BJ just rang me to tell me that we got a $900 electricity bill for winter. How ridiculous is that?!! We don't have gas but i seriously did not think it would be that high. I think we need our metre checked.

WOW that is a big bill...

Although our gas bill last winter with a newborn was $1200! So it can be nasty!!

I hope for you it was a mistake - best of luck

OMG - what sort of heating have you been running over winter with the boys?

We have a 125sqm 3br house with crappy insulation and our ducted heating is on 21 all day and 17 at night all winter, plus ducted a/c in summer (usually daytime only) and our electricity bills for the first year of DD's life were $1500. We have gas cooktop but everything else is electric.

Also if you are a high level electricity user, look into some of the plans they offer where daily charge is higher but per kwh charge is lower.

Steph
DD Alex (March 04)

I'd say that your metre is correct. We ran the ducted electric heater in our house for one winter. We ended up with a $1300+ bill and quickly swapped over to ducted gas instead. Electricity is unfortunately very expensive.

Susana & DH Chris[size=1] aka GoateeCat
DD Delia Jade 13/11/02 & DS Darcy Cole 2/11/04

bummer i guess it is correct. We run our ducted heating for 2 hours of a morning and then for 3 hours of a night time and we have a column heater in the boys room. I have since been told that column heaters cost a fortune (wish i had of known that before). Oh well, lesson learned i guess. At least the boys aren't cold.... no chance of that ;-)



This message was edited by RachieD on Thursday, 15 September 2005 @ 2:48 PM

I too had a huge bill - $720 and we have wood heating except.....a column heater in the boys room, we even had a timer on the power point which I was told was worse then running it full heat all day.

Lauren

<a href="http://www.snugglepie.com"><img border="0" src="http://www.snugglepie.com/cb/34055.png"></a>



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This message was edited by lozaloxx_2 on Thursday, 15 September 2005 @ 3:30 PM

Hi Rach,
Our bill was around $900 too. We run the ducted heating 24hrs a day when it's really cold. Now that it's not so cold, we are trying not to run it at night and rugging the kids up instead

gill

I was very surprised at my bill this year. It was only $450 in comparison to almost $700 last year.
We only have electric wall heaters as standard but last year I had a reverse cycle air con fitted and we have been using the heater from that.
The heater is so much better that I only 1 column heater running through the night and turned 1 electric wall heater on to boost in the morning.
My biggest surprise is that I use the dryer all the rime and it was still down.
But I am very happy to say that I dont ever get a bill. I am on the easy pay plan where they divide what you use based on the previous last 12 months and direct debit it out. I pay about $70 a fortnight but it is nice for the bill to say..Do Not Pay.
They can even incorporate your last bill into the next 12 months worth of payments.

Sylvia

I just told BJ that a lot of people have such huge bills -he is still surprised. i think we will start paying a bit each fortnight in anticipation for the next bill, which will definently be less since it is getting warmer!

You are right about the column heater, especially if it's on all the time. It would probably be cheaper to run the central heating for longer!

Rach, call ActewAGL and find out how much you would save by switching over to Home Saver Plus plan - the only thing is you can't pay by regular instalments, only direct debit of the entire amount on the due date for each bill.

Steph

One of the things we do is sleep Brielle is a sleeping bag. Its a snugtime one with arms and keeps her really warm. When she has this on there is no need for the heating to be on overnight.
I really do think your bill was probably right especially if the ducted heating is electric. Its just scary to get such a big bill.

Carol 34 DH Milton 41
DD Taylor 6/9/93
DS Ethan 30/6/02
DD Brielle 31/12/04 Mosaic Down Syndrome <ahref="http://www.snugglepie.com"><img border="0" src="http://www.snugglepie.com/ezb/122702.png"></a>

Hi Rach (btw, your pic of you and the boys is sooooo gorgeous! You are a stunner! And congrats on the PT work)

I have a tiny 10 square house....centrally (gas) heated but electricity everything else. I am a single Mum of an 11 and 3 year old.

Winter bill for me was *arrrgh* $800...... But I must admit I would rather be warm and poor than suffering for a few (well...a lot of) dollars.

Unfortunately it's a bit like petrol...yes you can save if you do ABC....but if you have an old car ( old heating etc) it will take a lot more to run it!!

Now...if you ask me about petrol...hahahahaha I put $40 in it this morning to get to my course....and the needle did not even reach half way......*oh if only the ex had taken the bomb...rather than the 'other' car!*

Rach

Mum to Sorcha Lee 14/10/01 and Jordy Lachlan 29/03/94.

Carol - we have the boys in sleeping bags too - so i guess i have probably been overheating them with the heater in their room, i am just so paranoid that they are going to be cold. Tonight i am not having the column heater on (has been banished to the garage), so i will see if they notice. I just don't really know how to know if they are cold or not.. i know this may sound stupid - but what is the best way to know if they are sufficiently warm or too warm?

