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presumably you’ll just end up in about £250 worth of credit by March having had your DD adjusted to zero?
Well I'm already £185 in credit as we also have PV there so our 'leccy usage is pretty minimum.
I've actually just looked at my account and, yes, "From 01/10/2022, you'll be paying nothing because you have a payment holiday".
I might keep paying a bit in anyway if possible.
Thanks irc, will keep an eye on the usage over the next few months. Have e-mailed ofgem to see what the procedure would be if the old meter was inaccurate. I imagine there's no comeback as many of my old energy companies have gone bust - if I've paid £40 too much each month for gas then I've overpaid by £6k over the time I've lived here.
Scottish Power currently telling me I'm not paying enough - £500 in credit at least by 2nd October. Web sites starting to get issues - just logged on - 605th in the queue. I'm currently overpaying by about £150 a month - I am not putting the DD up.
^^^^ similar here, won't allow me to change the DD, am also showing as £820 in credit..
British Gas saying I'm overpaying on the App, but lists me as underpaying on their website. Admittedly the amount I'm supposedly underpaying by (debit at end of contract) is shrinking by the day so App may use current usage (with meter issue mentioned above), and the Website uses historical data? Worth double checking both if you're with BG.
We've now got a new house with an extra room and maybe 4/5 extra rads. Plus we've lost the 1kw solar array we had at the old house. We had been paying around £100 per month and we have a few hundred in credit with Bulb. I'm guessing we will easily double our bills now. I'll know more next month when we get the first bill.
When Shell said 5-10 days for refunds to reach bank accounts they seem to mean it. 6 days on my cash is still in the shell energy account.
Any Shell customers received confirmation of what their tariff will be from 1st October? Aside from acknowledging the energy price guarantee takes effect from 1st October my account doesn’t seem to have any details of the actual rates.
I know i can find these elsewhere but it seems shoddy that they’ve not been communicated directly to customers will less than 48hrs until they take effect!
Any Shell customers received confirmation of what their tariff will be from 1st October?
I got an email on 22nd from them...
[i][b]Your electricity rates are changing from 27.627p to 33.017p per kWh and your standing charge per day is changing from 44.74p to 45.76p.
Your gas rates are changing from 7.282p to 10.236p per kWh and your standing charge per day is changing from 27.22p to 28.48p.[/b][/i]
...with the £66 per month to come off I should be better off over the next 6 months.
Cheers, not sure why I didn’t get that email nor why it’s not available on their website
The wife's small shop just got a message from Bulb.
Going from 35p kWh to 65pkWh.
We don't try to heat it in the winter, don't put the shelving lights on anymore and it still is going to cost £150 per month.
That rate is incredible. My BIL/SIL have an electrical shop - they've got lights on most of the time - i.e. ones they want to sell.
That rate is incredible.
I had a look online for a better deal. EDF wanted 85pKWh, fixed for a year.
Octopus have just knocked my DD back from £175pm to £110pm, but the new rates would have me using £110pm in the summer with no heating on & I'm not very much in credit, does anyone know if its possible to increase DD with Octopus?
They've knocked it back due to the £400 government payment split into 6 chunks of £66 starting in October. Log into your octopus app and adjust it back up, that's what I'll be doing with mine too.
@flicker - ah yes I'd forgotten about that, will monitor our gas use once the heating goes on & adjust as necessary. ta
My BIL/SIL have an electrical shop – they’ve got lights on most of the time – i.e. ones they want to sell.
Are they all on one circuit (I mean, not necessarily all, but on a few circuits) Any means to have each on a switch so you can turn on and off to show customers as needed.
I'd never even thought of that until now, but I drive past a lighting shop most evenings and you're right, it's always aglow.
The wife’s small shop just got a message from Bulb.
Going from 35p kWh to 65pkWh.
We don’t try to heat it in the winter, don’t put the shelving lights on anymore and it still is going to cost £150 per month.
if you're not heating, what are you using all that power for? Assuming 6 days a week, 8 hours per day (????), that's using 4,800w the whole time the shop is open. drop, say 300w for a till\screen and 4,500W is the equivilent of running 500 LED bulbs?
if you’re not heating, what are you using all that power for?
I'm not sure where you get the 4800 watts from?
We run a till, laptop, vacuum and 8 x LED light panels. The panels pull about 240w according to the Shelly controller.
