years and i now owe over £2000 (we were paying £60 per month on DD too!) So my DD bill should have been £150 per month!!
I think this is ridiculous and am now taking daily meter readings. So far its is saying 40 units per day – this seems excessive and I suspect a faulty meter (it is very old and is overdue to be replaced) Neighbours with similar houses pay £80 per month!
Plz i need someone to tell me how these meters work.i’m getting very frustrated.Ive been in a new flat for 3 months, but just last week a lad from Scotishpower came to change my meter in my absence, claiming that the meter is incorrect. Though i’ve never checked before, but i notice that the meter runs very fast when ever a heating appliance (microwave, electric kettle, electric heater, iron, etc) is switched on. is this normal?
I dont think my meter is working correctly, how do i check if it is faulty. The reading seems excessive. I dont seem to get anywhere with my supplier.
GUESS WHAT N POWER CUSTOMER AGAIN! BEEN WITH THEM SINCE 2000
SO AWARE OF BILLS RANGING FROM £150-£200+ PER QUARTER, ALSO
THEY PHONE FOR READINGS QUITE OFTEN………..BILL JUST IN AT £817.00
OOOOOUUUUCCCHHHH!!!!!!!AFTER HAVING KITCHEN FITTED AND POND IN GARDEN OBVIOUSLY RECORDED WHAT EXTRA WE WERE USING,
BETWEEN 6&9 PER NIGHT & UP TO 20UNITS PER DAY BUT NOW ALL OF A SUDDEN HAPPY WITH MY READINGS, THEY ARE READING BETWEEN 40&84
PER DAY!!!HORRENDOUS, THEY SAID THEY WILL PUT A METER NEXT TO IT
TO SEE WHAT’S ON, BUT IF IT’S NOT THE METER WE STILL HAVE TO PAY IT. WHYYYY WHEN THEY KNOW WHAT YOU NORMALLY USE?????
i’m really upset at the moment 🙁
I spent an hour on the phone to SWALEC today and they simply refuse to send anyone to check my meter as they are adamant that there is nothing wrong with it based on my usage. they said that “as the meter is not actually sparking” and i’m “still recieving an electricity supply” they will not send anyone.
SWALEC seem to think that an average of £20 a week for my electricity (oh did I mention, it’s a 1 BEDROOM FLAT that I live in? ) is not excessive at all.
i’ve been through my statements for the last few years and it averages around 27 units per day. this fluctuates emensely though, ranging from an average of 7.3 units per day during one quarter to an average of 53.57 units per day for another quarter (is that even possible in a 1 bed flat?)
march – june 2005 – 665 units total
march – june 2006 – 4037 units total ??????????
does this make any sense? same time of year, same 1 BED FLAT – extra 3372 units used??? wouldn’t i have to have been doing something crazy like trying to fill a hot air balloon using only multiple hairdryers or something to have used that much more electricity?
it’s just awful living like this, i have the lights off all the time, i don’t have any storage heaters or anything, just one oil filled radiator which i don’t use most of the time because i can’t afford it. i try to only use the washing machine twice a week. all my lightbulbs are energy saving too.
dec 05 – march 06 – they recon i used 5143 units, i had to pay £430 that quarter. that’s more than my friends pay for their whole farm’s electricity.
i’ve got my first baby due in march and i will have to start heating this place properly and using the washing machine. How much will it say i am using then? i’m so worried.
sorry for the rant but any advice on who i could speak to about this would be great,
thanks
bubble – there are a few things you need to check out. when did you move into your flat? are you certain that swalec used the right meter reading then? did you give them a reading and do you still have it?
has your bill been estimated? if it has, then they may be using the wrong readings – check your bill to make sure. it may be that they underestimated bills for a long time and suddenly an accurate reading has thrown up a huge bill. it might be right as your oil fired radiator will be very expensive to run.
how do you get hot water? if you are using an immersion heater, that’s terribly expensive too.
it’s unlikely but not impossible that your meter is faulty – it might be a good idea to ask for a check meter to be fitted for a while.
if you live in a block of flats with a communal meter area, are they reading the right meter?
have you ever switched supplier? did they use the right transfer readings?
if you think your bills have been wrong for a long time, ask them about the ‘backbilling code’. if you complained to them over 12 weeks ago and the problem is still going on, ask them for information about the energy supply ombudsman.
