How Is Your Electricity Bill Calculated?

The Bill Shock

The shock of opening and reading an electricity bill only to find out that it is much higher than what one expected can be a great source of stress, particularly when budgets are tight. One of these reasons may be seasonal variation. Hot temperature, especially during the summer season, will most likely have a noticeable impact on your electricity bill. During this time, the demand for consumption is high and more expensive sources are included to meet the increased consumer need. Prices are usually higher when it comes to commercial and residential customers as it is more costly to distribute power to them. Several energy providers in Texas will offer you the moon and stars, but when you read underneath the agreement, you can find weaknesses and inconsistencies in the services they give to their clients. Take a chance to find the best electricity rates in Houston and high-quality service and which are to be found cheaper here.

Another cause of electricity bills spiking up unexpectedly is the house design or the living space design. If the structure of the space is not energy efficient and the appliances are dated, chances are high that it will use more energy to compensate with the inefficiency of the space and appliance which pushes up the power bill.

Lastly, your lifestyle greatly affects your electricity bill. Changes like moving in with a partner, having a baby, and even working from home can all have a substantial effect on your electricity consumption since they all have specific power needs that should be met.

Avoid Bill Shock

The best way to avoid bill shock on electricity is to keep track of your usage. This is not to say that you should deprive yourself of cooling or heating just for the sake of getting electricity bill to where you want it to be, but making mindful decisions and not wasting energy will have dramatic effects on keeping the bill down.

One option is to make your living space more efficient when it comes to consuming power. When purchasing new appliances, it always helps to take note and compare products based on their energy-saving features as this truly help you cut the cost and save you more in the long run. And after getting energy-efficient appliances, make sure that their usage is also regulated. Unplug any appliance that is not being used and be mindful of the appliance that consumes the most power among others, like a space heater or an air-conditioner.

You can also compare retailers on which has the better price plans for your needs. Companies like iSwitch electricity retailer give you more options to better manage your energy costs with a different suite of price plans. Each plan has different flexibilities to help you save on cost while enjoying the same, reliable power supply from the national power grid of Singapore.

Calculate Your Own Bill

With all of those power-saving options, nothing matches the knowledge of how you are actually billed for the use of electricity. Going through the process of calculating your own bill gives you the comfort of knowing where your bill stands so you can adjust which appliance will have to cut back on usage and those that can be utilized more for you to enjoy. And, ultimately, help you bring down the total cost of you power bill.

To do this you need to follow three steps:

Step 1: Figure out how many watts each appliance uses every day.

Most appliances have a sticker label which says the watts usage. It is usually located on the back or bottom of the device, or in the owner’s manual.

A list from the Environmental Protection Agency is also below for the typical wattage levels of the commonly used appliances. This should give you an estimate for your calculations on the next step and help you decide on an electricity supplier for Singapore residents.

Typical range of power consumption (Wattage) of some commonly used appliances:

Get the number of watt-hours the device consumes each day by simply multiplying the watts and number of hours used. So if a Flat Screen TV was used for 4 hours that would be 480 watt-hours per day.

Step 2: Determine the kilowatts an appliance uses per month.

Since electricity is measured in kilowatt-hours, convert the watt-hours to kilowatt-hours by dividing the figure by 1000 since one kilowatt is equal to 1000 watts. This would make your Flat Screen TV .48 kilowatt-hour per day and if we multiply it by 30 (days in a month) we would get 14.4 kWh per month.

Step 3: Calculate the Cost.

For the final step, refer to your latest electric bill to see how much you are being charged per kWh. We’ll assume your electric rate is $20 cents per kWh. Multiply the 0.20 rate to your 14.4 kWh monthly usage to get the figure of how much the Flat Screen TV is costing you which is $2.88. Do this to the rest of the appliances and add them all together for the total figure of your calculated bill.

With this trick up your sleeve, you’ll never worry about another bill shock and know how much everything will be costing you.