Economy 7 with Electric Underfloor Heating???

[Leadhillite]

Desperately seeking some sensible advice here!!!

I am refurbishing a house out in the middle of nowhere and coupled to that the house is so small I only have room for storage heating!

The house is so small I am only fitting one combi storage/convector heater which should serve the whole house. I do have a multifuel stove tho which will be the main source of heat. To complete the picture I am also fitting panel heaters in the bedrooms, (tho I anticipate they will not be required).

The tricky bit is the bathroom where I am fitting electric underfloor heating. (The walls and floor are well insulated so I should be OK.)

I have been in e-mail communications with the so called "customer services" team at Scottish Power and am now on my 5th customer service advisor, and each time they don't answer my questions directly and usually say something in conflict with the previous advisor!!!!! Very frustrating!!!!!

What I would like to know is whether there is anyway I can wangle things to take advantage of the "White Meter ComfortPlus" package that I am on, with respect to the underfloor heating. The heating will probably be on 24/7, tho at different heat levels across the day, so could I maybe have a dual feed, (one from the ordinary fuse box and one from the heating fuse box), going into a Economy 7 time switch (like a Horstmann Electronic 7), with the timer set to run 24 hours a day?

Any advice would be very much appreciated. I don't know if Scottish Power are evading my questions, or are just staffed with people fortunate enough to have gas central heating and not trained enough to understand the foibles of their own services, but I would be chuffed to bits if someone can advise me of anyway to not have this heating costing me a fortune to run!!

Had a look at the pics in the WIKI when I was checking this out.....they're incredible!

P.S. When I say "wangle", I mean 'creatively'. I'm not interested in doing anything dodgy, as I will no doubt have to print off any advice here to give my electrician a steer in the right direction!

Thanks.

 

[Stoday]

With Economy7 you get only one supply, which is charged at a lower rate during the night.

You only install a night only circuit if you want to run heaters that only operate at night. If you want to run heaters 24/7, just supply them from the consumer unit that supplies the rest of the household.

Make sure E7 is the cheaper option. Day E7 kWh are somewhat more expensive than unrestricted kWh, so E7 is only cheaper overall if you use enough night kWh. The break-even night proportion is usually around 15%.

 

[Lectrician]

Although, if it is a true old school white meter install, only the off peak load is cheap, not the normal board. There are still a few of these install around, although they are not available as a new tarriff.

Can you take a pick of your actual meter arrangements?

If you have a dual rate meter (both the peak and off peak readings in one meter) then you likely have economy 7 where all the electricity becomes cheaper at night.

 

[Leadhillite]

Im on "White Meter ComfortPlus", so I actually have THREE rates - a "control", "night" and "day". Its a very modern looking digital meter, although my communications with Scottish Power have revealed to us both that its been broken since the day it was installed!!!!!

The last e-mail I received from Scottish Power said this:

"I have reviewed your account and can confirm that you are currently on our comfort plus white meter tariff. On this tariff you are charged a cheaper night rate for 8.5 hour between 10pm and 8.30am this is applied to all circuits in your house except the heating. Your heating is charged by your control rate which is available either for a period of totaling 8.5 hours in any 24 hour period staring at 12.00 or by Scottish Power weather call. All other usage you have will be charged on your day rate.

If you install a combined storage/convector heater you must have 2 separate power supplies one from the heating circuit and one from the domestic circuit. This will be charge on your domestic day/night rates depending on the time the heater is used.

With regards to the under floor heating, if you have it on 24/7 then it will need to be connected up to the domestic circuit and will be charged on the day/night rates depending on when the heating is used."

The above has been the most authoritative e-mail I have received, but I still don't have faith that thats the gospel truth - as no doubt the other 4 people I communicated with though their version of the facts was true as well!!! (Also why is the night rate applied to everything EXCEPT the heating circuits??)

I would love to know if there's anyway to power the underfloor heating off the Control Rate circuit, for wahtever times it is available outwith the Night rate period.

 

[Scud]

Ok, where do I begin? We've established, I think, that you live in ScottishPower's home area. That being the case, Economy 7 isn't applicable. ScottishPower do use that tariff, but only in SP South (the old Manweb area of England).

