My electricity bill has just tripled: how about yours? Alternative suppliers?

[MickiQ]

Yeah that would explain it.

Also having read cupid_stunt 's link again it seems that they refund the £66 to your bank account once the DD has "cleared" so i think they are doing it that way to discourage people from cancelling their DD's.

British Gas have explicitly stated they will do that in an email though they haven't come clean about any motivation.

 

[Ranbay]

Yes, the good quality high power ones are finally a cost-effective improvement.
I'm only raising seedlings so I will stick with my somewhat crappy LED strips next year, but will put the whole lot on a timer.
It was a shock to learn my 12 volt 10 amp power supplies burn 11 watts just by themselves.

managed to bag a decent make 630w one for £400 so going to test her out first.

 

[cupid_stunt]

it seems that they refund the £66 to your bank account once the DD has "cleared" so i think they are doing it that way to discourage people from cancelling their DD's.

That's not the reason, because if you don't pay by DD it's credited to your account.

British Gas have explicitly stated they will do that in an email though they haven't come clean about any motivation.

The reason I've seen mentioned is it saves keep changing the DD amount and buggering up how the average across 12 months is calculated.

 

[Karl Masks]

Yeah that would explain it.

Also having read cupid_stunt 's link again it seems that they refund the £66 to your bank account once the DD has "cleared" so i think they are doing it that way to discourage people from cancelling their DD's.

How very Tory.

Well the last payment is January iirc so all bets will be off then as it will be the middle of winter and the most miserable time of year.

 

[cupid_stunt]

How very Tory.

Well the last payment is January iirc so all bets will be off then as it will be the middle of winter and the most miserable time of year.

The payments are over 6 months, Oct-Mar.

 

[Karl Masks]

The payments are over 6 months, Oct-Mar.

Happy to be corrected

 

[2hats]

Do you mean this kind of thing?

AmazonCommercial 400A AC Clamp Meter, 2000 Count https://amzn.eu/6W2mPqQ

That wouldn't be much use - no current reading. Was thinking more of the type of energy monitors that a lot of the power companies used to give away 10-15 years ago, using a current transformer clamp much like this sort of thing or this.

Alternatively, you can roll your own for a few quid (though you will need to calibrate it, but it may well then be more accurate than a COTS model for your own use).

​

 

[Leafster]

That wouldn't be much use - no current reading. Was thinking more of the type of energy monitors that a lot of the power companies used to give away 10-15 years ago, using a current transformer clamp much like this sort of thing or this.

Alternatively, you can roll your own for a few quid (though you will need to calibrate it, but it may then well be more accurate than a COTS model for your own use).

​

I was up in the loft at the weekend trying to clear some of the junk out and spotted one of energy monitors. I think I got it from NPower. I think I might get it down from the loft and see if it still works.

 

[kabbes]

Ta. Do you think it would be easy to install for somebody with relatively minimal skills? I don’t have to start wiring things up, do I? Does it tend to be fairly obvious?

 

[2hats]

Ta. Do you think it would be easy to install for somebody with relatively minimal skills? I don’t have to start wiring things up, do I? Does it tend to be fairly obvious?

Those CT clamp meter monitors? You just have to (gently, firmly) put the clamp on the correct chunky mains cable coming into your consumer unit (the live one typically, or as directed by the device instructions, of course). The only thing you might have to wire up is the clamp lead to the wireless box (that broadcasts the data to the meter display). Usually those are a simple plug to plug in. Otherwise, just AA[A] batteries to pop into each box. Even that homebrew suggestion is about as simple an electronics project as you could get.

 

[20Bees]

I got this energy monitor free from E.on around 10 years ago. I changed tariff a few times with them, then switched to Bulb, and am now half way through a 2 year fix with EDF. It was very easy to set up initially and each time I change tariff I enter the new rates. It isn’t switched on all the time, only when I’m inclined to check something specific. It’s only shortcoming is that the clock is slow, around 5 minutes behind within an hour of resetting it, but it’s unnecessary to the function anyway.



I’ve had it on this morning:
1. The ancient fridge-freezer running

2. The fridge-freezer switched off

3. The broadband router switched off


Always on at the mains are two Echo smart speakers, three Tapo smart plugs (Sky box, tv and a table lamp), and the main switch for the boiler (programmer, pump, 3-way valve, and wall thermostat). Everything else, apart from the fridge freezer, is unplugged or switched off at the wall.

 

[existentialist]

Ta. Do you think it would be easy to install for somebody with relatively minimal skills? I don’t have to start wiring things up, do I? Does it tend to be fairly obvious?

I have a Raspberry Pi-based thing that does it. No wiring involved - you put the clamp around one of the incoming power tails, plug it in, (presumably) get it to connect to your wifi, and you're off and running.

You definitely don't want to be doing wired-in power monitoring stuff on the business side of a consumer unit.

 

[2hats]

I have a Raspberry Pi-based thing that does it. No wiring involved - you put the clamp around one of the incoming power tails, plug it in, (presumably) get it to connect to your wifi, and you're off and running.

Once you trust the meter, or if you want to monitor that in parallel, and assuming you have a mains meter with the flashing 'flow rate' LED (X pulses per kWh), you could monitor that using a light dependent resistor.

