Can someone please help me get my gas bill lower?

armabelle

We just moved into a new 3 bed detached house and have somehow managed to spend about 150 euro in half a month on gas. We do like the house warm and being kind of a big house, it does take a while to heat up. I would say the heating is on 6 hours a day on average. My first question is: is 6 hours a day a lot for heating? And second: How can I use the gas less but still keep the house warm? Like, are there any tips for keeping your consumption down?

thank you

oppenheimer1

Do you own the house?

armabelle

oppenheimer1 wrote: »

Do you own the house?

No, renting it

physioman

armabelle wrote: »

We just moved into a new 3 bed detached house and have somehow managed to spend about 150 euro in half a month on gas. We do like the house warm and being kind of a big house, it does take a while to heat up. I would say the heating is on 6 hours a day on average. My first question is: is 6 hours a day a lot for heating? And second: How can I use the gas less but still keep the house warm? Like, are there any tips for keeping your consumption down?

thank you

Our bills are on average 45 per month. We have the heat on average 2 hours a day.Is it mains gas or LPG (if LPG its very expensive to heat the home)? I'm currently with Flogas as they were the cheapest.

armabelle

physioman wrote: »

Our bills are on average 45 per month. We have the heat on average 2 hours a day.Is it mains gas or LPG (if LPG its very expensive to heat the home)? I'm currently with Flogas as they were the cheapest.

It is mains gas and we also are with Flogas. I worked it out here in my home to be about a euro per hour which means that if I used only 2 hours a day I would have a bill of around 60 euros a month which sounds reasonable. I don't see how it would be possible to just use heating for 2 hours here in winter. How do you do that? Any heat that you have in your home can't last the day after just two hours heating can it?

wally1990

Check out bonkers.ie for gas provider comparisons
It's a excellent website

armabelle

wally1990 wrote: »

Check out bonkers.ie for gas provider comparisons
It's a excellent website

thanks but all providers offer similar prices don't they? I think if I change providers I may save a couple of euros at most.

Pete67

300 a month is very high all right, your bill must be over €600? If you have just moved in, is there a connection charge on the bill, or is it all based on gas used? Sometimes energy companies have been known to recover outstanding debts from previous tenants when a new account is opened, completely illegal of course, but it has happened. Check the breakdown of the bill and see exactly what the charge is based on. Did you check the meter readings when you moved in?

physioman

armabelle wrote: »

It is mains gas and we also are with Flogas. I worked it out here in my home to be about a euro per hour which means that if I used only 2 hours a day I would have a bill of around 60 euros a month which sounds reasonable. I don't see how it would be possible to just use heating for 2 hours here in winter. How do you do that? Any heat that you have in your home can't last the day after just two hours heating can it?

I come home from work round 5. So no heat on all day. In winter our bills would be 65 a month so averages out at 45 a month over the year. Would put it on for half hour when I get home at 5 and then for 1.5 hours before bed. So grand and warm. 6 hours is a bit excessive unless your in the house all day.

Forever21

My daughter has mains gas & has it on for 8 hours a day & I know her bill is roughly €150 a month, her gas boiler goes from number 1 to 6 & she has it on number 4 which I think is 72degrees , she's at home during the day with two small children so she needs it on for that length of time, think she's with electric Ireland.

Dtp1979

Forever21 wrote: »

My daughter has mains gas & has it on for 8 hours a day & I know her bill is roughly €150 a month, her gas boiler goes from number 1 to 6 & she has it on number 4 which I think is 72degrees , she's at home during the day with two small children so she needs it on for that length of time, think she's with electric Ireland.

Nobody needs the heat on for 8 hours a day unless they're living in Siberia. That's just crazy.
Even 6 hours is excessive. Op do you you gas for cooking too?

K.Flyer

A lot of heating energy gets wasted due to very poor insulation. If the house is poorly insulated with draughty windows and doors you will find your energy bills much higher than a well insulated similar property.
Then you also need to look at the system and how old, or more to the point, how inefficient it is. Old and poorly maintained heating systems can be quite costly to run by comparison to modern radiators and boilers.

