What are you all up to
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We rang NFU this morning for a quote - they were £250 more expensive than the quote from our existing insurer, and that was 82% more than last year!
Just shows that insurance varies wildly and all depends on each individual's details.
So, we'll carry on getting quotes, something to occupy us on a rainy day
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To be honest it’s hard to see what controls the cost of car insurance currently, other than existing insurers trying it on, in the hope you won’t notice and it will automatically renew. Mine and the OH’s car insurance come up for renewal in October and November. They were both with Churchill and have been for quite a few years. So far we have been happy to let the renewal go through. This year although we haven't claimed and nothing else has changed, apart from we are now 71 instead of 70, both increased by 35%. As a result I switched both to Tesco and we are paying substantially less than we did last year. It could be just to get our business and it will leap up next year, or might be that since I put the club card in to get a discount, they know how much we spend with them and hope for that to continue. Either way I was very pleased and if it leaps up next year, perhaps Churchill will offer a good deal to get us back.
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"Energy costs are still high and with less support this year so it will be interesting to see how the winter pans out viz a viz costs?"
we are fortunate to be still on our 3 year fixed deal taken out before all the very large increases and it does not expire until November 2024, however, it is confusing now as to what payments we will get for winter fuel payments etc. If you ever watch Martin Lewis there seem to be a raft of payments out there but for most you are only entitiled if you are receiving a payment such as pension credit etc. We have just had a letter from DWP to say we will be receiving £250 each as winter fuel payment and cost of living payment. the criteria for payment is to be born before 24 Sept 1957 and living with someone else who qualifies.
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I had solar panels installed on both my south and west facing roofs with storage battery. I am hoping 9 months of the year we will be self sufficient and while we are away we will collect money from selling the surplus back to the grid. Every little helps.
peedee
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I mentioned this some time ago InaD. Both our cars are insured with NFU and I had a cracked windscreen a couple of months ago. Phone call to our local NFU office - put through straightaway to Nationwide Glass who attended at our camp site at 0800 the following morning and replaced the windscreen within the hour.( I could have been waiting for up to a week for the other lot to turn up!) All I had to do was pay the £50 excess over the phone to NG - and that was it. No forms to fill in - no hassle - couldn't have been easier.
The guy from NG was telling me that NFU customers get priority because NFU are a big contract for them and they get paid within a couple of days. He did mention another very well known internet insurer who are dreadful at paying and it often takes them months to get their money.
So - it's not just about how much the premium is.
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Yup we put solar panels on our East and West roofs, unfortunately nothing south facing suitable, did this 10 years ago, no battery but probably the best investment we have made, be interesting to see how you get on during the winter months, we are only generating on average 4kw per day just now and we are using most of that during the day so not sure how we would charge a battery if we had one, during the summer months we generate average 25kw so a big differance.
The way our contract runs it does not matter whether we are home or not we get paid on how much we generate and i give our supplier a meter reading every 3 months from this they make a percentage assessment on how much we put back into the grid and pay us additionally for this, but they have no way today of metering how much we push back into the grid.
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I have often thought about solar panels but I am not convinced at our age we would get the investment back? Probably should have done it back in 2008 when FIT payments were introduced by Gordon Brown and were at their most generous. I understand the price of panels has fallen since but probably risen again due to the Ukraine invasion.
Whilst the general energy subsidies are not as generous as last years us pensioners are still getting £500 between us which for us probably pays for a month and a half at peak use time so not to be sniffed at. Unfortunately still a long way from the time when energy bills were around a £1000 a year!
David
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Wow!!! you must be on one of the early contracts that pays out a lot of money per kw, we are currently only getting approx 18p per kw, but i know early contracts were in the region of 50p per kw, we get a return of approx £800, our bungalow is south facing but the apex is west/east we have 16 panels but it works ok.
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I think we probably fitted ours when the FIT was at its highest, in late 2011, I think, after that it started falling. Prices of panels were also high then. Break even time was 11 years, so we are in profit now.
These days we get about 70p per kWh when the 50% deemed export is included. Trying to work out whether it would be better to move to actual export now we have a smart meter. I think our FIT payments in the last 12 months came to well over £2k.
Being over 80 now, I will get £350 winter fuel and OH gets £250, so £600 total due to the pensioner payments. That plus our FIT payment should hopefully cover the fuel bills.
