Forums Forums Wirral History : Chasing the Past Wirral History Electricity Bill 1950's

Recently been given a number of old MANWEB bills from around 1954 belonging to my parents.
Quarterly bill was £7. 1 old penny per unit .
I do remember that we only had lights, radio and electric cooker. The cooker was hired from the company.
The washing was done in the boiler outside,once a week on a Monday and mum would put a shilling in the gas meter. We didn't use gas for anything else. Only the fire gave us hot water and the dreaded paraffin heaters for warmth in the rest of the house.
Maybe it's the way forward to keep our bills low?

I wonder what wages your parents were on 59 years ago.

My Dad earned I seem to recall from sorting old paperwork after he died , less than £3 a week for a 48hr week. Of course these days that would be --(quoting the measuring worth site

"Current data is only available till 2012. In 2012, £3 0s 0d from 1954 is worth


£69.50 using the retail price index

£177.00 using average earnings"

Of course I dont know how accurate the site is but that doesnt seem a lot of money.

This is the link if anyone wants to play with the calculators

http://www.measuringworth.com/ppoweruk/result.php?use%5B%5D=CPI&use%5B%5D=NOMINALEARN&year_early=1954&pound71=3&shilling71=&pence71=&amount=3&year_source=1954&year_result=2013

I clicked on purchasing power, UK £'s

Things have certainly changed. My 4 yr old grandchild started reception class at primary school yesterday , and apparently as well as the 'wendy house' corner than I remember we had, theres now a standard 'ipad' corner which consists of a carpeted corner with a few comfy cushions to lounge on, and half a dozen ipads in the middle, to be used as they wish. Gasp!

LOL, have you seen the price of paraffin lately? I too remember when our hot water was provided by a back boiler behind the fire in the living room.
Actually, Granny, it sounds as if the electricity was very expensive in 1954. Using the calculator linked by Venice, £7 then is equivalent to £157, using RPI. My electricity bill now is about £100 a quarter, with all the modern appliances. My heating is by gas.The cost may have been only 1d. per unit, but I'm sure there would have been a standing charge as well.

I have found another for 1963. Units used at 6.5d were 70 , units used at 1.3d were 589. Total bill for the summer quater was £5.1.9d..No add ons.
My father was older than most of my friends and he retired in 1962 on a private pension of £11.0.0d per week. His final salary was £1000.0.0d. We never seemed to be flush ,so I don't really know if that was good or bad.

Electricity....you were lucky!

Hmmm Granny; did he have a cannabis farm in the loft? He used 659 units in a summer quarter: last Dec/Jan/Feb I used 826 units. That, if you remember, was a pretty cold period. The reason I'm surprised is that I've got a lot more electricity-hungry appliances than he would have had. I'm pretty sure that the "unit" hasn't changed, being 1 Kilowatt/hour.

Could be that more electric fires and heaters were around then rather than the gas central heating that most of us have nowadays.

Probably right, Salmon, but it was a summer quarter so I would have expected minimal use (especially since in those days, when it got cold, we just put more clothes on).

When it comes to salary, I reckon £1000 p.a. wasn't bad. In 1962 I was working on the night shift at Handley Page at Radlett doing electrical inspection on Victor aircraft. Because I was working nights, I earned about £30 per week, £1500 p.a. On that, I was able to take my girlfriend to some very fancy West End restaurants.

OMG! Primary school has certainly changed! iPads! I remember a sand pit, a partitioned corner in the class room that went as a house,a folding book case that was the library! As you say times have certainly changed!!!

Salmon , you have jogged tbe memory. We did have a couple electric fires. Two bars that burnt our legs when we huddled around them on chillier evenings. Also remembered , by that time we had an emersion heater which was wonderful, as my sister and I no longer had to endure rusty coloured ,steam baths. Maybe that would account for the high usage. Mum also had a twin tub by that time too. All the mod cons creeping in.
Cannabis was not part of my vocabulary at the time, but had my father heard the word, the roof would have exploded off the loft.
Apologies for errors but using ipad at moment, and I'm not getting on with it too well. I can understand how some don't use capital letters and punctuation Chris, it's a nightmare on these things.

Immersion heaters are/were heavy users of electricity, particularly those days when insulation was not the big issue that it is nowadays. Some stuff here about costs.
http://heatsave.actimedia.com/immersion.html

I played around with one recently and I now understand better why upper-case letters may not be used.