How can I ascertain if I am paying for someone else's electricity? Help!

[Danielle]

My electricity bills are 1.5-2.5k per month for a 5 bedroom house. My heating was running off ? electric so while this figure is extremely high it (kind of) made sense, as the house is large. I had an electrician calculate the space and electric consumption. As it was so high, I decided to go down the route of Air Source, and have had 4 Mitsubishi air source heat pumps installed to make my electric more affordable... having been told this would take them to half or a third. But my first bill have come in and it is £2300, for ONE month!!. I wonder if I am paying for the electricity for the farm shop next door or something like this. My provider, utility warehouse will only check that my meter is working and the wires inside my house.
Does anyone know how or who can I ask to check that the wires going into my house are only providing electricity for my property. Utility warehouse refuse to do this. is there ANY service I can pay for to prove what is going on. Even if just for me! I am in a lot of financial difficulty now! Thanks

 

[Danielle]

Ok so either someone is tapping off your home supply (which fyi shouldn't be three phase, there's absolutely no need for it in a domestic property) or your meter is naffed.

First step is to turn off all power-drawing appliances in the house that are wired to the offending meter and see if it still ticks over - do this when all adjoining property is occupied and in use. If it is someone is nicking the leccy and you're paying for it. If not, the meter could be buggered.

Either way you need a qualified electrician in (check they have Testing and Inspection qualification as they're much more likely to be able to find their way around the system) and after their diagnosis you need to alert your supplier. Either way, you're clearly not using £2k a month in electric with domestic norms like toaster, lights, kettle. You couldn't use that much if you left that all on constantly 100% of the time with that set up.

As an example, you know how if you leave the lid off a kettle it will boil contstantly and never finish? Well if you did that and left a 2600w kettle boiling for 30 straight days your bill would still be less than £300.

I would hope it's a damaged meter because then you have a chance of getting your money back. If it's a horticultural expert you've got little to no chance, they'll pay it off a quid a month.

also i think (but not 100%) that we have 3 phase as originally the house was part of a farm (it was a barn). then it was a house that some teachers lived in who worked in a nearby school. i take your point though, no need for it, whould it cost me more just having 3 phase supply?

 

[Danielle]

Or in the farm shop

nothing works in my house when i turn it off. and i had a mate sit outside the farms shop and when i turned off their lights remained on. so did the farm house...

 

[Danielle]

thanks dave ?

 

[Danielle]

I've corrected that for you...

hahaha yes i totally agree!! i think i need a meter / electrical investigator, does such a thing exist?

 

[Danielle]

Also who is your energy supplier?as one meter is covered in EDF stickers

no its Utility Warehouse, they are no help AT ALL!

 

[Danielle]

Some pictures of the fuse boards fed by the two different meters might shed some light on what is going on.
What is the electricity consumption recorded by the meter in the utility room ( the new one that says installed in 2016) I would imagine that you might find that one is more in line with the bills you would be expecting to pay.

the old one has normal consumption, the new one is £1900 per month... i need an electrical investigator!

 

[Danielle]

does anyone on here live in east sussex?

I am miles from you, in coventry.

£37.50 per hour working
£30 per hour traveling
£0.40 per mile traveling

I could come and do a report for you, however I am busy with other work at the moment and could do without all the traveling.

SURELY there is a member here that can spend a day doing a load analysis without adding 7 hours traveling to the bill???????

 

[Danielle]

thank you so much i would love a report done, but coventry is so far - esp as you are busy!! i'm east sussex

 

[Electrics]

ok so i have turned off all the power in the house, the farm shop and the farm house remain lit up. so either its not them or they have tapped into my supply outside of my house.
I only turned off for a few mins and the numbers on the meter remained the same. i will turn it off for an hour tomorrw morning and see if the numbers remain the same then. i really appreciate this advice.
any idea how much does a 3* tumble dryer would cost per hour to run?

Did you turn all the power off at both meters at the main switch, or did you turn off everything consuming electricity?

Their lights staying on isn't an indicator that it's not them - if i was going to steal leccy i would do it for the high powered stuff, not the lights.

If they have a loft full of weed or even Bitcoin mining modules it could just be running those.

If you've turned the supply off then anything being stolen which is out of sight such as a drugs farm won't register on the meter. You need to turn off everything you're using and not the actual supply to see if someone is stealing from you supply-side. Turning off the mains is only going to be useful if you can physically see something go off everytime you turn your mains off. To see if it's being nicked from your energised supply you need to disconnect every last piece of electrical equipment and turn off anything like lights etc, all sockets, fans etc and then see if there is still power being used via the meter. You need the line being potentially stolen off to be energised to check if there's something being drawn from it but at the same time need to be certain you're not drawing it yourself.

If nothing is registering it's likely your meter is dodgy and i'd get it replaced asap.

Either way, now is the time to call in a professional. Just google someone in your area, make the call, ask them if they are fully qualified and if they have the Testing and Inspection qualification. If they check out, get them in.

 

[littlespark]

Does the farm shop know you have these problems? I'm just thinking about all their freezers going off when the issue is found.

 

[OnlQQker]

 

[Electrics]

My heart bleeds for British Gas.

 

[stevethesparks]

What does the other meter supply (sorry if I have missed something)
Its not just a case of you paying for the wrong meter?

 

[Danielle]

If one of those supplies did everything on that site in the past and is still connected up then yes.

They may not know it, but it is a definite possibility.

is there any way you can think of thast i could unravel this to prove it to be the case, if it was the case

 

[SJD]

is there any way you can think of thast i could unravel this to prove it to be the case, if it was the case

Turn off the expensive supply for a long period, and wait to see if contractors turn up at the adjacent property. You just have to make sure you can power your fridges/freezers and anything else you can't do without while you wait (from the other supply) ... !