OMG - Just worked out our gas/electricity annual bill

[fionas]

We live in a cold area. I've always been gobsmacked by how much we pay for gas/electricity but I've never had enough back copies of paper bills to work out what we spend over the year. Today, I called our utility company to work it out.

Last year:

Gas - $3133 or $120 a fortnight

Electricity - $2617 or $100 a fortnight

(have based that on 26 fortnights though I've a feeling there's 27. Anyway, whatever, still a huge amount).

AND we also pay for wood for our woodburner.

We don't even use the heater anywhere near as much as I'd like to. Don't have it above 20 degrees and it's zoned.

[fionas]

AND I don't understand how we can be using that much electricity - the heating is gas. We don't have aircon. We have one TV which isn't on that much. I use the dryer a fair bit but no more than other people I wouldn't have thought.

[briggsy's girl]

it's not hard to believe that sort of expense. sadly, it's very expensive to keep the house warm, and it really doesn't take much to burn through electricity...

we pay about 150 a fn for gas and electricity combined. our house is very new, and generally not bad for needing heating and cooling - and we try to keep the heating at a max of 18 (hard to go any cooler when DD won't keep blankets on!). our previous house wasn't well insulated, and we were paying about that just in electricity (due to having to use electric heating cos gas too exxy and not in right part of house!), and then bottled gas on top (about 120 a fn)....

[~clover~]

I use less gas than power. But I have a R/C air con, so I use that rather than my gas heater. My hot water is gas though.

My gas is $110-$140 every 8 or so weeks. Power would be $40 - $80 a week depending on the heater.

[LimeSlice]

I use less gas than power. But I have a R/C air con, so I use that rather than my gas heater. My hot water is gas though.

Can I ask why you choose to use the RC Heater over the gas one? The RC Heating is MUCH more expensive to run than a gas heater in itself, and the price of gas is much less per unit than electricity...

[TaRhLi.]

We live just west of Ballarat and are 100% Electricity, and over Autumn/Winter/Early Spring our electricity bill is about $1500 per quarter. Over summer it's about $400 per quarter and the summer/early Autumn quarter it's about $700, so we pay a heap in power costs.

Saying that we have 4 split systems for heating/cooling an older house (although I only use them for cooling on scorching hot days), plus TV's going and also the dryer in Winter as well, we have the heaters on around 20 degrees but on really cold nights I have to put the heater in the boys room up to 22, as they a HUGE room and won't sleep under covers yet .

Next year hopefully it will decrease a little as we will get in a load of firewood for the log burner in the lounge room - we didn't get any wood the past 2 years while the twins were babies and then just starting to explore as even though we have a fire guard it was still too risky we thought. Next winter though they will be 2 and I can hopefully make them understand to stay away from the fire, but time will tell.

Saying that it will be an interesting test to see if paying $500 for firewood means a $500 reduction in our power bill over the same timeframe, I'm tipping it will be more cost effective to just use the spilt systems but we need to try it out to see.

[~clover~]

Can I ask why you choose to use the RC Heater over the gas one? The RC Heating is MUCH more expensive to run than a gas heater in itself, and the price of gas is much less per unit than electricity...

Number one reason is that I don't trust the gas heater on over night. I have the R/C on over night. I've not really thought about price. I think I'd be buying a gas bottle once every 2 weeks, rather than 8 - 10 weeks if I used the heater. I really am not sure gas here is all that cheap.
I've no idea of city prices or how it works, but compared to what my parents paid for a bottle, I pay about $50 more.

[LimeSlice]

Oh you are on bottle gas! Gotcha.

[~clover~]

Yep

I've never had gas before now. And being so isolated, prices aren't great. But I like that the hot water is instant, rather than heating a whole tank that may not be used.

[Novella]

Our gas is around $140 per quarter hot water and cook top only

We have a medium sizes solar system and our bills for this year were

First quater $6.11 credit
Second $130
Third $650!!!!!
Fourth $72

Third quarter we used double the electricity but we had minimal sun and produced very little solar power and new baby meant the heater was on heaps more than normal and I was tired and it was wet so I used the dryer way too much.