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It gets a lot worse when you hit 80 Steve!! Some companies will not even quote for an over 80.
We were with NFU way back, for a couple of years, but the renewal suddenly shot up, so we reluctantly went elsewhere.
Cars are up for renewal late October, plus one road tax ,and one service, house is 1st January, plus the other road tax, and caravan in mid March, plus service, other car service is late August, so little respite from major bills any time of year!
More or less completed the new socket installation for DD today, just need to tidy up some of the wiring done before she bought the house. Really filthy under the floor there, but at least there is good headroom. The other, newer, end of the house is much cleaner under the floor, but much less headroom.
Callum got all dressed up in his overalls when he got back from a friends birthday party, and insisted on exploring under the floor with Mummy, so he was pretty filthy when he emerged.
Mummy has discovered that lots of her pipes under there are not insulated, and neither is a lot of the floor, so she is keen to remedy that. There is a lot of junk under there too, looks like the remains of an old warm air heating system. Plus lots of redundant pipes and wiring........quite a mess!
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Just a couple of points about the CL should you choose to stop here, Goldie.
The Wi-Fi is free and very good, at least as far a pitch 3, half way across the site from the arial. The drinking water is below the site by the track into the site and so it is an uphill pull of about 75 m to get the pitch we are on.
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Not quite as fine as it was forecasted yesterday but thankfully we had very little rain. After doing a round of washing we drove up west side of the R Ribble as far as Helwith Bridge where we had a walk up Long Lane towards Pen-y-Ghent. After lunch we had a further short walk at Langcliffe.
Today's photo is of a footbridge over Rathmell Beck, a short walk from the site.
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I probably won't get my money back either but there are other advantages. I had been thinking about putting panels on the roof for sometime. We are above average users of electricity and when I had a note from out County Council explaining they were part of the "Solar Together" scheme, I jumped at the offer. I felt it took many of the risks of buying away and I had seen a similar neat installation only a few months early. The money was sat in an account earning little interest and I wasn't likely to need it for anything else, so the decision to become greener was easy. I feel pretty confident the return on the investment will be two fold, savings will exceed interest had I left the money in the bank and the value of the property is increased. The FIT was of no great interest, I knew the rates were low. On sunny days I am self sufficient and the excess charges the batteries for use later. Even on the most overcast of days the panels generate three quarters of a Kw.
peedee
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Thanks for that Peedee. Interestingly MK is not on the list! If I was tempted I think I would probably go to Octopus Energy who are my current suppliers of gas and electricity as they do have a Solar Panel scheme. They quote a starting price for panels as around £5000 but double that if a battery is installed.
David
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Yesterday I spent two hours cleaning out our big larder cupboard, threw just a few back of the shelf out of date almost empty packets away, sorted everything into date use order, disinfected all the shelves, and then stood back pleased with myself. This morning OH went to get his cereal out, rummaging for it he started moaning,’ you seem to have 2 of things, we need to use one thing up before opening another, grumble grumble’. I let him go on for a quite a while about it, then I just reminded him that I had brought all the half empty packets home from the caravan for our winter shut down. He said no more and went off for a shower, I was smugly grinning. (Not sure how we have 4 packets of couscous though, glad he didn’t notice those!)
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Peedee
Comes up with "no active scheme" for Buckinghamshire. Also, of course, MK is a Unitary Authority so only geographically in Buckinghamshire.
David
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We have found the same with some items DEBSC. When we sold the caravan last November we came back with the stuff that was stored in it, we didn’t store food in it but just kitchen things. We now have a drawer full of extra fish slices, mashers, sharp knives, cookery spoons etc., this along with so much foil and cling film that will keep me going for the rest of this year and next!
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Many thanks to all for the good wishes for my sister and her recent breast operation. She is ok just rather bruised and sore, as expected I’m sure. She has to return in 3 weeks for results and see if any further treatment is required. I have done a self referral for a mammogram myself, as I’m over 70 I am no longer called for routine ones, my sister was 70 this year and they found hers so I thought it wise to get me checked too. My Mum was a breast cancer survivor so maybe we are in a higher risk group.
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I have always been a big fan of the idea of renewable energy and around 2011, had 2 quotes of 14,000 and 12,0000 for 16 panels, one company was going to use Chinese panels and the other Taiwanese panels, so I decided not to go ahead.