Last year my electric meter was changed and I was told by the person who did it that meters have to be changed by law every 10 years. If they aren’t then you don’t have to pay your bills because the meters cannot be guaranteed to be correct. The meter in question was 11 years old, if only i’d known sooner lol.
Does anyone know if there is any truth to this. I’m asking because come july 2008 I will have lived in my current accomadation 10years, and the gas meter is still the same one as when I moved in.
One more question, I have read in previous comments about socket meters, What are they and how can i get some?
Also is there anything that you can attach to you gas meter to see if it’s actually taking accurate readings??
A friend of mine is currently arguing with his gas supplier because apparently his meter was so bad it couldn’t even be tested to see if it was ok.
Dear Tim,
Is a unit of electricity the same regardless of which supplier you buy your electricity from.
I ask because my brother lives in small studio flat and has very appliances. Yet he uses 50% more units of electricity per day than my wife and I who live in a spacious three bedroom house and make great use of almost every electric appliance.
I think my brother in law’s meter must be faulty or connected to someone else’s flat in his block. His electricity supplier have told him that he will have to pay £75 to have his meter checked. Is this right?
Thanks
Cliff Watkins
Beckenham
020 8650 7347
Cliff: all the meters I’ve seen measure electricity in units of kWh. 1 kWh is the same amount regardless of which supplier you have.
I’ve no idea if having a meter checked is chargeable.
Martin Lewis has a forum for gas and electricity discussions, so perhaps you would do well to ask there.
If you’restill collecting electricity usage, my 2 person household in the midlands for the last quarter used 3,518 kWh. Which is about average for us during this time of year, summer will be a bit higher (air conditioning, disadvantage to having so many electronic devices/computers), dead of winter is lower (advantage to having so many electronic devices/computers, helps keep the place warm 🙂 ) I’m currently with E-On (powergen) , but am debating switching to Click Energy 5 with british gas as it would have saved 70quid from the last electricity bill. I’ve emailed E-on to see if they could come close to meeting British gas prices, we’ll see.
Glad that a few of you have usage like this expat yank 🙂
we are in a house built in 2001 gas combi boiler and central heating.
2 adults and 2 children under 7 in the house.
Our annual consumption should be about 2000 kw/hours.
the only things that are left on are fridge freezer, freezer, phone and smoke alarms.
We bought a monitor for the power usage this showed us that the 2 old hifi’s that we had ( we could not turn off as the cd’s stopped working) were costing us £30 per year to run (31 watts per hour for the pair in stand by)
we now have a background electricity usage of 31 watts per hour ( this must be for the phone and the smoke alarms.
every thing else is turned off when not in use TV, digi box computers etc.
CFL’s all over the house light turn off when leaving the room
Single guy, use my computer pretty much all the time when not at my 9-5, been working out my electricity usage over the past week and am currently clocking approximately 1100kWh/year. Pretty good going methinks!
Of course when winter kicks in and the nights get cold, I have to rely on nasty electric heaters (my flat doesn’t have gas), which bump up things quite a bit. (Just got my bill from, amazingly enough, exactly 1 year ago and it’s 3946kWh’s to today). Not actually that great.
Hi there,
i think my meter could be faulty!
i’m with N-Power for gas & electric and pay £45 per month for gas but for electric i’m always in credit.
my dd is £15 a month but cause i’m nearly £200 in credit they keep putting it down to £2 a month!
obviously this is a good thing but when i compared my own meter reading in mid march and then now 3 months on my meter says i’ve only used 6kwh! my wife, child & i live in a 2 bed semi and not overly cautious with the electric.
as this may sound amazing to some i am worried that a problem may be found and i’m gonna get a huge bill!
should i worry or just plead ignorance?
CHRIS: Unless you are really running your entire house on slightly less power than a modern TV on standby, your meter is definitely faulty…
I have never visited a “blog” before. How useful the advice I’ve just picked up in two mins far better than those confused and supermarket websites. My electricity for three people in a four bedroom house out all day and overseas 20% of the year was just short of £3000 per year (and no I haven’t got carried away with the zero’s) aacording to my bills I think they are charging me 10000 kwk per annum. By the way this is the beloved NPOWER.
