Recent large Electricity (ESB) & Gas (Bord Gais) Bills

Hi my last 2 esb bills have me baffled. October bill was 289, thats was a little high considering dh was home alone and in work most days and no heating or cooking!!!!!!. December went up to 550. feb bill 800e. My bills up to now were normaly between 250 and 400. 400 being xmas bill (always dearest) so it has doubled compared to last xmas. There is no aparent reason. I have compared my bill with 3 neighbours, and i seem to be using alot more units than them. Now were i can see that id use more day units the night units are double theres. we all have the same heating (storage) and are on night saver. I put my dishwasher and washing machine on at night but that it. How could i use 4000 units in the nightime? I rang them in december and the girl told me to check the reading cause it might be a diget out but it was right. We live in an apartment block but mine is a house and the metor is in the appartments. I have no gas all electic.

Comparing monetary values is of little use although quite understandable. You need to look at your usage pattern - the number of units billed each period. Have any of them been estimated? Are you able to access the meter and take regular meter readings? Can you tabulate, period for period, over the last two years what the readings and consumptions were and which if any were estimated?

Neither is there much to gain by checking your neighbours' bills. People with identical appliances can use electricity in very different ways depending on their family circumstances and readiness to economise.

My advice is to take daily readings for a week or so. These will tell you what you are using and you should, hopefully, be able to reduce your usage based on that knowledge.

Check out the ESB website (www.esb.ie) where there is a lot of very useful information on how to use electricity wisely.
 
Thanks for that, i just registered on esb website and had a look at the 18months, and the only ones that are significantly different is my december and feb bills. I dont have a key to the appartments or the metor box. i asked esb for a key for box and they said no the managment co should have 1 but they dont. And i supose i could ask some if i could make a copy of appartment key.
I was only really comparing the night because the heating system is the same and are set by esb, we all have water heating at 3-7in morning. Now i know there would be different things we each would use but surly it couldnt differ by 2000 units. Im going to try do a metor check when i can get my electrician friend down, its a bit of hassel cause i need some1 in appartment block and some1 switching appliances back on. No bills have ever been estimated. Thanks for the reply.
 
Frengg, is it possible to the ESB to "fix" meters at their end, if you get my drift....?


No, there is absolutely nothing untoward being done to ESB meters. The meter is a highly reliable and accurate recording instrument and if it records a large number of units in a particular period then it is up to the cusotmer to figure out what he/she was using to account for that usage. Forget about anything being wrong with the meter.

Regards,

Fnergg
 
Have to say my electricity bill took also a big jump - much bigger than the 20% rise they gave themselves. And I was more frugal this Christmas. No apparent logical reason for it.
 
Have to say my electricity bill took also a big jump - much bigger than the 20% rise they gave themselves. And I was more frugal this Christmas. No apparent logical reason for it.

There is of course always a logical reason for it - the trick is identifying it.

Are you comparing like with like? Check your usage for the same period last year - how many units did you use this year in comparison to last year? I would wager a lot more given that the increase was much bigger than 20% (the price increase effective from 1st August was 17.5% on average and like all price changes it was approved by the Regulator).

How many days were covered in the recent bill as opposed to the same billing period last year? Some winter bills can cover 70 odd days as opposed to the usual 60-64 days. A week's plus usage in winter can make a big difference.

Regards,

Fnergg
 
Thanks for that, i just registered on esb website and had a look at the 18months, and the only ones that are significantly different is my december and feb bills. .

Tina, beware of registering on the ESB site, did you know that once you do this they automatically stop sending you paper bills in the post?, I discoverd this recently, and don't get me wrong, I am not against e-billing, its just annoying the sneaky way the ESB are doing it, i.e they don't even tell you up front you will not get a paper bill anymore, especially when other providers offer an incentive (discount) to those who opt for e-billing.

For me it was the straw that "broke the camels back", I switched to Airtricity last week.

Btw, I don't beleive the ESB is fixing anyones meters, the reality is prices have skyrocketed in the last 6 months + we have had a very cold winter, and despite the fact that the ESB might have been kind to people over the years, the reality now is that our Electricity is the dearest in Europe.
Main reason over-reliance on fossil fuels and high taxes, some details can be found here:
http://www.finfacts.ie/irishfinancenews/article_1015242.shtml

In our financial sector we have had under regulation, while in the Energy sector we are now over-regulated, The regulator is responsible for fixing our energy prices based on Oil/Gas wholesale rates of six months ago and now due to the bureaucracy required to re-fix prices, the energy prices will drop in April, hah!, just when we will all be switching off our gas/oil heating and extra electric heaters, nice one , :-|

Now that there are at least three service providers in residential, there is a lot to be said for full de-regulation ?
 
Tina, beware of registering on the ESB site, did you know that once you do this they automatically stop sending you paper bills in the post?, I discoverd this recently, and don't get me wrong, I am not against e-billing, its just annoying the sneaky way the ESB are doing it, i.e they don't even tell you up front you will not get a paper bill anymore, especially when other providers offer an incentive (discount) to those who opt for e-billing.

For me it was the straw that "broke the camels back", I switched to Airtricity last week......