Rach - i know what you mean about petrol - it is ridiculous isn't it. We have two cars and i have just told DP that he will be driving me to work and i will be catching the bus home because the price of petrol + parking is just too much. When i first bought my car in 2002 it cost $27 to fill from empty, it is now $50 - i just think it is ridiculous - and it is only a 1.4 litre buzz box. Our other car mind you is $100 per tank and it just guzzles. Bloody 4 wheel drives. I think that i will prefer to get home 10 mins later and save $30 a week will be better - plus i get to relax on the bus and read a book (which i of course don't get to do at home)..!! Thanks for your compliments on the pic - i love taking pics of my boys.. i am one of those over the top mums who has 10 pics at work of my boys on my desk!! I feel sorry for my colleagues but it helps me to get through the day! Rach i'm also with you on wanting to be warm despite the cost. I know a lot of things i woudl prefer to spend $900 on, but as long as my bubs are warm and happy then it is ok.....!!

Anyhow ladies - i am so glad that i am not the only paying ACTEW employees wages!

Rach :-)

Call ACTEW and get them to DD fortnightly payments.

They estimate an average payment over your usage for the entire year. We do this for gas and electricity...I think its about $30.00 for each so $60. a fortnight.
Weve done this for years and have never looked back.

We missed the money a bit at first but its much easier that having to fork out $900 in one hit.

http://photobucket.com/albums/v235/thejagn...nt=85722cbd.jpg

Josie
Louis 1994
Sam 1996
Bronte 1999

Rach all i do to tell if Brielle is cold is stick my hand down the back of her of a morning. If she is warm i take it as a good sign. I think if they are really cold they will wake up. I sure cant sleep if i am cold LOL.
I also use flannette sheets on the cot (and all other beds) as find this really helps to keep us warmer. Its the first thing i do when the weather turns and the last thing to go when its warming up.

thanks carol - i tried that this morning when they woke and they were warm enough. i do use flanelette sheets so i guess i am doing the right thing!! it is little things like this that stress me out - as i have no idea!! thanks

Hi Rach,

I am feeling your pain, we got a $700 bill this winter I was quite shocked but I later found out that DH had been leaving our Gas wall heater on all night since the beginning of winter. I have put a stop to that damn fast. We have just applied to pay fortnightly as well.

Regards,

Nic

DD Gabrielle 21/2/02
DD Grace 17/10/04

<a href="http://www.tickercentral.com"><img border="0" src="http://www.tickercentral.com/view/1an3/1"></a>

every night i say to dh can you turn the heater down to 9 or 10'c, thinking we could probably even go lower... every night he turns it down to 12' so every night i wake up stinking hot. i don't understand why he does it! i HATE ducted gas, i was more than happy with our wall heater in our last house...

Hi Rach,

whats your gas bill?

I am really interested in everyones prices they are paying and have been trying to compare against ours.

I think because everyone has different systems, gas heating, electric heating etc. Maybe more of a fair comparison is to add both of them up over your winter period (ie gas and electric bill). That way even though someones electric bill might be low their gas may be high.

Our bills last year this time(haven't got ours for winter yet) was electric $250 and gas $450. So ours is $700. I have the heating on alot as we don't go out much but I have never left it on over night.

I do the same as Carol, put Zoe in a sleeping bag with lots of blankets. If they are cold they will certainly let you know

cheers
Alexandra

It's amazing how cold Alex's hands and face can get without her body being cold. I am a big fan of the "finger down the back of pjs" trick.

muppet - we don't have a gas bill - so i guess that is a good thing isn't it!! I was expecting around $500 so i guess i was just shocked they get so high!

S_m - i know what you mean, the boys hands get cold but their bodies are toasty, its very deceiving.

BJ is going to ring up today about paying fortnightly so next time we won't even see the bill!

Thanks girls!

We went out to seven display houses for "Solar House Day" last Sunday (basically people's (VERY!) high EER houses being opened up for public display - both retrofitted and new). You might be interested to hear that a 2 year old solar home (built by Strine) in Jerrabomberra (which has solar panels, thermal slab floor, orientated correctly, shade sails etc) had an electricity bill of $-1.50 for the last quarter! We talked to the owner and she had put her electric column heater on for only 2 days this winter (I think the average daily house temp for the year is something like 18-20C). Just amazing, and definitely something to think about if you are building from scratch. The owner also indicated that the price was not significantly higher than that of other "normal" non-solar homes.

Cheers
Christine (33)
DH Duncan (37)
DS Felix 30/05/2003

solar powered sounds great. i wish we were in a position to build a house. i might drag bj out to jerra on the w/end to check them out.

I remember our first Winter in Canberra and recievig a $1000 electricity bills and rining up Actewagl (sp?) and asking them to check the metre, they said its common for people form interstate to come to canberra and have a heart attack about electricity/ Gas bills.
There is a service where you call up an they give you advise about reducing your electricty bills.

Thanks Christine for the post about the high EER houses - we didn't get to the displays but it's something I'm interested in. Like RachieD I wish we were in a position to build from scratch - $1.50 heating bill is almost unbelievable. Just for the record, our gas bill this winter for ducted gas was about $550, and our electricity bills over winter are usually about $280 - this is for an average size four bedroom home. When my boys were babies the gas bill didn't go much higher than $650 in winter, and I'm pleased to say every winter since we've managed to reduce it more and more as we reduce the temperatures we set it at.

Alice
Me (36)
DH (43)
DS1 (7), DS2 (5)

Unfortunately Solar House Day is only once a year so everyone will have to wait until September 2006! (this is because they are family homes, rather than (empty) display homes). Great fun if you are stickybeak like me and like to dream about one day building from scratch. I checked the site but the Canberra/Jerrabomberra house list have been removed now - for privacy reasons I guess.
http://www.solarhouseday.com/