Looking back at my bills we use about 100 - 110 kWh per month. So roughly £70 + £10 per month standing charge.
So Bulb are taking the piss a bit with the increase in the payment amount. I will let them take a couple of payments at that rate, just as a buffer and then bring it down.
Don't forget your meter readings today. Shell app has a 6 minute queue to log on currently....I think they may be busy!
So Bulb are taking the piss a bit with the increase in the payment amount. I will let them take a couple of payments at that rate, just as a buffer and then bring it down.
Did our Bulb meter readings 3 days ago. Email today to say we could lower our payments from £194 a month to £115.
Think I’ll just leave it & stay warm.
Shell refund update. Should have been received in 5-10 days, 11 days later no refund. Decided to try chat on the app to contact them...172 in the queue. An hour later I get to the agent who tells me they rejected the refund! Apparently they wanted me to increase the DD, but didn't tell me they rejected it. Complaint raised. Ok tell the agent to change the DD, she does, and re-initiate a refund. Can't. Billing system turned off due to tarriff updates and they need an up to date bill. FFS. Billing 'should' be on again Friday. I'll try again then. FFS. I'll be off to the ombudsman if that doesn't work.
Dealing with Eon-next at the place I've been in for two months (they were the existing provider) has been pleasingly painless. I've elected to pay monthly by DD for what I actually use, based on my meter readings. I logged on with no problem on the 30th, input my numbers, and had a gas/elec bill for September within the hour: £46, that'll be deducted from my account on the 21st.
I haven't been following this, I've just cut back as much as possible. But it says that the new price cap from 1st Oct limits electricity to 34p/kWh, and my Intelligent Octopus tariff is 40p peak.
What am I missing?
What am I missing?
I think the cap only covers default tariffs such as the standard variable.
The cap is on the average rate applied, so if off peak is lower and that results in cap or less then it’s ok. Our octopus go is the same, so with 39p peak and 7.5 the average price is 15.8 p/ kWh, so better than cap. This will go up as it gets darker and our balance shifts a bit, but still much less than cap.
They emailed us and explained this at the end of last week. I had been holding a small flicker of hope that the peak rate may drop a bit!
@molgrips - you mention you are on intelligent octopus- from the EV thread I believe you have an Ioniq - how does this work with the Hyundai? I was not aware it was available for Hyundai currently. This could work well for me as often have the car at home during the day and could take advantage.
how does this work with the Hyundai?
I just went through the switch process on the app, and it listed Hyundai as supported, but they also support the Ohme charger (which I have, on good advice from the fitter) which will make Octopus work with any car anyway.
With my wife's current commute, the cost saving of the EV versus diesel pays for 80% of the projected electricity bill, including the EV charging. Another example of a poverty trap, since people on lower incomes can't afford EVs. That's not meant to be willy waving - we only got ours on a super cheap deal before everything went nuts, and we can't afford our own when this goes back.
I'm really confused, doesn't take much admittedly, there is a -£66 refund on my ovo account which has reduced my credit on my account but definitely not turned up in my bank account. It just looks like the government have taken money out of my account as opposed to money going in...
I'm sure I must have this back to front but somethings not right.
£46, for 2 months!
£23 pcm with ovo? "
That is less than my standing charge cost with Octopus, and i thought that theirs was on the lower end of the scale.
So either you have pv and have exported alot
You started with credit moved from your old place
Or i cant read a gas bill properly
Or you have been pn holiday for 7 weeks
£46, for 2 months!
£23 pcm with ovo? ”
That is less than my standing charge cost with Octopus, and i thought that theirs was on the lower end of the scale.
So either you have pv and have exported alot
You started with credit moved from your old place
Or i cant read a gas bill properly
Or you have been pn holiday for 7 weeks
Is that aimed at me, as I'm the only person who mentioned the sum '£46' recently? No, none of the above. £46 just for September, gas and electricity, including standing charges for both, based on meter readings from 30th Aug to 30th Sept (August was £40.99). No PV exporting, no holidays, no credit from other places, just careful use of resources.
I’m really confused, doesn’t take much admittedly, there is a -£66 refund on my ovo account which has reduced my credit on my account but definitely not turned up in my bank account. It just looks like the government have taken money out of my account as opposed to money going in…
I’m sure I must have this back to front but somethings not right.