After reading not quite all the postings on here I will be :
1 More green with my electricity usage (already had stopped using tumble dryer which seems to have been a problem)
2 Log a daily reading during my green mission
3 If no joy contact NPOWER for an attempt at getting some help
I’m on a mission now – thanks everyone for your insiration
Kerry: are your bills based on actual or estimated meter readings? Might be worth checking your actual meter reading to see if the bills are right.
Good luck with your green mission!
reply for teresa and everyone. you have been told by the meter engineer that your new meter has 10 years certified life, this is correct but your meter stays legal for up to 15 years…. depending on what type of meter you have had installed. if you have had an ampy digital meter installed they have a shorter life span than the old fashioned mechanical meters which have a 20 certified life (usually single rate tariff meters). i know this information is accurate for the central networks area (midlands) but could be different for other parts of the country.
also someone asked how to take a read from there new meter, we install meters when customers are out (outside meter) so i can understand the new ampy meters can be confusing.
This only applies to the ampy 5254ex and 5246c models.
You will always find a reading when you look at the meter, either R1 or R4, depending on the time of day. R1 is your rate one (normal) read and R4 is low E7 read. if you read your meter in the day time you will find the R1 read indicated by the 1 flashing. If you read the meter during the E7 hours (12.30am – 7.30am) you will see R4 flashing at the left of the meter readings.
1. Record the reading on the first screen (check what rate the meter is on R1 or R4)
2. Press the Blue Button on the top left of the meter twice, you will see the second read appear. check the rate either R1 or R4 and record the reading.
its that easy…
one more thing. saving money
alot of people dont use the E7. during the night usally between 01.00 and 08.00 am you have 7 hours of cheap electricity if you can try using washing machines, tumble dryers, water heater ect during these hours you will save money.
anyway i hope i have been of some help
If you suspect your meter is over reading the only way to be sure is to test it. This involves switching everything off and connecting a known test load. This is what the electric companies will do if you can get them to do it.
Meanwhile you can do your own crude test using something like a 3KW fan heater and a plug in power meter (£10 from Amazon, Maplin or ebay). Turn everything in the house off and unplug as much as possible. Keep going unti the meter stops turning. Take a meter reading and plug the fan heater (on max) in via the power meter. Couple of hours layer check the power meter agrees with the regular electricity meter. Say you do this for three hours. Both meters should show somewhere closr to 9 units used. It may vary quite a bit because the fan heater won’t be exactly 3KW but both meters should agree to within about 5% or so. If they differ by more than say 10% it would probably be worth trying to get a proper test done.
You blokes should not complain….my house in the US uses an average of 3,000 kwh a month !!! it is an average size house here and 3 people live in it. We do use natural gas for water heater and for a gas furnace during the winter but 1 run a 5 ton air conditioner during the spring and summer. oh well, I stay comfortable and just smile when i send the power company their check each month….btw, I also work for them so its like we just trade $$ back and forth!!! LOL
you should forgat the big 6 and switch to Utility Warehouse for gas elec mobile broadband and phone – you will all save an absolute fortune – they are the only ones who guarantee to be cheaper than all the big boys – they don’t spend all our money on advertising!
hi,
i have just had a massive SHOCK, 16,500 units of electric per year!
but gas for heating and water Combi Boiler 2,800 per year!?
4 bed house
2 adults
3 kids under 10
can this be right?
please help me
Hi – does anyone know of a website where I can find out how much electricity an average 1 bedroomed flat (with no Gas facility) uses per month ?
We just rented our flat to a foreign family and we think the electricity usage is excessive and we need proof to confront them with.
We are talking about 150 KW per week for normal rate plus 150 KW per week for the economy rate. We are responsible for paying the bill due to the nature of the contract.
Cheers
Rose
[…] I wrote previously, I’ve been keeping tabs on how much electricity I use. Last week I got a whole-house […]
If you ask your electric supplier to check your meter because you believe it to be faulty, then they are obliged to do so.
The meter is removed and sent to an independent company who check the meter, if you are wrong your electric company charges you £30.( this is perhaps more now than in 2005 )
They do not come to your house and check the meter themselves by switching appliances off and on as one person stated, that would be pretty stupid.
There are a lot of meters out there that are faulty, when you think that the law requires that light meters or noise meters are required to be recalibrated every year why is electric or gas meters any different.