In 2012, After the FIT payments were reduced a local company were advertising 16 panels (made in Germany) for 6,000 so I had them fitted (the huge reduction shows how much profit solar panels firms must have been making). I receive around 900 a year from the FIT payments and save on electricty as well.
Obviously, how many Kilowats your panels make, does depend on which way your roof is facing and whether your roof is overlooked by other buildings or high trees. I believe that Octopus do have the best solar deals of all the energy suppliers. I don't know if paying such a lot for a battery is cost effective or not.
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I don't know if paying such a lot for a battery is cost effective or not.
I look at it this way, you get such a pitance on the FIT its better to use it yourself plus I don't have to nag the other half about only using appliances when the sun shines. Most solar equipment is Chinese and it does not mean it is rubbish.
David (DK) have you or amyone else used Octoplus or have you any thoughts on it? I am in two minds about it for the same reason I state above, we don't want to be messing about decideing on best usage times.
peedee
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"In 2012, After the FIT payments were reduced a local company were advertising 16 panels (made in Germany) for 6,000 so I had them fitted (the huge reduction shows how much profit solar panels firms must have been making). I receive around 900 a year from the FIT payments and save on electricty as well. "
" I don't know if paying such a lot for a battery is cost effective or not."
we had ours installed approx 2012 16 chinese panels £5k, and i guess overall we are paid £900 and save on electricity not calculated how much we save, but my OH is not very good at using electrical equipment when the sun is shining so i chain her to the ironing board at peak times
Battery would have been an additional £5k and they are a lump even today so you have to put it in a reasonable storage area which can increase the cost of installing if not very near to the rest of the installation so decided that a battery was a bridge too far and probably not worth the additional cost and during the winter months i dont think we generate enough spare electricity to keep the battery charged so that we could use it when the sun has vanished
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We got home early this afternoon from a lovey weekend away just at The Ranch in Maybole had a nice relaxing time. We have three “local” sites that we use for weekends throughout the year The Ranch Ayr Craigie Gardens and Strathclyde Park club site and both Craigie and The Ranch are closing tomorrow for the winter which is a shame. Don’t know if we will get away in the van now until after Christmas as we have a lot on at weekends until Xmas and also the van is going in at the end of this month for a repair on the heating system so not sure how long that will take. Easy 40 min tow home today and the sun was shining so when we got back I took the opportunity to wash the caravan including the roof before putting it back in it’s space. SWMBO went out shopping with daughter and gdaughter so after sorting the van out I took myself out for a coffee to youngest sons cafe. Busy week ahead now with various things to do
Hope everyone else is having a nice weekend
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We have 16 x 250 watt Sanyo panels, we generate around 3600 kWh per annum, and that has remained constant since install. Our inverter is a Fronius, with 20 year warranty. Our roof faces very slightly west of south, nothing now in the way of the sun hitting them. We did have a conifer that would eventually cast a shadow, but I was allowed ( by OH) to remove it a couple of years back.
Bit of a shame as it was a nice tree, but needs must!
We have considered batteries, but decided not to spend more on the system now we are "getting on a bit". Plus do not know where we would put them.
OH is pretty good at doing washing etc when the sun shines, but it is tricky sometimes.
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It was a fine sunny day until mid afternoon. We had a late start but did another walk from Langcliffe, this time to the Langcliffe limestone quarry and the Craven Works. It has the remains of the largest Lime Kiln in the country, the Hoffman Kiln, as well as those of two others. We returned by the river walk which made a good circular trip. The photo dien not do it service but it is well worth a visit for those interested in industrial archaeology.
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Nth the shrub is a Calicarpa Japonica Luxians as it was on my Calendar when I turned the page over, and great Autumnal photos not much colour here yet.
RK sorry about the delay in replying to your post. Thanks for the info. It was the unusual blue colour of the berries that caught our attention. I don't think that we have seen that shrub before.
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Battery would have been an additional £5k and they are a lump even today so you have to put it in a reasonable storage area which can increase the cost of installing if not very near to the rest of the installation
Agree battery storage is not cheap but technology has moved on and prices have fallen. Battery storage costs about £500 per Kwh and a single solar panel can generate up to 425w. Installation of both batteries and inverter is in the loft space and takes very little space.
peedee
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