On Tue, 02 Nov 2010 23:09:08 +0000, Lobster wrote:

This strikes me as utterly ridiculous and I fully intend to whinge, but
before I start raking out old bills and trying to tease out me winter vs
summer gas consumption, does anyone have a rule of thumb as to how these
payments are or should be calculated?

They guess as they have no past history.

I've never had a problem getting any DD reduced when it's come in
above what I expect but then I have records going back years in a
spread sheet so can work out what I ought to be paying at the click
of a mouse...

The only real way is to go back to meter readings 12 months ago take
readings now and do the maths. This is were a spread sheet is good to
calculate the number of days between the readings divide it into the
total consumption and multiply by 365 to get an "annual" consumption
to then apply the unit cost to, the divide by 12 to get the monthly
payment but don't forget anything you owe/owed, standing charges and
VAT (@5%).

Southern just screwed up one of my bills but their system caught it
before sending it out. Recent meter reading on E7 tarrif but
somewhere down the line the two readings got swapped. This would have
plonked 70,000 units into the day rate at 15p/unit just over 10 grand
and -70,000 units at night rate at 5p/unit, approx £7,000 bill
instead of £90ish...

--
Cheers
Dave.