Just a thought if any one wants to double check their electric Maplin online are selling the plug in mains power and energy monitor for only £9.99 until 24/12 08. was originally £27.99 so a good saving.
Also you can buy an Owl monitor which you clip round one wire of your electric that leads from the meter to your fuse box and that tells you what watts you are using constantly, it either tells you the units used or cost per day/week/month these are accurate to 2% either way you can buy the Owl for only £34 99p with free P&P from 2 Save Energy on the web or their address is ” Save Energy,Valley point , Valley drive, Rugby cv21 1tn
or you can buy them from Electricity monitor.com for £ 29.95p plus £ 2.50p Royal Mail Recorded Delivery. total = £32.45p so that gives you all a choice.
FYI – 20 years in the UK before they legally need to change the meter not 10 years as Teresa stated. You would still have to pay for your electricity though even if your meter went over the 20 yr limit.
FYI Amy…. no meter has a set certified life! some need changing in 5 years others need changing in 10, 15 or 20 years… depends on when a meter starts to become inaccurate
Hi, Can anyone tell me what the average unit consumption per day is for electricity or has comparisons to mine?
I live in a small 2 bed flat. I work so I am out all day.
I have a fridge and freezer, electric shower and switch all things apart from main cable tv off at the wall. I have gas central heating and cooker. I am very mindful on my electric usage and I average 8 to 9 units per day which I was told today by the energy efficency dept is a low usage. However I was also told today by scottish gas (dual fuel) that the average consumption per annum for a 3 bed house, 4 persons is 3300 units. I used 3360! Very confused as I do not have tumble dryer, dishwasher etc. I am querying a faulty meter and I am going to take my readings for 14 days plus invest in the energy monitor(thank u Billybob). Any information would be a great help..thank you
When I looked for national statistics about this before all I could come up with was this page from 2003:
http://www.gos.gov.uk/goem/news/newsarchive/newstatsonenergy/
I’d love to know current statistics for household electricity and gas usage.
I would too.. I am aware that we all have a common denominator of appliances whether there is 1 person or 4 persons in a house. However their usage of washing machines, kettles etc must be more frequent than a single persons usage, logical I think..So how I can be using , according to scottish gas statistics the same as 4 persons is rather puzzling. I do believe the electric shower is 1 of the main culprits in my house!
My neighbour down the stairs in a 24 hour period has used 12 units, she was doing a baking, using her tumble dryer etc so perhaps an average of 10 units per 24 hours is normal whether you are 1 or 4 people, who knows! One thing for sure, at the moment I am on a mission to cut down these units and talk to more friends. Unfortunately the electric shower I can’t do without but just wait till I get this combi boiler put in and by hook or by crook that electric shower will have to go! 🙂
Thank you for responding to my previous post.
Hi guys & gals, I to am monitoring electric usage, aren’t we all? there are a lot of questions re consumption of different sized homes, why not calculate what usage your appliances should be consuming ?? I have a spread sheet that roughly calculates what I should expect my total consumption to be!! (Impressed?? don’t be I stole it from someone else) but it does give me an idea of what power I can expect to consume. Pick up any appliance and you will see the power consumption figure printed on it, ie a Kettle may say 3000watts. Try this formula, Wattage(of the appliance) x hours(used per day) x days(per year) / 1000 = total Kwh used per year, x Average cost per Kwh( £0.0975). To test your formula 1000 x 1 x 365 / 1000 = 365 Kwhs x £0.0975= £35.59 cost per year. You can then add a further column to identify multiple units, say 6 light bulbs etc, try it, its free and will give you a reasonable idea of what power your appliances are consuming and what the likely costs could be.
Hi Tim,
If you are in the North West of England I’m offering a free mater testing service until the end of January. I can also supply, install, and calibrate a tandem ‘smart meter’ for 79.99, about the same as you would pay if you went out and bought one yourself.
Best regards,
Malcolm Snape
energypricetracker.co.uk
Hi y’all. I’m a single person living in a 3 bedroomed house. I have most of the normal electrical appliances including cooker but no dishwasher or tumble drier. I try to conserve power as much as I can and switch off, at the plug, everything that is not in use.
