British Gas bill rates

[Welly]

Remember I said my gas bills were pretty ok for my place at £45.00 per month later rising to £48.00 well it's now gone up to £77.00

I managed to call them up last night (after waiting on the line for ages).....

Me: Grrrrrrrrrrrr

Them: The gas has gone up in price innit

Me: what? 60%?

Them: Well 50% but you'll use more over the winter, this is your new calculated rate based on last year's use.

Me: I'll give you a reading....*goes ouside in rain/slippers/torch etc*

Me: 10401....

Them: No - that's allright we are correct.

Me: Oh.

My house is efficient to heat so I'm shocked at this new high price but how are you lot getting on?

I save a bit with the interest rate coming down but it's taken away by someone else

[mjb]

Mine's over £200/month

Got to keep the heating on 24/7 in my house and it's still only around 16c in the living room. Shame the window of opportunity for moving out first week of December's past now (I'm on 4 weeks notice) so I won't be able to get out until first week of Feb

Stupid anti-pet estate agents

[Welly]

M, I know you rent but have you thought about banging some loft insulation in? it might pay back in no time? maybe draught proof the doors and windows and letterbox too?

In fact, it's probably cheaper to stay in a travelodge until your new place is ready

[mbell666]

My gas is £10 a month! Probably using more than that, but I don't have central heating and little flat

British Gas Get rid of them, no really get rid of them. They are worse company in history (make Virgin broadband look good!), rubbish customer service (and thats being nice) and expensive. Just the word "British Gas" makes my blood boil!

Never had an account with them they didn't mess up. Moved out of one place, they payed my final bill, 3 months later the sent me a second final bill for 1p and then never responded to my questions about it!

Also when i moved out of the last place they told me they couldn't send me my final bill because the new people had changed supplier?!?!?!?!? WTF has that got to do with my bill?????

They did call me to try and get me to come back, the people in my office where quiet entertained by my slating of them!

[mjb]

M, I know you rent but have you thought about banging some loft insulation in? it might pay back in no time? maybe draught proof the doors and windows and letterbox too?

I believe there is actually loft insulation from the mess the Happy Shopper Value Plumber (which my landlord got to mess up the other years heating pump failure - 3 weeks to diagnose and replace a pump with an obviously broken impeller which sounded like a chainsaw, then he messed the cold tank in the loft and left it pouring water down the side of the house taking another fortnight to fix and causing every room to grow mould on the wallpaper) left behind all over my bedroom floor. I can't physically fit through the loft hole though.

The major problems are the very large very thin single-paned windows, the massive leaks around the window frames (between them and the brickwork) and the number one biggie - the fact it's an end terrace house with probably just a single layer of brickwork between every room in the house, and the black painted fully exposed external wall to the side When it gets cold and windy out, the whole wall gets freezing to the touch regardless of whether the heating's been on for a fortnight straight or not. There are clues which strongly hint that when it was built it wasn't the last house in the terrace

[Welly]

And there was me moaning about my bills, sorry m, no wonder you want out of there!

Maybe your once neighbour was blown away in the blitz?

[steve_earwig]

I thought firms were past slating the opposition these days (fnar fnar). That sounds like a plan, there's no point in doing anything else to your house if the roof's leaking, like cleaning your windows while the roof's on fire...

Matt, I know 200 quid a month on heating's bad but if I heated my place to 18 degrees I'd be using about 1,000 litres of heating oil a month, that's 500 quid! Did you think about lining the windows with clingfilm? It's not much but it helps. When I was renting I made up polystyrene blocks to block off some of the windows, it still lets a little light through. I'm not sure how much it would cost but polystyrene might make an interesting new wallpaper for those rooms sharing your end wall... Hmm?

[mjb]

I like the polystyrene idea but there's one teeeensy little snag - cats! Plus it'd cost hundreds to do the side wall - about £450 by my quick reckoning at that price so it'd be a bit of a false economy now

[steve_earwig]

So, the cats'll climb the wallpaper Big place you got there! How about just some of the windows?

[TooT]

My NPower dualfuel bill has rose from £167 a month to £204

God only knows what my phone bill is going to be like, must of spent a month on hold only to be given a load of drivel about how much im in arrears

[mjb]

So, the cats'll climb the wallpaper

Urgh hoovering up polystyrene every day doesn't sound too much like fun ;)

Big place you got there!

Nah it's just a narrow house - every room shares this wall

[Welly]

I think mjb's landlord is a skank and is tighter than a Duck's harris.

[mjb]

Can't you (if owned) or your landlord (if renting) apply for a grant to the Council to have the house made energy efficient?
They'd probably bang up another course of bricks on the outside

If the landlord can't be bothered to fix leaking pipes, mouldy walls, flooded floors, the leaking toilet bowl and was happy to have me without heating and electric for a month, I doubt I'd be able to drum up much enthusiasm for that!