1 Topic by William (edited by William 2022-12-02 17:25:35)

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Topic: Electricity bills in the United Kingdom

The media keeps on about £2500 per year average cost.

There is also the media-stated £400 to each household, spread over 6 months, at £66, £66, £67, £67, £67, £67.

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However, I am finding this somewhat different.

It appears that 17p per unit is being deducted from cost. The 17p appears to be the difference between what I am being charged and what I would have been charged if the Ofgen price cap values had been used.

It is not clear whether this is in addition to the £66.

I appear to have received the £66 for October 2022 but not for November 2022.

However, my reading, has been logged as for 1 November to 29 November, so I am wondering if the £66 only gets credited when electricity for every day of the month has been charged. That would seem a reasonable way to do it.

Can readers please say what experiences they have had please over electricity bills since 1 October 2022 please?

I do not have a smart meter. I have economy 7. I send in readings in an email each month. Nobody has arrived to try to read the meter since before lockdown started in March 2020. I always send accurate readings, day and night readings.

Please don't say to ask the supplier! sad I know! I know! smile

William

  • Alfred
  • Alfred
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Re: Electricity bills in the United Kingdom

You should have received the £66 by the end of the calendar month, irrespective of when your billing month begins and ends.

"Has it ever struck you that life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quick you hardly catch it going?"
― Tennessee Williams
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Re: Electricity bills in the United Kingdom

Thank you.

For me, there is not congruently a fixed billing month.

I get a reminder email to send a reading about the 23rd of each calendar month.

Notionally my readings are due on 28th of each month. I wanted the last day of each month but they could not dp that as they had to have a day in the month number that is in every month, so the 28th as a compromise. I could have chosen any number from 1 to 28.

In practice I send it sometime within a week of that. At a ratechangetide big_smile , I send an extra one on the final day of the month, such as 31 March and 30 September, gathering the day reading near to midnight.

I send two readings.

Night is from 10:30 am GMT to 7:30 am GMT.
Day is from 7:30 am GMT to 00:30 am GMT the next day.

So in BST (British summer time) that is 01:30 am to 8:30 am and 8:30 am to 01:30  am the bext day on clocks.

The meter is above the back door with a liquid crystal display.

The display shows the reading for the tariff in use (ie night or day).

There is a blue button that can be pressed to give all the available data, press by press, shown for a while, then drops back.

But there are various things like the date, the sum modulo one hundred thousand of the two readings, and the two readings.

So I usually gather readings by noting the night reading just before switchover of tariffs and the day reading after switchover of tariffs. Not only does this meamn that I do not need to push the blue button, it makes it easier, because I usually need to shine the flashlight of my mobile phone on nthe display to be able to view it clearly.

Thus far the supplier has accepted my word of what are the readings as nobody else has read the meter since before the 2020 lockdown. The readings are correct.

As it happens, as I want/need a warm house, my bills are somewhat larger than the media headline annual cost, so maybe the large size of the bills means they have no concerns over the credibility of the readings.

Maybe they have it programmed that the £66 gets credited when the electricity for the last day of the month has been charged. That would seem a sensible way to do it. I gathered the readings on 30 November 2022, but as they always treat it as up to the end of the day before the readings are taken, the bill goes up to 29 November 2022.

William

  • Alfred
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Re: Electricity bills in the United Kingdom

William wrote:

For me, there is not congruently a fixed billing month.
I get a reminder email to send a reading about the 23rd of each calendar month.
Notionally my readings are due on 28th of each month.

As usual, I am unsure about the significance of the word ‘congruently’ here. That aside, if your readings are notionally due on the 28th of each month, then I would say that your billing month ends on that date.

"Has it ever struck you that life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quick you hardly catch it going?"
― Tennessee Williams
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Re: Electricity bills in the United Kingdom

The "not congruently" is because it is not always exactly a calendar month. In practice, anything from about 27 days to 33 days. So I send a reading some time towards the end of each calendar month. So, basically once a month, but not exactly one calendar month, like not exactly on the 28th of the month every month. So if I notice the reminder and I happen to be up early, I go and do it. If I feel I want some breakfast first I don't do it that day. I know that if it gets to the end of the month and i have not done it at switch over, then it will need to be done during the day, which takes longer as i need to keep pushing the blue button, which i cannot reach directly so I need to push it with a cardboard box, to get to the correct reading, then use the light to see it, and the display times out, so what with changing from box to mobile phone and the timeout issue interacting, there is an incentive to gather the readings at switch over time.

William