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The kWhs charged for gas on our bill don't match the difference in readings?

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For the last 3 months our gas bill seems to be increasing huuuugely. For £80 usage to £200+ usage in a month! Nothings changed though. 

 

I thought I'd analyse the invoices a little closer and it looks like we're being charged 10-12 times more than we've actually used. This has been ongoing since we were moved from to Ovo 14 months ago. I've tried on chat to discuss but they were useless so we'll have to call between 9am and 5pm on a weekday. Not handy for people who work those hours! 

 

Can someone take a look at the screenshot in the feed to double check I've not read this incorrectly? I've checked the electric and what's been used is what has been billed. 

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Best answer by BPLightlog 8 January 2023, 12:29

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Image 4 is electric - fine.

 

Image 2 and 3 are Decmber and November usage but this goes all the way back to November 2021. 

Image 1 is so far this billing cycle. 4th to 7th Jan. 

BPLightlog
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Hi @Sjsouth16 your first screenshot says 4days standing charge and so is only for a small part of the month. The others are full months by the look of it

Sorry - just reread your notes. I’ll have another look

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BPLightlog
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Updated on 30/10/23 by Abby_OVO

The second screenshot looks like a full (mostly) Nov bill and the next a Dec bill - we are in winter and have had a really cold snap during that time so maybe this is to be expected? I know my own bill increases dramatically over winter months. 
From the meter readings, these are converted to kWh via a calculation given by the National Grid 

 

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@BPLightlog thanks for your reply. As you can see from my electricity bill attached the units used match the kwh? Is Gas billed differently? 

Thanks 

 

BPLightlog
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Yes @Sjsouth16 .. sorry I probably didn’t understand correctly. 
Electricity meters measure in kWh and this figure is multiplied by your Elec unit cost. 
Gas meters mostly measure in volume or cubic metres and this has to be converted to become kWh like I showed 

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Ok.. seems a little confusing. I dont understand why one is billed as what we've used and the other is multiplied. No wonder Sunak wants to make kids learn maths until 18. 

I'll give them a call tomorrow and see what they say. 

Would there be any explanation as to why the electricity has stayed the same but gas inflated so dramatically in a matter of weeks? Nothing has changed at home. We use a gas hob and have baths and showers. Tbh, I'm quite surprised the electricity stayed relatively the same when I've used the tumble loads for school uniform over winter. 

BPLightlog
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Do you have gas heating @Sjsouth16 ?

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@BPLightlog Forgot about the heating. We do yes but it's set to 18c and on a timer. 6am until 8am and 6pm until 8pm. Other times we wear another layer so not to use the heating. Its usually only me and my daughter at home as my OH works away all week. I know it was colder the previous few months but it's was rarely on. 🤷🏻‍♀️

 

Looking at the hourly reading it seems middle of the night is when most use is showing. Its weird.

BPLightlog
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…

Looking at the hourly reading it seems middle of the night is when most use is showing. Its weird.

Ok, even at the settings you mention it would use more and if there’s use overnight there’s probably a ‘frost’ setting which kicks in at very low temperatures and we did have a number of days below zero ❄️ 

Just another thought .. it’s worth checking your meter readings to see if any are estimated - just in case

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@BPLightlog thanks so much for your help. I have 3 screens on the go right now and it's starting to make some sense. The maths degree needed to figure out the charges is bonkers though haha. Even with a GCSE and AS level in Maths it's mind boggling. 

 

I'll accept that I'm wrong though and OVO maybe aren't charging me extortionate rates. Hopefully now the weather is a touch warmer we'll see the gas bill reduce... 🤞🤞🤞

M
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Don't know if this affects anyone else, but it might be worth checking.

The smart meter readings for my gas had a blip on 1st and missed off all the decimal places (showing as 16 instead of the 16.905 it has been since almost three weeks ago) … the result of which is that I have been double-billed for my 10.10 kWh of gas consumption between 19th July (when my meter reading was last below 16.000) and the beginning of this month. 

I have raised it with customer services but it might be worth checking to see if you are also affected. 

It is somewhat concerning that the billing engine isn't intelligent enough to pick up such a blatant whoopsie  when every other part of the system is intelligent enough to realise that there was no new 10.10 kWh use and that it has already been billed.  One would typically expect the billing side of the system to be the more intelligent. 