In our financial sector we have had under regulation, while in the Energy sector we are now over-regulated, The regulator is responsible for fixing our energy prices based on Oil/Gas wholesale rates of six months ago and now due to the bureaucracy required to re-fix prices, the energy prices will drop in April, hah!, just when we will all be switching off our gas/oil heating and extra electric heaters, nice one , :-|

Now that there are at least three service providers in residential, there is a lot to be said for full de-regulation ?


Re ESB's ebilling: I just checked their website and far from being sneaky they are upfront about the paper bills:

  • No more paper bills
  • 24 hour access to your account
  • Track your bill & usage history
Surely, from an environmental perspective it makes sense to discontinue them for ebilling customers? You can always print off a copy of one if required. Airtricty's ebilling service also means you only receive your bill online and given their green credentials it makes sense for them not to send paper bills as well.

Full de-regulation will not occur until the competition in the domestic sector is seen to be working i.e. when ESB's market share of the retail market falls below 50%. How long this will take is anyone's guess. I'd say about 4 years at least.

Regards,

Fnergg
 
Re ESB's ebilling: I just checked their website and far from being sneaky they are upfront about the paper bills:

  • No more paper bills
  • 24 hour access to your account
  • Track your bill & usage history
Fnergg

Ok, I stand corrected, I can't prove it but I am not sure they were upfront advertising the no paper bills bit,when I signed up to view my account online in December.


Surely, from an environmental perspective it makes sense to discontinue them for ebilling customers? You can always print off a copy of one if required. Airtricty's ebilling service also means you only receive your bill online and given their green credentials it makes sense for them not to send paper bills as well. Fnergg

Absolutely I fully agree, what I like about Airtricity is they reward and encourage customers for going to e-billing, its obviously also saving them money, so why can't ESB do the same?

Full de-regulation will not occur until the competition in the domestic sector is seen to be working i.e. when ESB's market share of the retail market falls below 50%. How long this will take is anyone's guess. I'd say about 4 years at least.Fnergg

Not sure I agree that the state should try to control it and wait that long, don' t think they took that approach with Eircom, IMO the extra bureaucracy is realling killing us now with huge energy costs, when we least need them.


Regards,

Fnergg[/quote]
 
Interesting my ESB bill went up over €100 as well and was surprised - I put it down to a broken Fridge so will be interested to see how much my next bill is as I have replaced the fridge.
 
Thanks for that i did notice that there would be no more paper bills. But i had to register as it was the only way i could veiw previous bill, but i thought it would be like a full bill and that i would be able to see the units but its just the amount the bill was. I asume i will get an email to tell me when my esb bill is available. Like eircom do, but i still get paper bill from them aswell.
I am going to change over but need to try to get to the bottom of the sudden increase, im still waiting on our electrican to come back down.

Regarding changing to board gas. A friend said she heard on the radio about changing over and that if you use allot of units in the day that you would be better sticking to esb. i will have to look into it before i change. God we are going around with our coats on cause i turned off the heating because thats all thats used at night and even though its on the night saver my night is dearer than the day. The odd time i will have the dishwasher and washing machine on after 11 but thats it. So im woolie jumpers and heavy jackets all round in this house!!!!!!!!
 
Tina, Customers can always revert back to paper bills by canceling online account. ESB online account provides soft copies of old bills back to 18months... So save all soft copy bills and cancel the online access.

From Terms & Conditions:
10. How to cancel your account online

If you would like to deregister from our online account service then simply email [email protected] at any time quoting your account number, name and address. Please give us 10 days notice, from which date we will cease sending you bill notification emails and presenting your bills online and will revert back to sending you paper bills by post.
 
Ah great thanks for the info. Its a pity that they dont do both the way eircom do. Thanks again
 
....But i had to register as it was the only way i could veiw previous bill, but i thought it would be like a full bill and that i would be able to see the units but its just the amount the bill was.....

Regarding changing to board gas. A friend said she heard on the radio about changing over and that if you use allot of units in the day that you would be better sticking to esb. i will have to look into it before i change..... /quote]

Tina,

You should be able to view a copy of every bill in pdf format as well. In the Bills and Payments section of the ESB's ebilling site you will see a column on the extreme right marked "bill". Double click on the symbol and the full bill details will appear. If it that doesn't happen you need to download Adobe Acrobat to your computer.

Regarding your friend's comments - they are incorrect. BGE's rates are cheaper.

Regards,

Fnergg
 
Thank Fnergg for the info. I will check out the esb website now. And as for my friend she must have took it up wrong. Thanks again.
 
Re: ESB & Bord Gais Bill

Going to have to source some alternate for next winter. Looking at solar to help run the UFH, so we won't be totally dependant on LPG. Neighbours was at 35 deg last week. Not bad for february?
 
Re: ESB & Bord Gais Bill

Just got our gas bill today, big shock went from 298 for previous 2 months to 521.00 from 6 Dec to 9th Feb - 66 days - almost E 8 per day. We were away for 10 days over Christmas so thought it wouldn't be too much higher than previous bill!
We have a new house and a condensing gas boiler. Have we it set wrong or did we really use double the gas??

Can't wait to see the ESB bill.....:(



Got a gas bill today for over e650,this is for a four bedroom house not a hotel.Boiler is a heat line, only a few months old ,maybe i have the settings wrong? Any advice|||
 
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