The reason the night rate is applied to everything but the storage heating is that, in order to have a tariff which can split the storage heating charge across more than one time period, the storage heating has to be switched separately, unlike the old White Meter tariffs. The benefit of that is that the rate charged for the storage heating is actually slightly lower than that charged for Low rate. What this means is that, instead of having you heater charged for a straight 8.5 hours overnight, leaving you with a heater that is cooling by the evening, it can be charged for a shorter period overnight and boosted later, usually early evening. This makes the storage heater experience a bit more comfortable.

What you have in your house is a Radio Telemeter. The timing device built into this receives time signals regularly via a radio network. The core programme in the RTM then checks what state it is in (on or off) and makes adjustments accordingly (switches your heating on or off). Command signals can be used to interrupt this process, either to solve generation problems short term or to utilise Weathercall, targeting heating periods at times when they're most useful.

Unfortunately, I don't think it's feasible to supply your underfloor heating from the storage heating board. You'd run the risk of having two sources of supply, a slightly dodgy idea.

The email from SP is spot on when it talks of two supplies for a combined storage/convector heater. In fact, everything they say in that mail makes sense to me. But then, I would say that, wouldn't I?

 

[Leadhillite]

Hi Scud, and thank you so much for this.

For the 3 years the meter has been installed, its been broken, as I have readings on the "Control" and "Day" meters, but not the "night" - so the customer services advisor said the timer on the "Night" meter was broken and someone is coming out to fix this in July.

At the moment I only have 1 fuse box, with another 1 due to be installed shortly for the Storage Heater. Given my comments above about readings, would that suggest that all supplies have been linked up to my 1 existing fuse box, when the "control" feed should not have been?

I was thinking I could have a fuse for the underfloor heating in my storage heater fuse box, and put a supply from there and the ordinary fuse box into a Horstmann Electronic 7 switch and that swtich then feeds the heating. I understand that for Hot Water tanks these switches use the cheap rate by default, (on a timer), but allow you to use a standard supply to boost the tank as required through the day, (and will override the "boost" button if its been pressed during a period when the cheap rate is being applied by the timer). I was thinking I could adapt this scenario, by setting the switch to supply the heating 24/7 and then the control rate supply would come in by default, and if not available then the day rate would kick in, (or night rate if its late on). The Heating would then be controled by a further programmer after the Horstmann switch.

Also, from your reply, am I right in thinking that all I need for my Hot Water Tank is one supply from my ordinary fuse box to a simple timer switch, (ideally with a boost or advance facility)?

(For the fuller picture, the storage heating is a good solution for my house as it might not be occupied all the time and it gives me the confidence of knowing I can have a constant background heat in the house, without having to actively manage it.)

Re. the weathercall, whats your advice there? I live 1500' above sea level, sometimes above cloud level. It can be peeing down here, and glorious weather on the M74, and vice versa. My gut feeling is that I shouldn't rely on the weathercall to get my heating right as my village is so localised, but am I making more out of this than there really is?

Thanks again Scud for this. Your posting is very informed and gives me 100% more confidence than I had with the first 4 people I was communicating with at Scottish Power. The e-mail I posted here was the first I had any confidence in. Its confusing for me as a punter, but the contact centre should know what they sell and not be giving out conflicting statements. I don't know what your job is, but you should go in and kick butt at the contact centre! (Also folks like me should not be relying on your generosity of your free time to sort out confusions from Scottish Power!!) Thanks again.

 

[Scud]

Up until last year I was a meter fixer but I'm now employed as a technical trainer, mostly meter fixing, so I've had plenty of experience of meters. I'm surprised it's taken so long to spot and rectify a meter fault such as you describe.

You could stick a second supply from your storage heating consumer unit to the underfloor heating but I wouldn't recommend it. As I said before it might violate the terms of your supply contract. Frankly, I'm just not sure of this.

As for your water heating, it's what a Horstmann E7 switch is for. There are lots of different types but the Horstmann, from memory, has factory preset times which would work with your tariff. Just make sure you have a boost facility, although I can't immagine anyone would make a timer without this. This can be wired to your 24 hour supply alone.