 

Emmanuelle_OVO
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Hey @MCH59,

 

Thanks for raising this! 

 

Let us know what the support team say, and i’ll keep an eye out to see if anyone else on the Forum is affected by this.

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M
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Hey @MCH59,

 

Thanks for raising this! 

 

Let us know what the support team say, and i’ll keep an eye out to see if anyone else on the Forum is affected by this.

It is sorted, as far as my account is concerned, by simply replacing the weird reading with a manual reading which in turn triggered a recalculation of the charges.

No feedback on what caused the blip in the first place or whether it is an isolated problem. 

 

Firedog
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It is sorted, as far as my account is concerned, by simply replacing the weird reading with a manual reading ...

 

Good for you. I wonder how many other users have suffered similar injustices without noticing.
  

Just curious: I don’t have gas, so I’ve no experience of submitting gas readings. However, I’ve been frustrated recently by not being able to submit electricity readings any more accurately than to the nearest whole number below (e.g. 1.912 kWh has to be submitted as ‘1’). 

How were you able to send in readings with three decimal places? 

 

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA
Emmanuelle_OVO
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Hey @Firedog,

 

I was unaware that a meter reading could be submitted after the decimal also! 

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BPLightlog
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Hey @Firedog,

 

I was unaware that a meter reading could be submitted after the decimal also! 

That was always a problem for me in summer - if I needed to enter a manual reading, as the daily/weekly increment was so small, I could have entered a reading which was less than the previoius one recorded.

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@Firedog and @Emmanuelle_OVO and @BPLightlog 

Oh, I didn’t (and couldn’t) add the manual reading and nor could the front line customer service - I got the billing team to do it using their superpowers ;:)

Sorry for the slow reply - I lost track of this thread, 

Firedog
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I got the billing team to do it using their superpowers ;:)

 

That’s cheating!
 

I am also frustrated by this inability to submit readings with greater than 1kWh precision, but I understand why it has to be this way (if you ignore the decimals on submission, any subsequent reading for the same day - smart or otherwise - is bound to be greater, so eliminating the error flag that should otherwise be raised).

Two other frustrations: My Aclara SGM 1416-B currently only shows whole kWh (rounded down) for the register contents. I’m sure it’s capable of displaying decimals (that’s what I get from the manual at any rate), but it looks as if this can only be enabled by an engineer on site, not remotely. As it is, one of my registers stays on the same digit for days at a time.

On the other hand, my Chameleon IHD3 shows the instantaneous meter state to the nearest Wh, i.e. with three decimal places. Nice, except that it can only display the total import and not the individual register contents. 

I wish OVO would give us the choice of precision when deciding what equipment to install and how to configure it on installation.

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA
Z
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Hi

 

see attached image.

Between my two actual readings there is an increase of 289 kWh. Fine, as they are real readings.

 

my problem and issue is this, below - my total energy use states I have used 3375 kWh.

am I being stupid or is this figure ridiculously way off?


gas part of my bill:

 

Gas

Meter readings

17 Dec Estimated 23753.062
19 Dec Actual 23768.000
16 Jan Actual 24057.000
Total energy use 3375.417 kWh

Charges

Energy use charge

3375.42 kWh at 8.49p

 £286.57
Standing charge

31 days at 27.58p per day

 £8.55
Total cost (before VAT) £295.12

 
Firedog
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Your meter measures the volume of gas passing through it in cubic metres. You have used 303.938 cubic metres in the month to 16 January.

Your tariff and your bill use prices per kWh, not per cubic metre, so there has to be a conversion. What the conversion factor is depends on the calorific value (CV) of the gas used in that period, and this varies from 38 to 41 MJ/kWh. This is all explained on this official page: Gas meter readings and bill calculation - GOV.UK. 

In your case, the CV seems to have been about 39.1 mJ/kWh:

303.938 m³ x 1.02264 x 39.1 mJ/kWh  / 3.6 =  3375.84 kWh

For future reference, you could get a good estimate of your gas energy consumption by multiplying the number of cubic metres used by 11.1 to give the equivalent in kWh.

 

 

1 MJ  -  megaJoule = million Joules - is the same amount of energy as 1 million Watt-seconds. The 3.6 is needed to convert millions (M - mega) to thousands (k = kilo) and seconds to hours. 3600/1000 = 3.6

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA

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