Hi Scott

I'm hoping to move into a 1 bedroom flat that uses economy 7 heating. I've read through some information on the internet and I am worried that the electricity bills may be quite high. I will need to do normal things during the peak hours such as shower, use hair dryer and straightners, cook meals, watch tv etc, which I cant do during the off-peak hours. I dont know who the current supplier is but I was wondering if you could give an average monthly price/estimate of the cost of the electricity?

I'm also concerned that there wont be enough hot water to shower or have a bath in the evenings! I have read that a 'booster' switch can be installed and was wondering how easy and expensive this would be?

Hope you can help.

Thanks in advance, Katy

My guess is £50 - £100 per month.

Normally I would expect a switch on the wall near a water cylinder to turn the water heater on and off. It is entirely up to you what times you turn it on or off. Obviously leaving it on all the time will be most expensive and putting it on for an hour during the cheap rate period will be the least expensive. You can fit all sorts of timers and devices in place of this switch as long as they are suitable for the load of the heater. It might be a 3kW heater with a thermostat which will use one unit of electricity for each 20 minutes that it is on.

You might also have an electric shower fitted in the bathroom. This will heat up the water as and when you use it.

Hello Katy,

I was interested in your post because I too lived in such a flat for twenty years. I thought you may appreciate a few tips from my experience.

1.) As long as the hot water tank is at least 110 litres, you should have enough water for an evening bath and a bowl of washing up water. I used to put my dishes in soak in the evening, go and have a bath, then come back and rinse the dishes with whatever lukewarm water was left in the tank. Also you have to develop an unusual way of running the bath!

Slowly run about four inches of water into the bath at a comfortable temperature and hop in. Then with the hot tap half on, stir the water with your hands, while controlling the temperature with the cold tap. (Have the water as hot as you can bear it.)

About every ten seconds, you must touch the hot tap to make sure the water has not gone cold, or you will give yourself a lukewarm bath. Obviously the moment it does, you must turn off both taps.

The reason for not having the hot water running fully, is so that the hot and cold water do not get mixed inside the cylinder.

2.) Showering: I presume that there is an instantaneous shower heater fitted. In my area, at least in the summer, the cheap rate continues until 7.30 am. Could you have a shower before this time?

3.) Most flats designed for economy 7 already have a booster switch combined with the cheap rate timer. If yours doesn't you can install an immersion heater timer from B&Q yourself. However, I think I can count the number of times I used the boost on one hand, as I soon got skilled with my bath routine!

4. If yours is a ground floor flat, start the washing machine about 7am. (They use about 90% of the power to heat the water in the first half hour.)

Hope this was helpful. good luck in your flat,

James

Hi Max and James

Thankyou both for your posts.

James I dont suppose you can plunge at a guess as to how much the bill would be, Max has guessed it could be up to £100 per month which is very expensive.

As I'm sure you can guess this is all new to me and I find it a bit baffling!

Katy

I put my old consumption figures into a price comparison website. 7200 night units and 1300 day. This gave a figure from EON of £575 a year.

James

Katy Robs:

FWIW I think most households will struggle to keep day rate consumption below 5000 units/year in an all electric house. If I'm right that's about £55/month plus £5/month standing charge.

The night rate is much harder to estimate because it depends mainly on how well (or poorly) the flat is insulated and how warm you like to keep it. The number of storage heaters and the size of the water storage cylinder is also relevant. A large storage heater will store up to about 20kWHrs so in winter that will cost up to about £36/month just for one heater. The flat could easily have 2 or 3, plus water heating.

How many heaters you use and how warm you keep the flat is up to you. Its impossible to estimate on an individual basis.

However if you do move in, take regular meter readings so that you are aware just how much energy you are using.