High ESB Bill

ongarite

Hi All,

Im living in a 1 bed apartment thats all electric. I have been living there for a year and half with all estimated bills and no card in the letter box to give a reading. I've always felt the estimated readings were too high, €140 every bill.
Today I got my first non-estimated bill and owe them an extra €200.The bill is showing 8200 Day units and 3000 Night Units.
I checked the meter reading and its 2900 Units (Rate 2). The meter is one of the Solid State Digital Meters so no day/night seperation.

Now am I reading it wrong or have I been massively overcharged for an incorrect meter reading?

tonyboy247

yes if i were you i would make sure im in when yer man comes to read the meter...last time i was hit for 342euro more than what was owed.. they are at it all the time.I asked him what it was all about and he said he was just doin his job morya.

ongarite

The meter box is outside the house so this is the first non estimated bill in 20 months. Pretty poor from ESB!!

radia

First check here to make sure you're reading the meter correctly. If they're giving you a bill that's separated into day and night units then you should have 2 meters (or one meter with 2 rows) to read yourself. The 'rate 2' reading you've found is the day reading (rate 1 would be night), so go to the service area and look for another meter with your apartment's number on it that's rate 1!

Then if there's a big discrepancy between the readings and the estimates on the bill, either ring the ESB customer line (phone # is on your bill) or fill in the online form to get a fresh bill based on the actual figures.

ongarite

Thanks for the advice. My meter looks nothing like those ones in the link in your post. Its a digital meter with an LCD display with kWh used and electricity rate.
Looks like ill have to ring them tomorrow to see whats going on.

Red Alert

you should have a large sealed timeswitch somewhere near the meter, often made by either Sangamo or Schlumberger. this changes the dials on the meter.

never seen one of those digital meters you're talking about tho' so i'm not sure.

What sort of a setup do you have? Nightsaver and Storage Heating are usually two different circuits with two different meters. So you'll have a dual dial meter for power day and night, and another separate single dial meter for the storage heating.

ongarite

Me again,

I took a pic of my meter as its not like any of the ones mentioned above. Rate 2 is 3001, this is day units AFIAK and Rate 1 is 8200 this is night units.I have immersion on at night and storage heaters on also in winter.
I looked at my bill and it looks to me as if my night and day units are reversed; being charged for 8200 day units and 3000 night units. I rang the EBS yesterday and they asked me to check does the meter change over to rate 1, night time rate at 12am and back to rate 1, at 9am.

Paulw

Since the meter is digital, I'm just wondering - does it show the daytime rate during the day, and nighttime rate during the night? Have you ever checked it at night?

Any time I get an estimated bill, I just check the meter myself, and fill in the correct details online.

slave1

howdy, I have one of those meters, see the button in the circular area on the top left hand corner, press this and it will change to the time and also the rate 1 readings, keep pressing and it will come back to where you started......

Dublinstiofán

Was it a newly installed meter when you moved in or was there previous tenants in the Apartment before you? You didn't happen to take the initial reading when you moved in did you?

ircoha

slave1 wrote:

howdy, I have one of those meters, see the button in the circular area on the top left hand corner, press this and it will change to the time and also the rate 1 readings, keep pressing and it will come back to where you started......

It looks from the wiring that one critical point is that the meter is set to the correct time.

Slave1 has shown how to check it

ongarite

slave1 wrote:

howdy, I have one of those meters, see the button in the circular area on the top left hand corner, press this and it will change to the time and also the rate 1 readings, keep pressing and it will come back to where you started......

Thanks man thats really helped. I clicked my way through the menu and Rate2 is 3063 and rate1 is 8300. The date was correct, 30/08/2006 and time was 22:01.

I've owned the apt from new but this is my first "proper" reading.

If Rate2 is definately day units I've been massively overcharged since my first estimated ESB bill.

ircoha

ongarite wrote:

Thanks man thats really helped. I clicked my way through the menu and Rate2 is 3063 and rate1 is 8300. The date was correct, 30/08/2006 and time was 22:01.

I've owned the apt from new but this is my first "proper" reading.

If Rate2 is definately day units I've been massively overcharged since my first estimated ESB bill.

from the bill it would seem the lower numbers are the night rate.

I find the dates on your correction a little strange
20/08 to 02/06

so I would be calling them asking for a breakdown.
In passing what purpose does the grey wire from the meter serve?

leeroybrown

If it makes you feel any better a friend lived in a house where after over a year of estimated readings a subsequent manual reading correctly identified that he was Eur 570 in arrears. His electricity almost got disconnected in the ensuing misunderstanding. In fairness to the ESB the meter was hidden in the most awkward place possible.

Red Alert

where does that extra grey wire from the meter go?

how are your storage heaters wired up? is there a timer you can adjust or do they come on automatically on a fixed programme?