Nothing goes in or out of your bank account. The £66/67 rebate gets applied to your energy account by the utility provider. How exactly that works depends on how you pay your bills. It's not rocket science and there's plenty online explaining how it works.
I used £4 of gas in August, bill was £23. We were avoiding cooking during the heat, and the water tank was set to a pretty cool temp.
Got another email from Blub to say that because of our usage & recent meter readings that they’re dropping our DD from £194 to £120 a month (last week they reckoned £115) so I’ve adjusted it to £145.
Hopefully we won’t need to worry as we’re away all of October & 2 more weeks in February, already stacks in credit anyway.
There’s only 2 of us in the house so we’ve knocked the water heating off to an hour on a morning & an hour at nigh for showering & washing up. Heating goes on when it’s cold enough.
My September 2022 electric and gas bills with Bulb.
Electricity: £64 (Unit rate: 30.70p/KWh, Standing charge: 47.55p/day)
Gas: £12.03 (Unit rate: 9.71p/KWh, Standing charge: 27.13p/day)
Total: £76.88
Starting 1 Oct Bulb has provided Energy Bills Support Scheme of £66.
Council has also given £150 whatever rebate.
Normally, before the Ukraine/Russian war my energy bill (Electric and Gas combined) was around £42 to £48 at this time of the year.
I don't turn on my central heating until near January where my bedroom temp would go as low as 4c ... LOL! I am going to freeze again this year ...
4c! My living room used to get to 7c but now with better windows and draft reduction it might drop to 10c.
I won't be using the ch in the morning this year before heading to work. I'll make do with the far infrared panels i have bought or a fan heater in the kitchen to take the chill out of the room.
@Montgomery Appreciate its not rocket science but the £66 has actually reduced the amount of credit in my account. That definitely feels wrong and not sure what is going on. It looks to have been applied correctly in September, so it may be just some weird accounting thing during the billing period. I'm not bad at sums, job kind of relies on it 😉, and I hate rogue numbers. I'll drop ovo a line to see if they can clarify what is going on...
No changes for me so far from Octopus and they have sent me an email to say they aren't planning to adjust
I'm currently £160 in credit
EDF here. Average energy usage since last December is £143. I'm nearly £500 in credit and pre-october DD is £246pcm! I've dropped the DD to £197 today, which is the lowest the website will let me go down to. I can't see any option for requesting a refund, so I suppose I'll have to call them.
It looks to have been applied correctly in September
There wasn't a payment in September so that suggests its something else.
@Montgomery because I pay by DD I'm getting the money refunded to my bank account, not credited to my energy account.
I've built a reasonable £350 buffer from last winter and through this summer. Paying £65 a month for both via DD. This will probably only just cover my nominal usage so with the govt £400 and the buffer I should be able to make it through to next april but without any reserve for next winter.
I need to go wood collecting and order more wood briquettes for winter 2023 next summer.
I've just had my annual estimated use costs in from British gas, and currently gas for me costs £930/year, going up to £1300/year, and electric currently £550/year, going up to £650/year.
So not too bad really. £470-£500 extra to find, though I got £650 from the gov so its pretty much covered the increase. And I'll be a bit more frugal in energy usage, so i should be able to get that increase down a couple of hundred/year.
I'm reducing my lighting costs by trying to only use my cooker hob lights in the kitchen 2*4w rather than 6*7w. If the lack of light becomes a safety issue i'll revert to the big lights. I've removed a few bulbs in the bathroom as well. All miniscule savings in the grand scheme but the changes might add up over 6 dark months.
4c! My living room used to get to 7c but now with better windows and draft reduction it might drop to 10c.
I won’t be using the ch in the morning this year before heading to work. I’ll make do with the far infrared panels i have bought or a fan heater in the kitchen to take the chill out of the room.
North facing bedroom with no flat at the side or above to provide insulation. Worst case scenario is to sleep in the living room.
Another way to keep warm is go to work earlier ... arrghh ...
We're on about 8kWh a day without the car and it's hard to see how to reduce that. We already have very little lighting on. Kids' computers and telly are basically the main discretionary usage. Background consumption is about 100W ish at night. To save much out of that I'll have to go around turning things off standby every night, which is a royal pain. I could do it with smart plugs but they have their own power consumption.
Every 10W of continuous load is worth about £2.80 of leccy per month.