Finally, from what you've said, you live somewhere in the upper reaches of the Southern Uplands. You're a better man than I am! Good luck to you.

 

[Leadhillite]

The house is not yet occupied so my electricity over the last 3 years is only about £250, although I have had a dehumidifier running 24/7 for about 2 years. I had readings on the control and day, but nil on the night. I think that because my usage is so low, it slipped through the net, (its getting fixed tomorrow morning!)

I repeated my story to a mate who was an electrical engineer in the Navy and as the words came out my mouth, it dawned on me the full extent of what I was saying...... He straightened me out about the E7 switch having one supply only and confirmed that the type of automatic switch I would need is feasible, however he can't think there would be one available for domestic use. Basically, if there was, everyone would be using them, much to the horror of Scottish Power!

I think thats the plan for tthe electric underfloor heating possibly kaput now!!

Thanks again for all your help.

 

[ericmark]

Although you can have storage type under floor heating this system stores the heat in water and is an expensive wet system. It also uses a lot of space for the storage vessel so I would not think it is suitable for you.

See here for details

 

[energyadvise]

Im on "White Meter ComfortPlus", so I actually have THREE rates - a "control", "night" and "day". Its a very modern looking digital meter, although my communications with Scottish Power have revealed to us both that its been broken since the day it was installed!!!!!

The last e-mail I received from Scottish Power said this:

"I have reviewed your account and can confirm that you are currently on our comfort plus white meter tariff. On this tariff you are charged a cheaper night rate for 8.5 hour between 10pm and 8.30am this is applied to all circuits in your house except the heating. Your heating is charged by your control rate which is available either for a period of totaling 8.5 hours in any 24 hour period staring at 12.00 or by Scottish Power weather call. All other usage you have will be charged on your day rate.

If you install a combined storage/convector heater you must have 2 separate power supplies one from the heating circuit and one from the domestic circuit. This will be charge on your domestic day/night rates depending on the time the heater is used.

With regards to the under floor heating, if you have it on 24/7 then it will need to be connected up to the domestic circuit and will be charged on the day/night rates depending on when the heating is used."

The above has been the most authoritative e-mail I have received, but I still don't have faith that thats the gospel truth - as no doubt the other 4 people I communicated with though their version of the facts was true as well!!! (Also why is the night rate applied to everything EXCEPT the heating circuits??)

I would love to know if there's anyway to power the underfloor heating off the Control Rate circuit, for wahtever times it is available outwith the Night rate period.

As Scud said - good description from Scottish Power. This type of meter has 3 readings - day - night - control. SP control the times when the control part of it kicks in, that operates the storage heating system, not much use if you have removed the storage heaters. The main downside to your meter type is, you cannot switch your supplier. When you try to switch, a related MPAN gets flagged up on the systems. This means you have two different supply numbers, no other supplier can support your tariff. I would ask SP to change the meter to either a single rate, or a standard day night off peak meter. You may have some trouble getting them to do this though. As it means you will be able to switch your supplier!

 

[Taylortwocities]

energyadvise

Can you explain why you felt that it was relavent to dig up an old topic from 2½ years ago???????????????????????
I would rather expect that he has got it sorted by now!

 

[Leadhillite]

Taylortwocities

I was stunned to get a notification of a reply to this - cos as you say, it is over 2 1/2 years old now........me thinks he could be touting for business.

Indeed the cottage is finished....and up for sale!


Always chuffed to bits with diynot.com and very grateful to the professionals like yourselves who help out the "eager" but ignorant amateurs like me!

 

[ban-all-sheds]

Taylortwocities

I was stunned to get a notification of a reply to this - cos as you say, it is over 2 1/2 years old now........me thinks he could be touting for business.

Or maybe it's you who is touting - for a property sale.

 

[energyadvise]

energyadvise

Can you explain why you felt that it was relavent to dig up an old topic from 2½ years ago???????????????????????
I would rather expect that he has got it sorted by now!

Hi,
I didn't notice the date at first. I was looking for something else, when I stumbled on this forum. The information still applies to anyone who is searching for same - So I didn't see the harm in posting. Not touting for business as someone suggested. As you can see I didn't post any urls.
Thanks for raising the question.

Kind regards

Martin