Airtricity Bill €400+ every 2 months!?

CelticRaven163

I am having a dispute with my landlord over my electricity bill. I'm a student and at the end of the year was handed an electricity bill for 1630 (Split between the 3 tenants) for 8th months usage from Oct-May. This seems massively high. I'm a 4th yr medical student and have never paid more than 200euro for an academic year. My landlord simply repeats "thats what the bill says" and "i'll just take it out of the security deposit". Because I'm not the bill payer (it's in the landlords name) I can't get anywhere with airtricity. Does any one have any ideas to help or am I screwed?

Deco99

CelticRaven163 wrote: »

I am having a dispute with my landlord over my electricity bill. I'm a student and at the end of the year was handed an electricity bill for 1630 (Split between the 3 tenants) for 8th months usage from Oct-May. This seems massively high. I'm a 4th yr medical student and have never paid more than 200euro for an academic year. My landlord simply repeats "thats what the bill says" and "i'll just take it out of the security deposit". Because I'm not the bill pay (it''s in the landlords name) I can't get anywhere with airtricity. Does any one have any ideas to help or an I screwed?

Ask him for a copy of the bill first.

CelticRaven163

The best I got was fuzzy mobile phone photo's from the landlord. No where in the pictures i was sent does it indicate if the bills are estimates or actual readings.

brembo26

Doesnt seem that high to be fair. Most of your usage was in the winter season. How were ye heating the place?

CelticRaven163

There was a storage heater but this was turned off in early February and the bill was still 200+ a month afterwords. also in December the house was empty, heating was off, no tenants and the bill was still 220 for that month..

brembo26

Sounds like there may be estimates involved. Tell him to forward on a copy of each bill. If he tries to take it from the security deposit I would be contacting the PRTB.

Those storage heaters are expensive though. Me and another guy rented a 2 bed apt which had 2 storage heaters on over the 2 month billing period and ended up costing us in around €350. We were both working so we were only watching tv, using laptops and cooking for a short time each evening.

The_Morrigan

Tell the landlord you want a legible version of the bill or bills before you will pay towards the bill...if he refuses and deducts from your deposit start the PRTB process against him for refusing to return your deposit.

shruikan2553

Thats not really expensive. In act I would see it as very cheap. Storage heaters are pricey. No idea how you were getting away with 200 for academic year.

ted1

Its expensive but not excessive. Really the bills should be in your names and paid every time that they arrived

The_Morrigan

shruikan2553 wrote: »

Thats not really expensive. In act I would see it as very cheap. Storage heaters are pricey. No idea how you were getting away with 200 for academic year.

ted1 wrote: »

Its expensive but not excessive. Really the bills should be in your names and paid every time that they arrived

200 euro a month isn't expensive? Taking into account that for one month they should really only have the standing charges as the place was unoccupied - making the monthly cost even higher.
There are two of us living here (I'm unemployed so home all day too) and the electricity & gas bill are never more than 100 per month - granted we do not have storage heaters.

ted1

The_Morrigan wrote: »

200 euro a month isn't expensive? Taking into account that for one month they should really only have the standing charges as the place was unoccupied - making the monthly cost even higher.
There are two of us living here (I'm unemployed so home all day too) and the electricity & gas bill are never more than 100 per month - granted we do not have storage heaters.

I said expensive but not excessive.

My bill is 140 every 2 months but 4 students could unwillingly rack up a bill of 200 a month.

If they didn't move the bill to their name they would not be receiving te discounted rate suppliers offer. If they are using incandescent lamps and old appliances, if the immersion is keftvin and other electric heating is on its quiet believable.

Ger Byrne 1

it seams a bit high but if heaters and immersion going all the time no problem

Grandpa Hassan

You need to see the actual bill, for sure. And make sure it's not estimated

But I agree with the others. It's on the high side, but I can see how a bill like that can be easily racked up

makeorbrake

The_Morrigan wrote: »

Tell the landlord you want a legible version of the bill or bills before you will pay towards the bill.

That's reasonable. However, I assume you can access the meter in the house? I also assume a reading was taken upon moving in to the property? Between that and checking the unit rates on the bill, you can figure it out quite easily.


Presumably, estimates have caused this issue. It's a shame - as this could have been avoided. Not with airtricity right now but when I was with them, they sent me email and txt reminders to submit a reading. It doesn't take more than a couple of minutes to do this- and have deadly accurate billing as a result.

shruikan2553

The_Morrigan wrote: »

200 euro a month isn't expensive? Taking into account that for one month they should really only have the standing charges as the place was unoccupied - making the monthly cost even higher.
There are two of us living here (I'm unemployed so home all day too) and the electricity & gas bill are never more than 100 per month - granted we do not have storage heaters.

oops sorry, thought he meant over the 8 months. Was wondering how he managed that.