[chody47]

I have to budget around $160 a fortnight for our gas and electricity. I think it's insane. We even have solar hot water and its not like we have the air con or heater running much and we are all out at work/childcare during the day.....

[Beatrix]

I got my elec bill for the last 90 days. We have used 780 kw of power in that time, which = 8.6kw per day... so quarterly bill is about $300 inc supply charge.

I dont understand my friend who says she uses the same as us elec wise and turns everything off at the power point can use 2000kw in a quarter.
We both have gas and use about the same on that $150-$250 per quarter depending on summer or winter.

Whats your average kw use per day?

[Amity]

My gas bill is about $50 a month. Electricity is $400 every 2 months, on average (not much difference between summer and winter as I use the split systems for both heating and cooling). Water is about $300 a quarter including rates - usage is about $80 a quarter.

However, I'm anal about turning things off at the power point, and the heating and cooling is only used when we are at home (which is not during the day, five days a week). And I don't have the kids here every second weekend, so I only use one split system overnight during that time. I am not at all worried about using the dryer for every load of washing - it's worth it to me for the 80c or so that a load costs, rather than the time that I'd spend in the morning and night taking it out to the line and bringing it back in. I'd rather spend that time with my kids - it's worth the money.

When I renovated the house, I bought very expensive but cheap to run appliances. My Bosch washing machine uses 56L per wash and has a 5 star energy rating. My Bosch dishwasher (that I use for EVERYTHING - if it can't go in the dishwasher, it's not in my house) uses 11L per wash and also has a 5 star energy rating. My Westinghouse dryer doesn't have a 5 star energy rating lol - no dryer does! The 55inch Panasonic TV is turned off at the wall when not in use. The Westinghouse fridge is a 5.5 star energy rating. The Mac computer is on all the time - but I do turn it off rather than leave it on standby. The three split systems are the most expensive Fujitsu on the market - energy rating very high (can't remember exactly what, but the running costs were minimal compared to other brands). So the expense I had at startup has resulted in extremely low ongoing costs. I'd rather do it this way - buy quality and have lower running costs - than buy cheaper and pay more to run things. JMHO.

[Ca Plane Pour Moi]

I would check your meter readings. We live in a cold area and pay under £40/month for gas - but then we only use the heating for 1-2 hours a day and use jumpers and blankets instead. Hot water only on for showers/baths so we need to plan ahead. Electricity is less than that.

Maybe you could look at changing suppliers?

[~clover~]

Over winter our average usage was 32 units/day. But thats with the R/C heater on all night & some colder days. Averaging $8 a day.
IIt gets to the minus's here & I have kids that kick blankets off all night They also strip in their sleep on occasion!

[~TT40~]

it is absolutely insane. I truely feel for some families who cant afford to pay the bill... our bill is higher over summer. last summer it was more for our place (3 bed 1 bathroom, and was a time when i wasnt even living her just DH who was working fulltime), than my folks (5 bed 2 bathroom) !! and we always turn off power points. we ended up turning off our pool pump. next bill was half the amount of that one. We now pay the same each month, and every 6months it reevaluates how much based on previous bills. makes it so much easier to budget and you're not stuck with a grand to pay at once. over winter ours isn't that bad cause we use our wood fire. we only have fans too no a/c. our gas (which is only connected to a heater) is bottle gas too (no natural gas in our town even though the pipe runs along the highway and every town that surrounds us has it...anyway), we have 2 bottles that were full when we moved in 18mths ago and we haven't even emptied one bottle yet (so havent had to pay for gas at all)

[Olive]

we pay the same amount on water, gas and electricity every fortnight
water: $60 = $1440
gas: $100 = $2400
electricity $130 = $3120

which = $6960 a year.
We're in credit at all times.

[Mumma T]

We pay $170 a month for both gas and electricity. We have evap cooling and ducted heating which I have set at 22 degrees as I like it warm. Being in Melb we use the heating quite alot. I feel for all the families with huge power bills.