How long do you leave your heating on each day?

63 thoughts on “How long do you leave your heating on each day?”

1. http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/utilities/energy-saving-myths. Anyone who doesn’t receive emails from MSE might find some answers to this discussion here.

2. I have been pondering the question on whether to leave the heating on all day or once in the morning and once in the evening.
   I have always taken my meter readings regularly, so have a very good record of Gas usage throughout the year. I have been doing a trial for the past month taking readings every day.
   My house is 4 bedrooms, cavity wall insulated and 12″ insulation in the loft. So what are the results, Taking into account that the last month has been warmer than November in the last 2 years, I have found that the usage has reduced by about 25%, even on the few near Zero days that we have had it only uses 8 units, I would have expected 10+ units going on past readings of similar days when the house was not heated from 11 am to 6 pm. We also have thermostatic controls on every radiator, set to the temperature required in each room. The boiler thermostat is in the hall, set to 21 Deg. The radiator thermostat in the hall is set to number 3, whatever that means in degrees.
   I will continue this trial throughout the winter to see if it really makes a difference in the long term.

3. Detached 2 bed well insulated bungalow. 15 year old boiler thermo rad valves on 7 rads. We are working class pensioners, not rich but comfortable. Home all day most days. In recent hard winters if living room temp 18 c or < we put heating on for 1 hour first thing.( If temp above that we don't) Then 1 hr boost again lunch time unless temp above 19 c. Main heating on from 15:30 to 19:30. (Temp gets up to about 22 c) Bedtime after 22:30, room temp still comfortable.We use oil all summer for hot water & we prefer baths to showers. We use approx 1200 litres P.A.

4. I recently started working for Scottish power and there seems to be a lot of confusion when it comes to heating costs. It is not wise to have your heating on all the time regardless of the temp. Really what you want to do is have it on as little as possible and at the lowest heat that you are comfortable with. Turning your temp down just 1 degree does make a difference, not a huge one but a difference in the long run. Try using draft excluders and have doors and windows closed to keep the heat in. Call your energy supplier and make sure your on the cheapest option available and they can even give you an energy efficiency no which will give lots of advice on how to reduce your costs. Hope this helps!

5. last year i was only putting the heating on when the house went cold and this used up a lot of oil,
   i was told it takes more oil to heat the house from cold,
   so i was advised to leave the heating on continues and the thermostat between 15 & 20 in the day and 10 at night that way it uses less oil to heat the house as its not working on a very cold house,
   i only started this in jan last year and i also only had a small amount of oil left but this worked as it got me through,

6. We have a small 3 deb end of terrace brick house with double glazed windows. We used 500 litres in just over two months, we only have the heating on for 2 hours in the morning, mainly to heat the water and then for a few hours in the evening. I think this is going very quickly, the radiators are old and constantly need bleeding, do you think there is a major problem with the system or is it normal to use this much??

7. i had 1000ltrs delivered 12/01/11 when we ran out of oil over the coldest days at xmas , had to wait as the depot had run out themselves at that point.( left some in so it didnt suck up sludge in older iron tank ) after new load i hadnt checked for a few weeks the level , when i did it was 3/4 full then it got milder put it back to twice a day only and at 18-20 on dial sometimes less when log fire going or during day none at all. then i found this tues. 7/02 1 day short of 4 weeks- since last delivery ( costing £635.25 ) i had COMPLETELY RUN OUT AGAIN ! i phoned a boiler servicer, noting new filter fitted by prev. owners 2009 he said on 7 rads- old or new- AND the use of a log burner- there was NO WAY i can have used up that ammount – he said if i had a leak ( tube to boiler thru garage ,not under concrete ) i would know about it as would be swimming in it. He recons its been stolen. Look on the web police blogs – it is happening everywhere . keep tabs on what your using- i’m not filling up again until i have a padlock on lid etc. luckily i have electric as an option. theres no way electric is going to cost me £160 week like this last load has done !!!???? i’m sitting here with a coat on- not intending to fill up at least until March the theiving bar stuards can go freeze . i was born in a council house with a coal fire and crittall windows – i’ll survive ! hot water bottles are my only needs around here from now on until spring , to save some of our money back…

8. 800 ltrs per month, not that outrageous considering the really cold weather we’ve had lately. My place is reasonably large, reasonably well insulated although solid wall construction and we were using around 20-25 litres per day in the coldest spell in December. We don’t have a combi though and it’s a pretty inefficient old boiler. If you really want to know if you’ve got a leak, turn the boiler off for a day or so and see if the level still drops…

9. We have a Worcester with a heat-bank in a modern 5 bed house, admittedly we have a few leaks however we are burning 1000L a month in Dec type weather. It comes with the territory Four/Five years ago – when we rebuilt – Oil was less than 25p a litre. We burn 6000L a year so annual cost of £1500 not too bad. current price of 69p £4130 per year – bang goes the summer holiday, the new clothes, and even the food shopping has seen a credible impact. Thermostats are down thermal undies on and the local trees are quaking in their roots.

10. I’ve recently moved into a large, stone built, farm house, constructed around 1910. The loft seems to be very well insulated, all windows double glazed and draft free etc I have just calculated that I am using an alarming 400litres of oil every 2 weeks! I find this very worrying and a lttle hard to believe, is it possible for a worcester heatslave combi to burn oil at this alarming rate? I’ve had a close look around the tank which is a modern bunded plastic version and no signs of leakage.
    On moving into the property approximately 2 months ago I had the boiler fully checked/serviced. I’m actually hoping that I do have a small leak on the tank as burning 800ltrs per month is rapidly becoming a major financial drain.

11. My house is over 100 years old and due to the age I lose a lot of heat through the walls and flooring. Last year I got my roof insulated for the winter and I didn’t notice that I wasn’t losing a lot of heating. My husband and I work 9 – 5 and both are home around 6 – 6:30. I don’t have the heating on all of the time as it is a waste and it can be very expensive as I do end up having to pay for heat that escapes. I set my boiler to come on at 5 so when we wake up at 6 the house will be warm and the hot water for the shower will be warm up quicker. The heating goes off 8:30 when we leave and comes back on at 4:30 so when we are home it will be warm. I did hear that it can be cheaper to have your heating on all day then on and off as it can waste power and money with the system having to turn on and off at set times.

12. We live in a 3 bed 1930s semi, original windows and we get a problem with the draught. We have our heating on first thing in the morning and in the evenings til about 7.30, then once the kids are in bed we get the real fire going and that keeps us toastie for the rest of the night.

    Can’t beat a real fire burning quality seasoned hardwood logs!

13. I have a question! We have a boiler that services our house (Old, very large house with 40 radiators) The system that we have in place to turn the radiators on is a pump that we manually plug in or out that pumps hot water directly from a large hot water tank through the radiators and back again. I am wondering if it would be more efficient to leave the pump plugged in full time. When you unplug the pump and the radiators go cold you then have a huge volume of cold water that returns to the hot water tank once you re-plug the pump in a few hours later.This seems like a large strain on the system and maybe it would be better to keep the hot water circulating all the time…Any thoughts?!?