My meter was replaced a couple or so years ago. I made the mistake of not taking a final reading from the old one before it was taken out and think I got diddled there – so be warned – certainly the next bill showed more units used than I would normally expect for that quarter. This is the third meter I have had in this house. I got the original changed by telling my supplier that it was making funny noises (the wheel did intermittently give a ‘ting’ as it span). I was concerned my bills were too high and was proved right when they came down by over a third.
Electricity meters are not the property of the power company and if you require one to be tested they have to pay the meter company to do this – that is why they then pass these costs on to you where they can. However, if the meter is faulty you will not be liable for the costs so it is worth making a few checks before contacting them. First (if in a shared property) check that you/they are reading the correct meter. Then switch off and unplug all electrical items and confirm that no power is being drawn – the spinning wheel or flashing light on the meter will stop. Next plug in one appliance at a time and note how much power is being drawn. If you don’t have a power monitor you can make an estimated judgement by watching how quickly the wheel spins or light flashes – the faster it is going the more power you are using. Remember that electrical goods can become faulty and this can cause them to use more power than they should. You should consider replacing anything that uses more power than it should.
I have an efergy power monitor, keeping a track of my daily consumption in a spreadsheet. This gives daily, weekly and monthly figures and is a brilliant ‘toy’ for working where all my hard earned cash is going.
Just keeping necessities like the fridge/freezers etc running consumes between 4 and 4.5 units a day. Showers, cooking and entertainment (tv/radio etc) pushes this up to 9+ units a day.
As far as I can tell a standard shower runs at around 7kw/hr so 1 unit will give approximately 8.5 minutes of heated water.
My cooker hotplate uses .86kw, the oven 1.8kw but the grill 2.3kw whilst my microwave/combination uses .65, 1.35 and 1.2 respectively.
If heating water for cooking I always use a kettle – 2.6kw but much faster at heating so it works out cheaper than using the stove and I never boil more than required.
All my light bulbs are low energy ones. I never leave my mobile ‘phone charger (or similar) switched on when not in use. Rather than using electric heating (mains gas is just a myth where I live) I use mobile gas heaters. These are much, much cheaper to run.
hi folks ;
just been reading your comments on electricity prices.i have a 3 bedroom house and through a pre payment meter i pay £80-£90 per week .i have lived in this house for 16 years and its always been high.
Keith, pre-payment meters are a more expensive method for paying for electricity. See http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/may/30/thegreatmeterripoff. Nonetheless the figure you quote would suggest that you are using something close on 20 times more electricity than I am. Even though do I try to be economical that still seems excessive.
Are you using electric fires/heaters; these can use an awful lot in the way of kilowattage. As will an unlagged hot water tank especially if it is left on 24/7.
You might, perhaps, carry out a home survey to find out just what electrical items you are running, when and for how long. See ‘Colin says’ July 9th 2008 above. Start by making sure that you switch absolutely everything off and ensure that NO power is being drawn through your meter. The cost of a hand held power monitor, like the efergy one I mentioned above or the owl that billybob suggested, might prove a worthwhile investment to help you do this. Once you work out what you are using turn off anything that is not needed, every time it is NOT needed
Are you in rented property? I’m not sure what the position is nowadays but I do know that landlords used to be able to have the meter set to charge at a higher rate eg a 1kw fire running for 1hr should use 1 unit of power but the meter could be set to record 4 units used.
Is it possible that there might have been a debt on the property before you moved in? I have heard of power companies ‘turning up’ pre-payment meters to recover debts. If it is possible that this has been done may the meter have not been reset when the debt was recovered?
Gosh, I thought my £20 a month was expensive!!
try 2000 pounds a year yes thats what we are using in a four bed house we have loads of electrical gadgets but this seems high
I recently challenged my electrical supplier on the accuracy of their meter readings. I must admit they tried everything to make me feel the fool and when that did not work advised me of the cost of having someone come out and test my meter if I was wrong.
I went to Energy Watch and they got their customer complaints section involved and they then sent EON to do a Meter Accuracy Test instead of installing a check meter.
The upshot was my meter was 24.95% reading too high. I have received an apology letter and then a rebate of the overpaid amounts.
I have been doing power measurements on RF Systems for over 30 years so therefore I have both the equipment and the ability to test my meters.
One of the “tricks” the suppliers like to try is to have you list the equipment that you have in your home and then they will inform you based on the current ratings of the equipment that their readings are accurate.
