How long is your household storage heater on at night?

Hello,

I would realy like to get some feedback from people using nightsaver ESB and storage heaters.

• How long is your heater "storing" the heat for at night? Does it keep going for the duration of nightsaver(11-8/12-9), or is it set to only be on for a couple of hours?
• Is there a timer accessible to you to set how long the heater comes on for?
• What is your average bill for storage heating per two months, and how many heaters do you have?

I would really appreciate any replies, as I am having a real problem with our heaters and the ESB is being extremely unhelpful. I have read the Storage Heater key-post, but my question is more precise than the information offered there.

Thanks in advance all!

Im in my apartment just over 6 months now! The first 2 mths using the convector part (instant heat) of the heaters cost €175..i then switched to using the storage heating on the nightsave rate as supposedly it was better value..next bill €320
The storage part switches on at 11pm at night, im not sure how long it stores it for but as the dial goes from 1-5, i cannot switch it off completely i.e. no 0 button. Therefore it continues to "leak" out heat throughout the next day, so when i got home from work at 7pm there was little or no heat left in it so i had to switch on the convector which defeats the purpose obviously of storage. If you're only in your place for a few hrs in the evening use the instant heat rather than storing up heat for hours and hours thats just wasted the nxt day if you;re not there...it works out cheaper for me!

Thank you for your reply. Indeed there is also no 0 button on mine, and despite being in the house during the day, the cost of the nightsaver storage heater alone is absolutely ridiculous. I would really like to encourage a survey on this matter here, so as many responses as possible would be great, as I think that I have uncovered a seriously unethical energy policy and I need as much info as possible to see if it is the case on average. I will divulge more as the answers come in

Our bills are between 80 and 100 euro per 2 months but a lot of them are estimated, I've never got one for more than 150 though! If we're not in the apartment during the day we would usually just turn on the boost for a couple of hours in the evening and use the storage at the weekends. I find if we turn on the storage it does leak out during the day before we get home but if it's a cold spell and we leave it on for 3 nights then the apartment is lovely and warm all the time. I think the idea of storage heating is that you turn it on and leave it on all the time so you get a steady level of heat all of the time. You can adjust this at the fuse board by turning the little knob with the plus and minus signs. I would love to have gas or oil heating but living in an apartment block you can't be too choosy.

Thank you Marianne! I know the troubles of living in an apartment only too well...thank you for the information.

Anyone else getting ridiculous bills for storage heating? I'm taking €250+...

My partner has storage heaters and they appear to work well. He leaves them on constantly during the winter months. When he goes to bed he turns the output down to Zero. He leaves input constantly at 6 (max). When he comes home from work he turns output up to 6. The ESB bill doubles from approx €70 to €140 for his 2 bed apartment during the priod in which he has the heaters on. (Nov - April give or take a couple of weeks)

Thank you pugwall, that seems to be quite a different story to everyone else here, Do you know if the storage heaters heat all night(11-8/12-9) in that apartment?

Anybody else think that having them on all night is both costly and wasteful?

Thank you pugwall, that seems to be quite a different story to everyone else here, Do you know if the storage heaters heat all night(11-8/12-9) in that apartment?

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No... but the apartment appears to be really well insulated and there never seems to be a need for extra heat.

My storage heaters will kick in at different times depending on the temperature. Colder nights they seem to kick in approx 11/12 and then when it's warmer they will keck in much earlier.

The max ESB nill I get during the winter for a 2 bed apt is approx 180

Off peak storage heaters should be capable of storing most of the heat until it is required.

The only ones that really do that with little loss of heat are the
ones with low level vents from which the heat is pushed out by a fan.

Unfortunately they cost a little more therefore may not be often used.