Time to give electricity the flick?

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#1438646 1-Dec-2015 14:55

timmmay: Tell them the truth - you have a solar system that is not connected to the mains or switchboard in any way.

I suspect they simply don't want very low use clients, If you you are dropping off grid on sunny days, your grid power will be significantly lower than the average, and given there is likely to be some fixed cost to them in providing you with service, they presumable need a minimum sale per month/year to break even...

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#1438653 1-Dec-2015 15:00

They charge a daily fee plus a small kwh margin, but you could be right. It could also be that they can't feed power back into the grid and they didn't understand the system in question.

timmmay

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#1453469 19-Dec-2015 12:55

Just a reminder (as per the Flick email) that the Flick Electric power rates could spike 1pm to 5pm today due to maintenance on the link between the north and south islands being down for planned maintenance. Prices could rise.

For reference, at 12:40pm 371MWh was going from the south to the north islands, price for power in Wellington was $84/MWh. Let's see where it goes...

niallm90

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#1453481 19-Dec-2015 13:35

Looks like you guys are paying quite a bit in the North Istland ($253/MWh). Im in Christchurch so only paying $53.42/MWh a bit cheaper than normal I think. Though I just switched to flick last week.

timmmay

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#1453497 19-Dec-2015 14:08

Yeah, down to $180/MHw now, which is around 30c/kwh in Wellington with line charge, inc GST. Way more than average for Flick, but not awful given most people pay 20 - 24c/kwh most of the time and we're usually more like 15c/kwh (ish).

zerkms

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#1453660 19-Dec-2015 20:54

timmmay: Yeah, down to $180/MHw now, which is around 30c/kwh in Wellington with line charge, inc GST. Way more than average for Flick, but not awful given most people pay 20 - 24c/kwh most of the time and we're usually more like 15c/kwh (ish).

Guys, and could someone provide an actual price from the last bill? I'm currently on a genesis contract which ends soon.

And as per my last bill I paid 27 cents per kWh. It includes the line charges, gst and everything else (I literally divided the amount by number of kWh).

So what would be your value of $A/BkWh?

PS: when I joined I also had got a free month, which was an expensive august one, which results in ~10% additional discount.

timmmay

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#1453667 19-Dec-2015 21:30

Generation: 147.76kwh @ 6.65c/kwh = $9.83 (this is the variable one)
Network charges:
- daytime 4.76c/kwh 100kwh $4.83
- night 1.67c/kwh 48kwh $0.81
- $1/day = $7
- network total $12.64
Metering 21.6c/day = $1.52
Flick variable access charge : 147.76 @ 1.5c/kwh = $2.22
Flick daily charge 40c/7 = $2.80
Subtotal $28.18
Plus GST 4.38
Total $33.55

Divide it all up that comes to 22.8c/kwh, when you include all the daily charges. Note that power prices with Flick vary a lot around the country - line charges are higher up north, lower down south where most of the power is generated.

Flick tells me that if I was with my last power company the bill would've been $41.10 after prompt payment discounts.

Aredwood

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#1453852 20-Dec-2015 12:08

@RickW Did you manage to join Flick electric? As your solar system would be ideal. As if wholesale prices spike you can simply switch your house to the solar. Main reason Flick don't want solar customers is they can't buy exported power.

Just sign up via the website instead of by phone.

nickb800

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#1467558 11-Jan-2016 13:28

I'm thinking about switching to Flick, but only using a passive approach to managing consumption rather than active. By that, I mean having hot water switched to run overnight (it's currently on ripple control for night plus afternoon) and starting the dishwasher before I go to bed - just general time-shifting of my demand. As opposed to active management - modifying usage day-to-day depending on spot prices and flagging a cooked dinnerwhen the HVDC link goes down (for example).

Active monitoring would be limited in my case as I have boarders that pay a set amount for living costs including power, so wouldn't expect them to modify their usage (although they do cook outside peak periods which is handy for other reasons too).

From this thread it seems a few are using an active approach with Flick, but is there anybody here using the passive approach that could comment on what kind of savings they are experiencing?

jpwise

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#1467563 11-Jan-2016 13:38

I'm not doing much to manage mine, but usage is pretty low until kitchen renovation is completed.
During winter I think we (2 people) peaked at $42/wk, but that was with heaters running during the coldest patches.
Now it's warming I think our lowest bill has been about $12/wk.

It does vary quite a bit, but if the flick notes on the will with 'you saved $x' is anything to go by, supposedly we're still better off.

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timmmay

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#1467582 11-Jan-2016 13:49

We don't do much active management. If we get an email alert of high prices (from a 3rd party) we might not put something energy intensive on, but otherwise we just do common sense things like have the dishwasher run on timer at 2am, do at least some of the clothes drying overnight on a timer, it does reduce the bill significantly. Putting hot water onto a timer plus clothes drier / dishwasher off peak you should be able to drop your bills by 30% or so on average, I guess.

jonathan18

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#1467623 11-Jan-2016 14:27

I'm a completely passive Flick consumer, in that I've done very little to change my power usage (in quantity or timing). That's primarily because we have gas hot water, so can't control that, and use the dishwasher maybe once every couple of weeks (and I think that's set up to use hot water from the cylinder rather than heating its own!).

And yet, apparently, I'm still enjoying substantial savings over my previous provider - it's down to 15% (according to a recent bill), has been as high as 26%, but has typically hovered around 19%.

Since we moved to Flick we've installed an all-house central heating heat pump system, and even with that going often nearly 24/7 in winter our weekly bills peaked at $49 (including gas that would suggest a theoretical monthly maximum of $362). So the cheaper rates have also made it more affordable to heat the whole house.

Totally happy with them thus far, and yet have my fears realised of paying a significant amount more in summer.

nickb800

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#1467631 11-Jan-2016 14:35

Awesome, thanks for sharing your experiences. Very likely i'll shift once I sort out my billing debacle with Meridian

timmmay

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#1467638 11-Jan-2016 14:48

Late summer is the risky time for power price spikes. NZ power is mostly hydro based, so when hydro lakes are low prices go up. That's when you really want hot water on a timer, alerts on high prices. I had a bit of this late summer or early spring last year, but it made little difference to my power bill as I was aware of it and was a bit careful.

jpwise

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#1467687 11-Jan-2016 15:30

Slightly OT - but if you're still a bit uncertain about your usage patterns, particularly with the boarders - you could also look into a monitoring device.
I've got a Smappee (http://www.smappee.com/au/) which is pretty interesting to look at the data from, although I haven't reviewed it in the past few months.

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