@trail_rat there is a 'Energy Bill Support Scheme' payment of £66 on my September statement... if this has been incorrectly applied that would account for a deduction in my current billing period...
Looks like a omnishambles one way or another...
Just realised Octopus haven't actually billed me for the last few months. I've been paying in though still.
Just had an email from Bulb telling me to reduce my monthly DD. Haven't they seen the news?!
We've just moved into a new build. Contacted OEN Next and they need to change the account from business to domestic. Takes a week or so, so I hope that the first estimation isn't based on the usage by the builders during the build. We have £260 credit from Bulb but we just got that back and will use it towards the winter. Trying to find out what their tariff, almost impossible!
Every 10W of continuous load is worth about £2.80 of leccy per month
I was just coming to say that must be too high but just done the sums and get more or less the same. It's surprisingly higher than I thought.
In terms of actual costs - Shell energy have been pretty useless - only updated smart meter/app with new tariff today. The app is showing my account with £67 additional credit on one screen and not on another. I'm sure they haven't taken account of the significant credit properly in our DD - but equally we've only had an EV for a couple of months so that will not have played through. Also a new gas boiler, better insulation, better controls means gas will be lower than estimated.
So I'm leaving my DD at their predicted £220 per month with a £460 (or is it £527 credit) and will let them sort out the app first, then I'll work out my own estimated usage when we've had a couple more months of EV
I realised this a while ago - that our house base load + the daily standing charge would cost us £550 a year without ever switching a light on or boiling a kettle.
I think that all the sundry chargers and things on standby must be about 10-20W. I suspect the WiFi and broadband modem are hefty though.
I suspect the WiFi and broadband modem are hefty though.
Not really, depends on the model but some only run at 5 watts.
8-14W for the router and we have a fibre modem l too, as far as I can tell it's similar. So maybe as much as £5-6 per month between them.
Or put another way, in the region of 20% of our base load. Not sure what the rest is. I think the readings of 90-95W I see at night are when the fridge is idle.
Just had a revised heating (central heating and water)
prediction come through of a 60% increase.
Which sound ok on the face of it - however it's within a community heating scheme, which according to the email has been running at a 60% loss since it's introduction 7 years ago.
Ours are fridge, boiler, fish filter/pump, security system, router and a couple of 2w lights. The only things on standby in our house are the microwave, hob and oven. Everything else is off. Base load is 122w.
Seems a complaint, combined with raising the DD, had kicked shell into action to raise the refund request again.... It could still take 10 days to reach my bank and it's not the full amount which I asked for when I raised the complaint (rather the previously agreed amount) but if it's paid this time I'll not push it further. Blood and stone come to mind.
Is it just me or do others think the app is a pointless and stripped down version of the website? Usage for instance, website=monthly usage for gas and electric in kWh or in £s (would be daily if I had a smart meter). App= monthly combined cost 😕. Think I'll bin the app off
Today was most expensive so far 6kw of electricity and 34kw of gas.
Ah yeah we have fish, forgot about them.
Shell emailed us today. Our DD has been £200 per month for a while and we've ended up £350 in credit (this is including an EV.) From next month they're upping the DD to £252, but they'll also effectively be getting £66 on top of that for the next 6 months. So they think our bill needs to increase £118 in one month, despite us currently being in credit.
I was expecting to keep the DD at £200, let them add the £66 on and monitor how we get on for a few months.
I've just had the "conversation" with Bulb. In good credit now but they wanted to raise my monthly DD from 350 to 550 (which would be 616 with gov contribution). I tried to adjust down as I have done previously but the lowest allowable was 488. Not really wanting to give them a large interest free loan (and have had house re insulated and plan to save power/heat this year) I contacted them and the solution was to go onto pay as you use DD (which I didn't know existed). Might be a good option for some. I am in the fortunate position of being able to absorb the month by month changes and this stops me from getting into massive credit or debit.
Just had my Shell email to, DD rising from £165/month to £214 (am currently £430 in credit), looking back it went from £89 to £165 in June
has anyone received the £67 credit yet? as a british gas customer im led to believe it will be paid back in as a type of refund seperately? were now 11 days into october has anyone received it?
has anyone received the £67 credit yet? as a british gas customer im led to believe it will be paid back in as a type of refund seperately? were now 11 days into october has anyone received it?
Not from BG, who Im with for my gas, but Scottish Power just text and emailed to tell me the £67 was being sent to my bank account. I wasn't expecting to receive actual cash, I assumed bills would be adjusted etc.