That amount every 2 months is quite high. Our never went above 250 euro with 3 people and that was winter with water and storage heaters.

You need to look through the bills and see where estimates were made.

BonkeyDonker

makeorbrake wrote: »

That's reasonable. However, I assume you can access the meter in the house? I also assume a reading was taken upon moving in to the property? Between that and checking the unit rates on the bill, you can figure it out quite easily.


Presumably, estimates have caused this issue. It's a shame - as this could have been avoided. Not with airtricity right now but when I was with them, they sent me email and txt reminders to submit a reading. It doesn't take more than a couple of minutes to do this- and have deadly accurate billing as a result.

The one thing that would really annoy me was the fact that the LL did not come looking for it regularly, as A) it would have been for smaller amounts and B)you would probably have been more aware of the cost of electricity and used less, resulting in even lower bills.

When i was with Airtricity I found that unless I sent in the meter reading they just guessed (and always guessed high) the readings.

As for the bill itself - I share an apartment which is all electric and my bills are @100-110 per month (that's level pay). However, we do not use the storage heaters as we are on the third floor, and luckily heat rises - for that bill we usually get 2-3 showers a day (over night heating) and the usual cooker/lighting/tv etc etc.

I can easily see an additional person upping this, especially if you use space heaters as they are very expensive.

Like the above posters said get a physical copy of the bill first.

makeorbrake

BonkeyDonker wrote: »

When i was with Airtricity I found that unless I sent in the meter reading they just guessed (and always guessed high) the readings.

I bet - doesn't surprise me. Although I wanted to submit readings anyway (initially, there as a need to share the bill), later when there was no such need, I stuck to the routine of always submitting readings. I had a fair idea that otherwise, they would go for a high estimate rather than a low one (as it means they can hold all that excess cash on account - and have the opportunity value of all that cash...over their entire customer base, it must add up to a fair amount).

Sarn

Strangely enough Airtricity estimated my usage over three months as zero units of electricity used. That's the problem with living somewhere where you don't have access to the meter. The bill was still €54 with standing charges and levy alone.

the_syco

Whilst living there, did you have access to the meter?

Mrs OBumble

shruikan2553 wrote: »

That amount every 2 months is quite high. Our never went above 250 euro with 3 people and that was winter with water and storage heaters.

Agreed.

Two person apartment, storage heating and immersion (no elec shower), our worst was E180 over winter.

We're on the cheap side 'cos it's the middle of the city, lots of ambient heat from surrounding buildings. But still.

Grandpa Hassan

The two tenants in my flat in Dublin ran up a €300 bill for March and April. When I investigated, it was because of two things. The timer had been moved as was heating water in the daytime rather than at nighttime and a short boost in the evening. I have subsequently fixed it so that it can't be moved.

But the biggest thing was that the shower head was old, and was letting through too much water, emptying the tank and needing more use of the immersion. The purchase of an eco shower head has made all the difference and the bill for the last two months was under €100.

So my advice: check your shower head

Michael D Not Higgins

Grandpa Hassan wrote: »

The two tenants in my flat in Dublin ran up a €300 bill for March and April. When I investigated, it was because of two things. The timer had been moved as was heating water in the daytime rather than at nighttime and a short boost in the evening. I have subsequently fixed it so that it can't be moved.

But the biggest thing was that the shower head was old, and was letting through too much water, emptying the tank and needing more use of the immersion. The purchase of an eco shower head has made all the difference and the bill for the last two months was under €100.

So my advice: check your shower head

I hate those dribbly showers. You have to run around to get wet.

Grandpa Hassan

Michael D Not Higgins wrote: »

I hate those dribbly showers. You have to run around to get wet.

Eco shower's aren't dribbly!! I think you are thinking of something else. They are brilliant. They use less water as they mix air into the water jets. They are as good as any power shower

Michael D Not Higgins

Grandpa Hassan wrote: »

Eco shower's aren't dribbly!! I think you are thinking of something else. They are brilliant. They use less water as they mix air into the water jets. They are as good as any power shower

Fair enough, maybe the newer devices are better but anything purporting to save water/energy for a shower I've used before has been woeful.

L1011

Aerated showers use more power as the water needs to be hotter in the first place as the ambient air cools it - they save on water, absolutely not on energy. They're also less thermostatically stable as the air warms up in the room during the shower meaning you end up needing to fiddle with the dial during it.