The current ratings of the equipment in your homes is not the current draw of the individual equipment but rather a nominal indication of the current rating or maximum draw of the equiipment.
For example many 1KW heater only draw 800 watts of power and if you were using this for a test of your utilisation you would not be accurate.
The best test is to have a fixed resistive load placed on your system for a set period of time to see if the meter is really accurate. In my case I used a 52.5ohm load capable of handling 2500 watts.
This load would reach 1kw in 54.7 minutes. So if I had set the meter to where it just clicked over in a unit that did not have a tenths reading. It would click over again in 54.7 minutes
Since finding the defective meter and receiving my refund I have checked an additional 10 meters in my area and have found, not the 2% as told to me by my supplier but that 100% of the meters have been from 10 – 27% reading high.
I can not reccomend enough to anyone with a question about their readings being high to get them independently tested.
The reason I say independent is that the replacement meter arrived from my supplier and it is also 10% high.
So I begin the procedure once again with my supplier. I will update as the Saga continues.
John
I purchased a large 6 bedroom house about 2 years ago and I was staggered by the massive bills I’ve been getting. I put it down to the size and thought nothing of it.
Then I realised that, as we only have a small family (2 adults, 2 young kids) and a gas central heating system we shouldnt really be seeing much more electricity usage than other similarly sized families. The electrical equipment we use is all modern (less than 2 years old) and I tend to keep an eye on lights left on etc.
So, I bought one of these Owl meters and after a few days it reckons my energy useage is less than half what my electricy meter shows for the same period. I’ve got an inline test meter on the way to sense check the loading of certain electrical items I have and that they show up on the Owl at the correct loading.
If I can show that this meter is inaccurate I hope to be asking for a sizeable rebate on my bills for the past few years.
To John (post on May 5th)
I am in N west and having terrible time with EON. Meter was changed in Feb 08 for new digital type. At that time we were in credit with them. At each quarterly bill we were getting behind on what we were owing them and the payment steadily went up. For the last 4 months we have been paying £180 ( gas/elec) and at the latest statement we are now £780 in DEBIT the bulk of this being electric costs. They insist that the meter is correct but have not actually sent anyone to check it. Nothing has changed usage wise apart from a replacement electric shower in the kids bathroom.
They said if I wanted a test meter fitted then it would cost me £80 if they found there was no issue with my meter. As they are now wanting to increase my payment to £260 a month I can ill afford to gamble another £80 with them. Do you know of someone independant who could test my meter ??
Hi, reading through your comments makes me realise I am not alone with this problem.
I live with my partner in a 1bed mobile home, 28′ x 10′. My bill for this last quarter is £800, Previous was £500 and approx £200 each for the 2 quarters prior to that. This makes a total of around £1700 pa. Hot water tank on for around 3hrs daily, biggest usage is undoubtably the oil filled radiator on for few hrs a day over the winter but that is the only form of heating I have. Electricity company are trying to get out of it but there has to be another way to check their findings. I am in Hampshire, does anyone know a reasonably priced independant person who can check if the meter is correct? Its dated ’89.
Biggest problem I have is that the bill goes to my landlord and not myself so I have to tell a few porkies to get anything done as Im not the account holder!
Single person living in 3 bedroom house. Have the usual TV. computer, microwave, kettle, washing machine. Have just received my electric bill for £54 per last quarter. I think this is fair although I cook and heat house with gas. However, my query is my next door neighbour, also single, same appliances has received her bill for £96 plus she was away for one month out of the last quarter. Both houses have had their meters read… This just does not seem right. Her energy supplier refuse to check or change the meter…. it must be over 25 years old. My meter was changed a couple of years ago to digital.
We are currently in the throes of a huge wrangle with E-on and I wondered if someone out there could help. Reading the posts it appears that a few of you are savvy with electric meters (which we are not). We have lived in this house since September 2002, and a new meter was installed when we moved in. By April 2007 the meter showed that we had used in the 5 years approx; 30,000 units. So on average we had used 545 units per month.
In 2007 our meter stopped working, even though we reported the fact, it was not changed until December 2008. The new meter has been giving readings of anywhere from 130 units per day to now dropping to some 30 units per day. So far in 10 months the meter has clocked up 16660 units as being used. This works out pro-rata to 1660 units being consumed per month.
