briefly, we bought the house in UK on 18th January, it has been empty until yesterday. On the 18th Jan the gas reading was 08223. Just had an email asking for the latest meter reading and the number my husband supplied me with is now 09716. Now my calculations say that we have used 1493 kWh (the heating had been left on 24/7 due to the really cold weather and not wanting pipes to burst in empty property)
Anyway, the British Gas website has calculated that I have used 16,625 kWh!! The bill came up as £765.00 WTF???
I will have to phone them in the morning to get this sorted out, but can tell I'm going to have a sleepless night thinking of it.
Surely this must be wrong

Hope it all works out for you.

Keep us informed.

Having said that, if you've had the heating on 24/7 since mid Jan then I'd expect a larger bill than around £76.50 (roughly 10% of the £765 based on the readings above).

Elizabeth, also nearly committed suicide. My most recent bill for quarterly use was 1,400 units. = £700. that was for heating(radiators) and hot water only, no gas fire used, as that makes it much worse,and no cooking. Hot water must take a fair bit in this house as there are three of us living here at the moment. Your's seems remarkably high in that case.
Admittedly I have had the heating on around the clock through most of the time since Christmas. Meter was read beginning of March. Everybody I spoke to, told me to leave it on low all the time. Exactly what I did as it is a cold house. So now my gas bill(only) has gone up by £20 per month to £130 per month. Electiric had also zoomed up this quarter.
Good luck.

Check what your thermostat was set at, if it's full on then it won't half wack the bill up. Good luck with it anyway, it must be scary.

Just spoke with British Gas who said that it is possible the cost could be that high if it's been running for 24/7 at a higher than normal temperature

Will keep you posted though and thanks for the replies.

sounds about right tbh if its on 24/7, my gas an electricity bill are about £200 a month an thats for 2 people in a 3 bed house

Welcome to are world, try £1500

Having it on 24/7 will not help...

I am havin probs with scottish power, sent me a bill for 1100 pound for gas and electric even tho i was already payin them by d.debit. I got told by e on that if your bill goes over 100pound then its the companies policy to contact the customer. Dont know how true it is but worth checkin out. I am to scared to ring them at the min coz i cant afford to pay debt off and last time i rang them they didnt really help.

Are you sure he read it right?

By the way, if it's a GAS meter then it doesn't measure kWh, it'll measure in Cu. Ft. (or Cu. Meters)...

Check here: clicky

Ours went down to £120 after the summer, and now its gone back up to £212 a month...i thought the Gov had ordered the utilities to simplify the tariffs...NPower had about 30 different ones..

Mine was dual fuel and also saved by payin by d.debit and they told mehow much to pay after meter readings done and told them how much i use heating. Then still sent me bill. I went from 80 to 187 and thats without the debt. Onlw got 2 bed house

I believe the readings are correct unfortunately So for 80 days with no-one living in the house, and the heating on higher than it needed to be, I'll have to pay the £765.

My husband did comment that when he walked into the house it was so hot, it was almost tropical. So I'll have to suck it up this time and now he's there in the house the heat is only on for an hour twice a day turned down very low.

Oh well, what I'll save in paying medical bills over here will be replaced by the cost of gas over there, such is life eh?

At least your mind is put at rest as to the cause and effect. These bills are only going to shoot upwards now anyway, all the energy companies now owned by foreigners who are just going to rip us off until something is done about it. About time all strategic utilities were taken back into public ownership.

I'll be more upset that I was paying British Gas in the usa than having to pay £765.00

ps only pulling you leg xxx

Not only but also Bandy;

"Between 2000 and 2010, our total trade deficit was £286bn, but during the same decade the value of our net sales of portfolio assets was much larger than this – at £615bn. None of this money was spent on direct investment in plant, machinery and industrial buildings, which would have strengthened our economy. Portfolio assets are no more than titles to ownership – mostly shares - so selling these to foreign owners involved no physical investment in the UK, just loss of ownership and control on a grand scale.

What did we sell? Foreign interests bought from us an incredible range of what had previously been owned in Britain. Most of our power generating companies, our airports and ports, our water companies, many of our rail franchises and our chemical, engineering and electronic companies, our merchant banks, an iconic chocolate company - Cadbury, our heavily subsidised wind farms, a vast amount of expensive housing and many, many other assets all disappeared into foreign ownership.
No other country in the world allowed this sort of thing to happen. Why did it occur in Britain? "

More here if anyone is interested:

http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkin...f-british-assets-has-damaged-our-economy

That sums it all up Granny. I am by no means a left winger but I know what is sensible. It's a hard loif.