Grandpa Hassan

MYOB wrote: »

Aerated showers use more power as the water needs to be hotter in the first place as the ambient air cools it - they save on water, absolutely not on energy. They're also less thermostatically stable as the air warms up in the room during the shower meaning you end up needing to fiddle with the dial during it.

That is not necessarily true. It depends what kind of water heating system you have. If you have a tank, which heats up overnight, then the aerated shower uses less hot water = less use of the immersion when the hot water runs out if the shower is being used a couple of times a day = much lower electric bill. Has certainly made a big change to mine.

And most apartments have water tanks

L1011

Grandpa Hassan wrote: »

That is not necessarily true. It depends what kind of water heating system you have. If you have a tank, which heats up overnight, then the aerated shower uses less hot water = less use of the immersion when the hot water runs out if the shower is being used a couple of times a day = much lower electric bill. Has certainly made a big change to mine.

And most apartments have water tanks

No... you have to increase the flow of hot water so you use more hot water. It is not physically possible for it to use less hot water.

You have obviously changed other habits in relation to immersion use as otherwise you are breaching the laws of thermodynamics.

Sleepy

How's the insulation on the house? Double Glazing?

For an old 3 bed terrace with a family of four we pay an average of 400 every bill because our heating is old fashioned storage heaters and the insulation is terrible.

Grandpa Hassan

MYOB wrote: »

No... you have to increase the flow of hot water so you use more hot water. It is not physically possible for it to use less hot water.

You have obviously changed other habits in relation to immersion use as otherwise you are breaching the laws of thermodynamics.

Why would you increase the water flow? The whole point of them is that they decrease the water flow. 60% less according to Which magazine in some cases. We must be talking about different things

Whats the point in switching your shower head for one that uses more water?

L1011

Grandpa Hassan wrote: »

Why would you increase the water flow? The whole point of them is that they decrease the water flow. 60% less according to Which magazine in some cases. We must be talking about different things

Whats the point in switching your shower head for one that uses more water?

We're not talking about different things.

They decrease the overall water flow, by introducing air to the mix. That air is room temperature - which is much colder than you're showering at.

This means that you need to significantly increase the proportion of hot to cold water to regain the same temperature as you had before.

Effectively you use more hot water and less to no cold water. They do nothing for heating bills at all, if anything they make them worse.

Grandpa Hassan

MYOB wrote: »

We're not talking about different things.

They decrease the overall water flow, by introducing air to the mix. That air is room temperature - which is much colder than you're showering at.

This means that you need to significantly increase the proportion of hot to cold water to regain the same temperature as you had before.

Effectively you use more hot water and less to no cold water. They do nothing for heating bills at all, if anything they make them worse.

In my case I have hot water now for 4 or 5 showers rather than 2 before the hot water starts to run out. Old shower head was obviously letting through too much water. In the 4 inches between the shower head and my body, I doubt the water cools too much

L1011

Grandpa Hassan wrote: »

In my case I have hot water now for 4 or 5 showers rather than 2 before the hot water starts to run out. Old shower head was obviously letting through too much water. In the 4 inches between the shower head and my body, I doubt the water cools too much

The water is cooled significantly in the shower head by the aeration process - distance has nothing to do with it. These things work entirely by putting air in to the water stream, which cools it, requiring more hot water. No two ways about it - they use more hot water despite using less water overall.

You have either changed other habits relating to water consumption or time in the shower; or you've managed to violate the laws of physics - the Nobel Prize has a nice cash element if you want to go for it :pac:

edanto

@celticraven163 - tell us a bit about the storage heaters.

Do you use them just on the 'storage' setting where they charge up on night electricity and then release during the day OR do you use them on the boost setting where you just flick the switch when you want heat and they heat up instantly like radiators? The second way uses a lot more power, and if a few of them were on like that for a few hours each evening (or left on in one persons room), you could easily reach €200/month

On top of that then you have immersion - how many hours is it timed to come on for each night, was it accidentally left on sink/bath for a few hours/days a few times?

Presuming it's a house (since there's 3 of you), is it old or well-insulated?

At the very least, you should have a meter reading from when you moved in (normally recorded on the lease) and then you can check the current reading. I think it would be stupid for a landlord to lie about meter readings since they could so easily be found out, but anythings possible.

Can you give more details about typical power use in the house/apartment?

brembo26

edanto wrote: »

Do you use them just on the 'storage' setting where they charge up on night electricity and then release during the day OR do you use them on the boost setting where you just flick the switch when you want heat and they heat up instantly like radiators? The second way uses a lot more power, and if a few of them were on like that for a few hours each evening (or left on in one persons room), you could easily reach €200/month

Never even thought to ask this, very good point. A lot of people dont know how to use storage heaters properly.