I should say at this point that our house has 3 bedrooms, and we have the normal appliances including dishwasher, drier, washing machine. There are 3 of us living in the house. If anything the consumption should have gone down from 2007 as children have flown the coupe, meaning less washing, meals, computers, showers et al. I should also say that in 2007 I had no timer on my emmersion, and now I have. Comes on three times a day for 2 hours, whereas it was on all the time before.
E-on have checked the meter, they installed a check meter for a week running along side this one. All was fine. We have had an electrician in to check every appliance, all is okay and I have got EDF (who supply the overhead cables) to check the supply into the house. All is fine, but they were puzzled as to the amount being shown as usage. Now I have a bill back dated for under charging since August 2007 and it states that we owe £8k..the whole thing is madness.
Right now my consumption has dropped to 30 units overall for a day and night…Still quite high….anyone got any ideas?
Help!
We received a phone call on Saturday morning demanding £200 for a electricity bill we never received. Yesterday morning a threatening letter form SPM Collections arrived warning of legal action if the bill is not paid immediately. I have no problem paying the bill however on close inspection of the meter readings I discovered something has gone drasitically wrong in the month of August.
We moved into the flat in the middle of June and the meter reading was taken as 067968.
A meter reading was then taken on the 31st July (6 weeks later) of 068791 which showed we used 823 units of electricity since moving in. Then a further meter reading was taken on the 3rd of Sept (5 weeks later) and it read 070727. That’s 1,936 units used in the period 31st July to 3rd September (5 weeks).
A final meter reading was taken on the 27th Oct (8 weeks later) and it showed that we had used 121 units of electricity in the 8 weeks.
The meter readings are all over the place and I’m wondering if the meter is faulty. 1,936 units seems way too high and at the same time 121 units seems way too low.
We have not changed our daily routines, therefor I
I am keen to hear from those who have Horstmann electricity meters. I am a disabled person and have been doing battle with my supplier over the results of a faulty metre – even when the fault was found.
I am convinced that Hortsmann meters have a high fault percentage (I was told inofficially that most those who found a fault were refunded an average of £200).
Horstmann meters are not the only faulthy one but the official position is truly uneblievable (Read the end of this submission).
What is truly alarming is the position of OFGEN: Based on the results of testing my meter, I suspect that the final Examiner’s report was tailored in favour of the supplier. Of course I was refunded some money, but this was not the main concern: the main concern was that the metre has recorded at some stage over 5000 Units that were never used in a period of 6 months. Unfortunately, I cannot dwell any further until the matter is finalized. But I intend to use my situation, and any other situation that comes to light, to present to OFGEN, and if necessary to a court of law, in order to revise the way examiners test meters and on the impossible situation of no appeal even when the examiner’s interpretation does not tally with the facts.
Here is a proof that we, the consumers, bear the grunt of failures, while utility suppliers and meter manufacturers go on to be unjustly enriched:
Read the pdf document of a seminar entitled “Future Arrangements for In-Service Testing – 23 June 2005” in which representatives from OFGEN and several meter manufacturers and utility suppliers took part. This is available on the internet. I quote below the exact position on faulty metres (gas or electricity):
quote:
Question: Is 30% faulty accurate? Why not 50%? – still means half the population is accurate and need not be removed.
A. John Stevens – Ofgem. … A balance is needed between the cost of inaccuracy to the customer against the costs to change out millions of meters.
A. Adrian Rudd – Ofgem. The 30% figure was broadly accepted as part of the Transco Price Control as a balance. The costs of an idealistic 100% where all meters conform would, at this stage, be prohibitively expensive. Obviously there are, and will continue to be, meters installed performing outside tolerance.
unquote
[try this link: http://www.ofgem.gov.uk/Networks/Techn/Metrolgy/IndMeterng/In-servTest/Pages/MtringinservicGrp.aspx%5D
SO PLEASE, IF YOU DO HAVE A “Horstmann” METER AND SUSPECT IT IS INACCURATE, LET ME KNOW.
Stumbled across this post and thought I would add our experience. We have continuous electric hot water, well kind of continuous, it only has a small tank, but I digress….
