Investigation on massive electricity bills

[Octopus]

Get the home owner to take weekly readings for a few weeks.

That said £4100 for a quarter is a joke.

 

[sparky1508]

I will be doing as advised earlier and fitting an energy monitor. Might do a week on the main DB and then a week on each sub mains DB. Not even sure if the other 3 subs come from the main DB as the cottage is close to the main house so may be fed from there. Will know more after my initial investigations.

 

[ruston]

are producing & they selling bob hope !

Or someone might be without their knowledge.
Do they have a swimming pool by any chance?

 

[sparky1508]

Or someone might be without their knowledge.
Do they have a swiming pool by any chance?

No swimming pool that I am aware of and I'm pretty sure it would have been spoken about today if they had.

 

[sparky1508]

Or someone might be without their knowledge.
Do they have a swiming pool by any chance?

There is also a couple that live in the cottage.

 

[ruston]

There is also a couple that live in the cottage.

Maybe the place to start then.

 

[sparky1508]

Thinking may get away with a clamp meter as I've just seen the price of these machines. Just check current flows to each DB and see which one has got an unusually high current flow.

 

[buzzlightyear]

now your thinking!

 

[freddo]

We've recently been using Inlec to hire some data loggers, their service is top notch, would highly recommend.

 

[westward10]

Meter readings are rarely incorrect unless smart meters are involved. Even estimated readings are based on past consumption so I would guess somewhere along the line this power is being consumed.

 

[davesparks]

Thinking may get away with a clamp meter as I've just seen the price of these machines. Just check current flows to each DB and see which one has got an unusually high current flow.

That will only tell you the instantaneous current flow, it won't tell you anything about the average demand.

I would say the first thing to do is contact their electricity supplier (the meter operator, not the DNO)
I believe they are required to investigate if there is a query about the bill.

As mentioned above if the bulls are estimate s this may be part of the cause. Have a look at previous bills to see if there is a gradual increase over the years or if this is a sudden jump up.

 

[dmxtothemax]

Leakage in underground cables is not uncommon,
have you tried testing any underground sections
I would do a megger test on any underground sections ?

 

[Leyland30]

The expense of a data logger at this stage seems a little excessive, a basic clap meter will allow you to identify the circuit (s) with high loadings. If you can't identify an issue with this method then a data logger might be considered a robust method of demonstrating a meter malfunction to the DNO.

However, Do DNOs offer meter calibration testing - only charging the customer if no fault is detected.

Let us know how you get on.

 

[Pete999]

I thought I had caught at one stage of my life, lucky it was a false alarm.!!!

 

[GMES]

I bought myself the Fluke 1730 Energy logger and it's already paid for itself at nearly 2k it wasn't a knee jerk purchase but I've had it hired out nearly every week since I bought it so it is now making money every week.
They are well worth the money, simply input the unit price for electricity and it will work out exactly what your installation is costing.
The logging period can be set from 10 minutes to 3 months and at the end you can print off the results or email them direct to your customer, equally you can drag snapshots off of it with a memory stick while it is logging.
We also use it to carry out load tests on machinery, some of our customers like to know what some of their large machines are costing to run for help with working out production costs.

 

[Octopus]

Problem with such vague posts such as these as we are all guessing.

OP - you need to ask the customer to get out ALL their old bills, and

1. look at the amounts due
2. they need to check if they are estimated or proper readings
3. also log the consumption per quarter

- only then can they actually compare apples with apples.

 

[sparky1508]

I will be doing tests on all circuits making the underground ones a priority. I feel with that amount of current flowing it shouldn't be hard to find.

 

[buzzlightyear]

Leakage in underground cables is not uncommon

they need to put a smart meter in for downton abbey !

 

[Lucien Nunes]

with that amount of current flowing it shouldn't be hard to find.

Indeed not. If half the bill is wastage via leakage to earth, the L-E insulation resistance would be 8.2 ohms, so about a ten-millionth of what you might expect on a domestic system. You would want to search for it with a continuity tester, not an insulation tester, as that would just read a string of zeroes - 0.000008 Megohms if it had that many digits. Somehow I doubt this as the cause - the fault would be dissipating the heat of over three 2-bar fires, which I can't imagine XLPE SWA withstanding for over six months. The ground would probably be steaming! Although anything is possible until you get some data.

 

[Midwest]

may be the electricity company they get
the supply from need to be involved and ask them.

Think this is the most sensible suggestion to check first. Why pay hundreds of pounds getting an electrician to check if there is something wrong with the electrical installation, if they've got some dodgy meters or readings.

Get the fuel supplier to verify their meters.