Why am I suddenly using a lot more gas or electricity?

If you think you are using more gas or electricity then check our guide below.

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Energy

Apart from prices rising, common reasons why bills go up suddenly include:

• More time spent at home, for example
  • unemployment
  • working from home
  • retirement
  • new baby - home kept warmer
  • illness - home kept warmer
• more people at home, eg. relatives staying
• additional electrical equipment
• faulty gas and electricity appliances using more energy
• appliance accidentally left on all the time (for example, an immersion heater or electric fire)
• getting to know a new heating system
• not understanding economy 7 controls (particularly storage heaters)
• gas boiler needs servicing

Be sure to check our guide to reducing energy consumption.

Occasionally a suppliers' record is not amended properly after an old meter has been exchanged for a new one. This would show a very sudden jump in consumption between two bills. Check the reading given on your bill against the meter itself.

Sudden changes are not usually caused by faulty meters. Meter are very reliable and rarely make bills larger than they should be. But if you are worried, check our question on faulty meters.