Are you always in a panicking mode when the end month has come and you are yet to receive your electricity bills? It can be discouraging to keep up with a huge budget when you are not certain the amount it will cost for your utilities every month. At this juncture, all the blames are directed to your electricity service provider for raising the rates. Remember even if you get a service provider with the best electric rates, the way you use it will determine your monthly bills. Chances are that your bills will always be higher or lower depending on your usage. To help you lower your monthly electricity bills, this article has highlighted some of the obvious reasons your electricity bills are higher. Although many of the reasons that cause your electricity bill to hike are within your control, there are others that are out of control.If you’re distressed from high electricity bills, it may be because of:
1. Weather
Weather changes especially if the weather has been extreme in your area can be a key reason why you are getting higher electric bills. When most of the home’s electricity costs come from heating and cooling costs, extreme weather conditions can cause a major hike-in your electric charges and cause damage to your wallet.
As the weather is an uncontrollable condition, it is advised to program some of the home appliances such as a thermostat to save yourself against the hiking monthly electricity charges. It can be good when you raise your thermostat just a single degree during the summer season and lower it a single degree during the winter to save yourself some money.
2. Leaving your appliances plugged into the socked every time
This is one of the unidentified factors that you are likely to cause without knowing. Why leave your electronics and appliances plugged into the socket when you are not using them? There are appliances and electronic machines that could not consume power when switched off, but with most modern machines, even after power off, they are always consuming power. When you switch off your computer, you must always know that it is still on, only that you cannot see that, but have you asked yourself why your computer does not lose the time and date? That clearly shows that, even if you power it off, it will still be in standby mode meaning it still consumes power. Therefore ensure you unplug all electronics and appliances that you are not using to safeguard yourself against the hike in electric rates.
3. Using appliances that consume high amount of electricity
Do you have a dishwasher, clothes washer or clothes dryers in your home? These appliances have a higher appetite for electricity and when used regularly, your electricity bills will are no doubt going to hike. For your dishwasher, you must make sure it is full before you switch it on, and ensure you select the right wash cycle and adjust the drying settings to consume no or low heat. For clothes washer and dryers, ensure you don’t have laundry on a regular basis, you can do it weekly so that you fill it to capacity and choose low heat for drying.
4. More users is equal to more usage
How many people are in your home? It is obvious that during holiday seasons everyone is at home. As a result, more energy is likely to be consumed generally for a longer period of time until when the number of people reduces. This is because appliances like water heaters and air conditioning will be used more and thus electricity bills will be higher than when there are fewer people in the home.
5. Misusing lights and ceiling fans
This is another factor that can hike your electricity bills without your knowledge. There are times when you will switch on all the lights in the entire room to make it bright, but in the long run, you will be hiking your electricity bills without knowing. Yes is good to have a bright room, but why light up all lights when there are other rooms that are not being used? Only uses lights in rooms that are being used and switch off fans in rooms that aren’t being used.