Forever21

I keep telling her to to go to credit union & take out loan to install new gas boile & trvs , like she has ideal classic ff350 boiler which is about 13yrs old no trvs & cold porcelain tiled floors hall & into kitchen/dining room. I feel the boiler would pay for itself in 3yrs as she wouldn't be running the gas as much to heat the house

DGOBS

Firstly, learn how to read your gas meter, and start a daily log to determine your usage.
Second, request your landlord get a full service carried out, including a soundness test.
During the service ask your RGI to gas rate the appliance to check it's usage.

Lots of factors at play, including, the age of the property, how quickly it looses heat (how long after turning on the boiler does it take for the house to get cold? Do you have a room(s) thermostat, if so, what temp is it set too.

As the house is detached, it maybe loosing lots of heat if not well insulated.

Wearb

What is the energy rating of the house (BER)? The landlord should have had this on his advert.
Are you heating the whole house all the time the heating is on? If so, you need to isolate one or two of the living areas and until near bedtime just heat those only.

I have oil heating and (the house is occupied most off the day) have heating on for most of the day during the colder months. That is not to say the boiler is running all the time. After a few hours, it cuts in and out on the room thermostat, so that during the day the boiler is only running about 20% of the time on average. I don't heat hall or bedrooms during the daytime. It costs about €25 per week during the colder months.

Hope the above helps you to cut your bill. That and the advice given in the other posts, especially the previous one.

armabelle

Pete67 wrote: »

300 a month is very high all right, your bill must be over €600? If you have just moved in, is there a connection charge on the bill, or is it all based on gas used? Sometimes energy companies have been known to recover outstanding debts from previous tenants when a new account is opened, completely illegal of course, but it has happened. Check the breakdown of the bill and see exactly what the charge is based on. Did you check the meter readings when you moved in?

There is no connection charge. Can you tell me how much you spend for an hour of heating in your home so we can compare?

Yes, I had this problem with Electric Ireland actually. I couldn't believe it. After an hour on the phone they sorted it out for me. The rep that opened my account apparently should have told me about the charge outstanding and inform me that it would need to be paid before a switch of account can be made. She conveniently did not tell me and I had the issue after the first bill came. The solution given to me was to close the account. Some solution huh?
They expect you, the client, to be a debt collector and fetch the money from the LL (we were renting and the account was in their name prior to us moving in). Very inappropriate. My wife and I were shocked that such a thing could happen in Ireland.

Pete67

Each house is different, in my case the house is zoned, so bedrooms are heated separately to living areas, and only as needed typically one hour in the morning and 1 in the evening before the kids go to bed. A programmable thermostat brings on the heat until the main bedroom hits 18 degrees at these times, at all other times bedrooms are only heated to keep the temperature above 12 degrees to avoid condensation. The other bedrooms have TRVs set at about 18C too, so they don't get overheated.

In the living areas the rooms are maintained above 18 degrees from 7:00 am to 4:30 pm as the wife and kids are in an out during the day, and above 21C in the evenings (up to 11pm) when we are more likely to be crashed out on the couch. I couldn't say how many hours the heating is on for, it totally depends on the weather and outside temperature, the boiler runs only long enough to maintain these room temperatures, and keep the hot water cylinder topped up at the times when we use hot water for showers etc.

Our worst ever gas bill in the depths of winter was around 300 for two months, and usually would be less than this, in summer it would be less than 100 and that's including all hot water as well, as we don't use the immersion.

Kimbot

armabelle wrote: »

There is no connection charge. Can you tell me how much you spend for an hour of heating in your home so we can compare?

Yes, I had this problem with Electric Ireland actually. I couldn't believe it. After an hour on the phone they sorted it out for me. The rep that opened my account apparently should have told me about the charge outstanding and inform me that it would need to be paid before a switch of account can be made. She conveniently did not tell me and I had the issue after the first bill came. The solution given to me was to close the account. Some solution huh?
They expect you, the client, to be a debt collector and fetch the money from the LL (we were renting and the account was in their name prior to us moving in). Very inappropriate. My wife and I were shocked that such a thing could happen in Ireland.

Yesterday you had a thread up and some posters replied that they are using 1.8 per hour which would be right in line with what you use but you are using your heat for 6 hours a day is madness. Are you home all day? Do you have an open fire?

armabelle

Pete67 wrote: »

Each house is different, in my case the house is zoned, so bedrooms are heated separately to living areas, and only as needed typically one hour in the morning and 1 in the evening before the kids go to bed. A programmable thermostat brings on the heat until the main bedroom hits 18 degrees at these times, at all other times bedrooms are only heated to keep the temperature above 12 degrees to avoid condensation. The other bedrooms have TRVs set at about 18C too, so they don't get overheated.