Michael D Not Higgins

brembo26 wrote: »

Never even thought to ask this, very good point. A lot of people dont know how to use storage heaters properly.

I even rented a place in Dublin before with storage heaters that didn't have a night rate electricity meter. Useless.

Firstly they never warmed the place properly and secondly they cost a fortune. I've avoided storage heaters like the plague since.

CelticRaven163

@edanto There was two storage heaters. They had no boost function. They charged at night. The storage heaters were turned off on the 14th Feb onwards and the bills were still 200+ a mth afterwards.

As for the immersion when we moved in the timer was broken for the first month. It was fixed by the landlord but the timer we did not have access to. It was supposed to heat for 2hrs in the early morning 5-7am. All we had access to was the booster function (So the immersion was not on all day). We never checked the meter when we moved in we were told by neighbours that their electricity last year was ~€120 each(4 in an apartment) for the academic year the year before and they had storage heaters and the same immersion system we had. We used that as an estimate of how much ours would be, so I put 200 aside just in case and then got this bill for €421 =( .

The apartments less than 10 years old, very well insulated (hence why the heaters went off in Feb). Me and my girlfriend both study in the hospital and have to be in from 8am not getting back til 9pm+ so we were sitting around all day watching a flatscreen etc. The 4th tenant dropped out in Feb (he was a 1st year) and was barely in the house before that.

We've all been out of the house since mid may and were given this bill when we asked for the security deposit so I have no access to the meter. I will be more diligent in future I guess.

Anyways Guys and Girls thanks for all your time. The Landlords agreed to query the bill but has assured me it'll come back the same =[, unless there a miracle i'm just gonna have to take this as a lesson learned.

brembo26

Well something is amiss somewhere. I hope it gets sorted for you or at least get provided with a breakdown of the bill.

The_Morrigan

Folks, could you please take the eco shower discussion to it's own thread or pm, you're derailing this thread.

Thanks

Mrs OBumble

CelticRaven163 wrote: »

@edanto There was two storage heaters. They had no boost function. They charged at night. The storage heaters were turned off on the 14th Feb onwards and the bills were still 200+ a mth afterwards.

Something seriously wrong there.

Rips

I'm having a similar problem with them, but I've given up and I'm paying off the bill and switching suppliers.

Our storage heaters were on timers, as is our water heater ( over the winter it was for 1hour at 5am) We have no washing machine/tumbledryer.

We've been billed for €1200 worth of use for the first two months of the year.
Airtricity agree this amount of usage is something a commercial business would struggle to attain, and suggest our metre has been tampered with. It hasn't that we can see. Every customer service agent has a different story.
One even tried to tell me there was a balance carried over from the previous tenants underestimations!!

We were charged €200 total from a period extending from August to December, and in Janaury, without any metre readings, we got a bill estimation for €1600, and then it turned out the actual bill was €1200

You tell me how that works.

melekalikimaka

Rips wrote: »

I'm having a similar problem with them, but I've given up and I'm paying off the bill and switching suppliers.

Our storage heaters were on timers, as is our water heater ( over the winter it was for 1hour at 5am) We have no washing machine/tumbledryer.

We've been billed for €1200 worth of use for the first two months of the year.
Airtricity agree this amount of usage is something a commercial business would struggle to attain, and suggest our metre has been tampered with. It hasn't that we can see. Every customer service agent has a different story.
One even tried to tell me there was a balance carried over from the previous tenants underestimations!!

We were charged €200 total from a period extending from August to December, and in Janaury, without any metre readings, we got a bill estimation for €1600, and then it turned out the actual bill was €1200

You tell me how that works.

moving suppliers because of high readings doesnt slove the problem, you are aware of this, your issue is with networks.

Rips

melekalikimaka wrote: »

moving suppliers because of high readings doesnt slove the problem, you are aware of this, your issue is with networks.

No, but we might get some transparency in our billing, its taken 5 months of phonecalls, having various copies of bills and receipts for payments sent out to us to reach an agreement. Not to mention that every time we called, despite remaining polite and civil we were treated like the scum of the earth for having an outstanding bill.

I've received numerous incorrect bills (online billing) and the customer service agents can't keep their story straight.

(Edit: I was withholding payment until the matter was clarified)

melekalikimaka

Rips wrote: »

No, but we might get some transparency in our billing, its taken 5 months of phonecalls, having various copies of bills and receipts for payments sent out to us to reach an agreement. Not to mention that every time we called, despite remaining polite and civil we were treated like the scum of the earth for having an outstanding bill.