What's to stop folk using this cash for something other than a gas or electric bill???
octopus just dropped my DD by £67 and said I could put it back up manually if I wanted to.
and looking at my account, there is a £66 credit.
£66 from EDF yesterday - paid into my account.
@boardinbob - thanks - my dads with eon and his is just coming off his bill apparently, but british gas is supposedly paying the £67 back into the bank account if you pay via DD - im not bothered really but id know where im at a bit more if i did get it as a refund as ill just keep it to one side, if it come off my bill id be confused as hell as to how much im actually using/charged as no doubt it would generate about 50 different bills knowing BG
I've had my £66 credited to my account (Bulb). Email from them on the 1st of Oct telling me the Energy Bills Support Scheme payment had been applied.
good news guys - i didnt really believe it but thats positive! least its a little nest egg to keep to one side for next year (im already almost £500 in credit)
Just checked my British Gas app and there's no sign of any credit or refund
EON really are a useless bunch of *insert popular group slur here*
Trying to get an account setup is like pulling teeth out of teeth. Going from a business account which was owned by the builder during construction to a domestic account means we will probably have a crazy estimate for our first months. We had been paying around £120 a month with £280 credit with Bulb. I fully expect it to double even after the gov grant.
EON were bloody useless when we moved too.
I had that 'going round in circles' conversation many times and they completely refused to accept I'd done the address switch online weeks before the move.
They'd even written to me at my new address to acknowledge - but no, that couldn't have happened!!! I sacked them off in the end and stayed with the previous home owners supplier.
Sounds about right. We have been on the phone to them, everything has been done at our end with meter readings and account details. Still no email to activate the online account. I think the address is all correct, they haven't queried it with us. I'm just worried those first few months will be crazy until a few months of correct meter readings settle it down. We have a smart meter in a box, I'm very reluctant to use it.
So I just checked the wattage of my pond pump. 38W which runs 24/7. I make that nearly 1Kw a day. Which is around a sixth of the whole house consumption. I am going to change the water at the start of November then turn it off until April. It's only goldfish not Koi. I'm sure they will be fine without a pump and filter running over winter.
I also used to have 40w of LED lights in the garden on a timer. Up to 8 hours a day from dusk to midnight. THey are already switched off.
Our 2021 Sept electricity was 225KWh. This year it was 186KWh. Removing the pond pump should get us down towards 150KWh which is a one third reduction achieved fairly painlessly.
Garden lights reduced. Pond pump off. Less use of tumble dryer. Careful to only fill kettle as much as required.
Amazes me that people fill kettles just to make one cup. It takes forever to boil!
Eon credited my energy account with the first £66 last week which means, I guess, that September's £47 gas/elec bill won't be DD'd on the 21st - and the £19 credit will be added to next month's £67 thus giving me another free month's utilities even at the new rates. Thanks, Liz!
(*Two hundred year old stone building high up in Calderdale).
I’m sure they will be fine without a pump and filter running over winter.
We just used to run pond aerator over winter, you may find that uses less energy while still keeping things healthy. Also helps to stop the pond freezing up.
You can even get solar powered ones - not sure how much use they'd be in winter though!
Trying to get an account setup is like pulling teeth out of teeth. Going from a business account which was owned by the builder during construction to a domestic account means we will probably have a crazy estimate for our first months.
I'm a year and a half since moving into our new build and in that time British Gas are still unable to properly transition us from the builder to our own personal setup. Latest debacle is them insisting our opening meter reading being 00000 despite it actually being about 00640 when we moved in and calling at the time to tell them. So glad I took a note of the reading. Utterly useless
Still waiting for my £66 prepayment meter voucher from EON 🙄
And still wondering if well ever find out how to get the £100 for oil heating...
Take photos of your meters, don't rely on the fact you told them, submitted online or have noted it down.
I had a nightmare with companies going bust, the meter being misread by a meter read (transposed 2 digits) and then all my submitted readings continually being ignored. Hours of phones calls to sort, only to revert again the following month. Apparently I was owed over £1k from previous supplier, only then to get hit with a baliffs letter demanding 300 from supplier who had gone bust and there website where I had submitted the readings had gone so no way to prove either way. Absolutely nightmare to deal with British Gas...
I take photos every month now, lessons learnt.