We noticed a problem with the hot water being “less hot” or more precisely there seeming to be less available hot water before it “ran cold”. It turned out we had a leaking hot water pipe somewhere in our walls. Anyway the plumber came and found the leak and fixed the pipe.
However our electricity bill for that quarter was phenomenal, almost double the amount of kWh used compared to same quarter previous year. Essentially the leak meant that the hot water system was running continuously and heating all that water that was leaking out of the pipe.
The killer indicator which we could have detected in the first place was the speed at which the meter disc (ours is one of those mechanical type meters) was spinning compared to the other meters in the block of flats. Even objectvely, without reference to the other meters it was really spinning quite fast compared to how it goes now that all is fixed.
For those of you with highly variable bills and electric hot water, get your pipes checked.
FWIW, we use between 17 and 24 kWh per quarter (we live in Oz so only limited heating) the period with the broken pipe crossed two bills but mean that we used about 45 kWh for the quarter in which it happened. We still have no idea how long the problem actual existed but probably a couple of months.
Regards,
Philip
I have just asked my electric supplier to check my meter because my bills seem to be really high, and all they did was turned everything off, and only plugged in an electric fire that they brought with them!
I still think the meter is wrong, what can I do?
if you have a horstman timeswitch (under a plastic dome) check what time it is set to switch on your Economy 7 rate heater circuit – there is a pointer at the bottom on the dial which is fixed and should point at the present time, or switch off your NSRs till cold, put on again and monitor when they start heating up, it shouldnt be before midnight
useage – well in 48 hours on a new meter – 57KW rate 1 (day) and 86.5KW rate 2 (night)
Wow. I have just had a massive bill. I noticed that when my LCD meter got to 35xxx it jumped up to 41xxx!. Now I have a history with this meter because I was told by the suppliers that they had made an error last year reading the meter and issued me a refund. However I have looked back over the bills and I see that it has got to nearly 35xxx before but then the next reading jumped down to 31xxx hence the supposed error in reading the meter. It is now obvious that the meter reader didn’t make a mistake it was the meter that is faulty. I ma having it tested and having a usage monitor installed as a backup. I am getting a real run around by the suppliers though.
I have to say that my electricity usage has gone mad and yet nothing has changed since I moved in in Jan 2004. I have been paying £115 a month to Southern Electric per month by direct debit and still ended up with a bill of £1200 on top of what I have paid. I have a 2 bed single story thatch cottage, just 2 of us living here, and we are out during the day at work… I think my meter MUST be wrong but would like to get it independently tested- Any ideas would be gratefully received… Yes we only have electricity for water, heat and lighting, BUT I really can’t understand how my readings can be that high.
julie,
what the electricians did is sufficient. if the heater they used is 2kw. and they switch it on for 1 hour your meter will read 2kw for that period,proving your meter is ok.
Many people don’t realize that they actually consume the energy the meter says they do. That’s the #1 fact, and they can’t get over it. “Oh I didn’t change anything…” “my bill has never been this high” Blah, blah, I’ve heard it all.
If a meter is faulty, 99% of the time it’s in the consumers favor. The meter will tend to slow down over time and you guessed it=it actually meters a little less consumption. But, the consumer gets a high bill and demands that the meter is at fault. So, the electric company has to come out and test it. And if it’s just a tad out of accuracy (the state commission here in Ohio sets the accuracy limit from 98-102%), the company will change out the meter.
Now, let’s say the meter was tested at 102.4% accuracy, well…in this rare case the meter was running fast. However, it’s not going to make that much of a difference on your bill. 2.4%? Cmon.
**This is what happens 99.9% of the time—-> Let’s say it tested at 97.5% The company changes it out because the consumer whined that it wasn’t right. Well guess what?? Now your new and improved meter that just got installed is gonna be 100% accurate. Which means…your usage is really accurately recorded now, and your bill just went up because you are a crybaby.
Thank you and good day.
Just a Thought, If you think the suppliers Meter is reading Incorrectly, Why not get your Electrician to Install Another Meter Owned by you, (In Addition to the Suppliers meter) Even a second hand one, with mechanical time clock for the Rate Switching, if this was set to the same time, as the Suppliers is. Both meters should read the same, you could then try a 2 kilowatt heater for One hour (as mentioned in previous post) and both meters should show 2 units used . Might give you insight into whats happening. Rod Watts