I've received numerous incorrect bills (online billing) and the customer service agents can't keep their story straight.

(Edit: I was withholding payment until the matter was clarified)

What might I ask wasn't transparent from your original bills?

ted1

melekalikimaka wrote: »

moving suppliers because of high readings doesnt slove the problem, you are aware of this, your issue is with networks.

Airtricity are prone to misbilling so it actually might

Michael D Not Higgins

ted1 wrote: »

Airtricity are prone to misbilling so it actually might

They can only misbill if they're working off estimates. In which case, submitting meter readings would prevent that.

ted1

Michael D Not Higgins wrote: »

They can only misbill if they're working off estimates. In which case, submitting meter readings would prevent that.

No, Airtricity are extremely incompetent and do misbill even if given the correct t details. I do a lot of bill verifications for large energy users and see it often

Caliden

ted1 wrote: »

No, Airtricity are extremely incompetent and do misbill even if given the correct t details. I do a lot of bill verifications for large energy users and see it often

What's the best way to verify a bill then?

I submit meter readings as often as I can but can't shake the feeling that I'm getting over charged.

Rips

Billing for the wrong period, and just plain and simple misbilling. On their website, the payments or balances on the account are shown on a different page to the usage, and they are often errors.

I've had emails for totally random amounts then as well.

Not to mention that after the account was open for a year, they automatically credited the security deposit back onto the account with no notification (just before the winter) meaning the balance of the bill we received was negligible, leaving us to believe we were in good standing, when infact we had used a considerable amount of energy €300+ and since we didn't know, and didn't make any attempt to conserve energy, or change our timers etc and our next bill was quite a surprise.

In my experience you have to spell it out for them. I requested receipts for payments I had made over the phone etc and emailed screen shots of the errors... this is one example;

melekalikimaka

Rips wrote: »

Billing for the wrong period, and just plain and simple misbilling. On their website, the payments or balances on the account are shown on a different page to the usage, and they are often errors.

I've had emails for totally random amounts then as well.

Not to mention that after the account was open for a year, they automatically credited the security deposit back onto the account with no notification (just before the winter) meaning the balance of the bill we received was negligible, leaving us to believe we were in good standing, when infact we had used a considerable amount of energy €300+ and since we didn't know, and didn't make any attempt to conserve energy, or change our timers etc and our next bill was quite a surprise.

In my experience you have to spell it out for them. I requested receipts for payments I had made over the phone etc and emailed screen shots of the errors... this is one example;

they are shown on different pages to take reversals into account? pretty standard practice by all supplier. as for the deposit, you clearly were not reading your bills correctly, all the information was clearly liad out in your bills, but you did not read them, thats not misbilling or over estimating, its lack of monitoring, do you expect them to send a letter everytime a read is reversed or deposit taken off? why was the deposit removed? i assume it was due to dd details?

Rips

melekalikimaka wrote: »

they are shown on different pages to take reversals into account? pretty standard practice by all supplier. as for the deposit, you clearly were not reading your bills correctly, all the information was clearly liad out in your bills, but you did not read them, thats not misbilling or over estimating, its lack of monitoring, do you expect them to send a letter everytime a read is reversed or deposit taken off? why was the deposit removed? i assume it was due to dd details?

As I said it was automatically credited onto the account with no notification.

I don't want letters at all really, I'd prefer if they would keep their online billing correct and transparent. The only reason I have requested paper bills and receipts is to clear up misbilling issues, because the online account is randomly changed.

I've just had a look actually and my account has been recently been credited by €208.

There is no justification for this at all, anywhere on the account, our last payment off the bill was for €138. Made just last week (also noted) and this €208 credit doe not include that amount.

It makes no sense.

I've just rang them to get the credit clarified and 'they can't see that amount'. They went through all the last payments (payments I made and understand) but its like this €208 which has been CREDITED off my existing balance, does not exist. They've just given me money, which they claim they can't see.
I did the maths for them, on the phone, I said: Our balance X, we paid Y, and the remaining balance is €208 short of the amount we should owe. No response.
I explained why I was concerned about random credits on the account, 'well I can't see that amount to be honest' was the response. Its like talking to a brick wall.

As far as I can see, this is an adjustment of the bill, due to overbilling, which they won't acknowledge.

HelpImAlive

Rips wrote: »

In my experience you have to spell it out for them. I requested receipts for payments I had made over the phone etc and emailed screen shots of the errors... this is one example;

I don't see any error there though?

Your usage was 3841 kw/h? Your bill obviously goes from the previous reading, not the actual reading, so that's an error on your behalf.