In the living areas the rooms are maintained above 18 degrees from 7:00 am to 4:30 pm as the wife and kids are in an out during the day, and above 21C in the evenings (up to 11pm) when we are more likely to be crashed out on the couch. I couldn't say how many hours the heating is on for, it totally depends on the weather and outside temperature, the boiler runs only long enough to maintain these room temperatures, and keep the hot water cylinder topped up at the times when we use hot water for showers etc.

Our worst ever gas bill in the depths of winter was around 300 for two months, and usually would be less than this, in summer it would be less than 100 and that's including all hot water as well, as we don't use the immersion.

Oh ok, see we work from home so would use the heating for longer periods. Perhaps, this is why our bill is so much higher but should it be that much higher I ask myself. Yesterday I tried to heat for an hour and it was cold outside so a good day to test the retention of heat. I found that within 2 hours, the house was completely cold again. I think to maintain a nice warm temperature in the house we would have to heat for one hour and then switch off for an hour. In a winter day, this would lead to around 6 hours of heating which would cost 6 euros. Over a period of 1 month that would be 180 euros. Do you think this is too high? What can we do to reduce this in winter if we work from home?

armabelle

jonnycivic wrote: »

Yesterday you had a thread up and some posters replied that they are using 1.8 per hour which would be right in line with what you use but you are using your heat for 6 hours a day is madness. Are you home all day? Do you have an open fire?

We work from home. Do you think 6 hours a day is too much? I did a test and the house gets cold after an hour with no heating. Also, you want to open the windows and air the house every couple of hours which would completely cool it down on a cold day so how do you retain heat all through a cold day without having heat on for 6 hours?

armabelle

jonnycivic wrote: »

Yesterday you had a thread up and some posters replied that they are using 1.8 per hour which would be right in line with what you use but you are using your heat for 6 hours a day is madness. Are you home all day? Do you have an open fire?

are you sure that the other users weren't me? I wish someone could tell me how much they are using per hour but so far can't recall anyone getting back to me re that.

armabelle

physioman wrote: »

I come home from work round 5. So no heat on all day. In winter our bills would be 65 a month so averages out at 45 a month over the year. Would put it on for half hour when I get home at 5 and then for 1.5 hours before bed. So grand and warm. 6 hours is a bit excessive unless your in the house all day.

But even if you have heat on from 5 until 8pm every winter day you would spend 100 euros a month for heating? 3 hours a day X 3 euros X 30 days= 90 euros and taxes etc on top of that. How could you spend only 65 a month?

armabelle

Forever21 wrote: »

My daughter has mains gas & has it on for 8 hours a day & I know her bill is roughly €150 a month, her gas boiler goes from number 1 to 6 & she has it on number 4 which I think is 72degrees , she's at home during the day with two small children so she needs it on for that length of time, think she's with electric Ireland.

Thanks for this. This bill of 150 euros for 8 hours a day would be great but how is it that everyone seems to be paying so much less for heating than us? If I go by my 1 euro per hour of heating, I would pay 8 euros a day and 240 euros a month if I was your daughter. How does hers stay so much lower?

I have my boiler also set about 70% of the way up. Does disengaging the rooms you are not using help somehow? Each radiator has a valve with numbers one to 5 but even when I take one of them all the way down, the radiator still stays warm so I am not even sure how to switch it off or disengage it. i am even unsure if by reducing these valves I can help save gas?

Dtp1979

armabelle wrote: »

Thanks for this. This bill of 150 euros for 8 hours a day would be great but how is it that everyone seems to be paying so much less for heating than us? If I go by my 1 euro per hour of heating, I would pay 8 euros a day and 240 euros a month if I was your daughter. How does hers stay so much lower?

I have my boiler also set about 70% of the way up. Does disengaging the rooms you are not using help somehow? Each radiator has a valve with numbers one to 5 but even when I take one of them all the way down, the radiator still stays warm so I am not even sure how to switch it off or disengage it. i am even unsure if by reducing these valves I can help save gas?

The gas might be on 8 hours but if a stat is satisfied then the Boiier won't fire.
Thermostatic radiator valves dictate room temp, not rad temp. So when the room is warm the rad turns off. Set the valve to 2.5 and see how it goes