 

[existentialist]

Once you trust the meter, or if you want to monitor that in parallel, and assuming you have a mains meter with the flashing 'flow rate' LED (X pulses per kWh), you could monitor that using a light dependent resistor.

That's probably assuming a level of electronic construction ability I'm not sure even I have, and I'll try most things once

 

[Ranbay]

So SSE are paying me the £66 tomorrow and not just knocking off my bill?

Seems strange

 

[gentlegreen]

Counting those LED pulses appeals to me - I'm fairly sure it occured to me before - perhaps I'll cobble something together using my PC rather than a dedicated data-logger - since the PC is on all day when I'm not in bed and mostly I'm using my local plug-in thingy and reading the meter downstairs once a day is not a problem ... I doubt that level of monitoring is of much benefit in a single-person household...

Meanwhile I was sitting here idly poking my non-contact mains tester around and realised I had a distinctly warm 24 volt supply permanently plugged-in for under-bench lighting I hardly ever use ...

 

[cupid_stunt]

So SSE are paying me the £66 tomorrow and not just knocking off my bill?

Seems strange

That's OVO policy, they own SSE, it's been covered up thread, see top of this page.

 

[Ranbay]

That's OVO policy, they own SSE, it's been covered up thread, see top of this page.

Ohhhh... im going to spend mine on drugs.

 

[cupid_stunt]

Ohhhh... im going to spend mine on drugs.

That's the sort of reason why I've increased my DD from £1 to £67, I want it paying the bills and not getting spent elsewhere.

 

[Ranbay]

That's the sort of reason why I've increased my DD from £1 to £67, I want it paying the bills and not getting spent elsewhere.

Buy drugs, - cut drugs, - sell drugs = profit

spend profit on more drugs

 

[Leafster]

Meanwhile I was sitting here idly poking my non-contact mains tester around and realised I had a distinctly warm 24 volt supply permanently plugged-in for under-bench lighting I hardly ever use ...

I've got the smartpower meter down from the loft and set up.

It's suggesting a daytime background power consumption of around 200w. That's with the usual suspects running - PC, server, router and Sonos along with the usual things on standby.

I think I'll look more closely at the weekend to see what's actually drawing the most just in case I've left something running I don't actually need.

 

[Thora]

Can anyone give me some advice?
We moved in to a new house in June and so are on a 'deemed tariff' with EDF paying a monthly bill - currently about £35 gas and £75 electric.
EDF want me to move to a standard variable tariff and pay by direct debit of £174 - they say bills would become £188 a month if I just paid monthly I think. Obviously we haven't had the heating on yet so I'm not sure if going to £174 is the best thing to do?
Any suggestions?

 

[cupid_stunt]

Can anyone give me some advice?
We moved in to a new house in June and so are on a 'deemed tariff' with EDF paying a monthly bill - currently about £35 gas and £75 electric.
EDF want me to move to a standard variable tariff and pay by direct debit of £174 - they say bills would become £188 a month if I just paid monthly I think. Obviously we haven't had the heating on yet so I'm not sure if going to £174 is the best thing to do?
Any suggestions?

Paying by DD is cheaper, and £14pm/£168pa is a decent saving TBF, I would grab that, you can always adjust the DD down or get a refund if you build up too much credit.

 

[Thora]

We used to pay £99 a month. Painful

 

[cesare]

My electric usage power meter arrived today so I'm testing now. Early shock this morning was that an insect zapper (problem with mossies) that we've had on all day every day since June uses the same kwh as a kettle It's now unplugged.

On the +ve side the airfryer is using less kwh than I expected, I'll edit to add what it is.

 

[cupid_stunt]

We used to pay £99 a month. Painful

Well I live on my own, but in a big 2-bed bungalow, and I was paying £60pm this time 2 years ago, that would be £157pm now, if it wasn't for the £400 grant over the winter, and the introduction of some major energy saving measures.

 

[Karl Masks]

Jake Berry just says get a better job or use less energy. Stop whining plebs.

He should know, he's the Tory party chair.

And cunt

 

[iona]

BTW is there an official "chimney blocking bag" available. I tend to put books & old copies of the FT up but that seems to attract mice. And very messy to take back down in summer. Must be a lot of hot air goes up uncapped chimneys.

You can get a kind of balloon thing

Eg Keep warm air in and cold air out with Chimney Balloon! - Chimney Balloon

This isnt a reference just the first useful hit on Google

There's also wool ones called chimney sheep which are good

 

[Storm Fox]

Jake Berry just says get a better job or use less energy. Stop whining plebs.

He should know, he's the Tory party chair.

And cunt

What pisses me off about this comment Jake makes, in addition to being completely shitty in themselves.
If everyone got the ( non-existent for the number of people he is talking about )high-paying jobs. Who does he think is going to do these currently low-paid but vital jobs? I'm sure he'd soon start moaning to Waitrose management if there were gaps on the shelves or had to clean his own office.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

So after a nightmare years ago I've never paid by direct debit. But I see even Octopus offer a discount for them, which they didn't when we signed up.

If you have a smart meter is done so it takes the exact amount you've used rather then what they think they should?