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A few months ago I applied for a seasonal pitch on one of my favourite sites and was told the fee was x amount plus electricity, which is on a meter.

nanashirley, you are right that sites are not allowed to 'sell' electricity, but there's nothing to stop them charging for it on top of the pitch fee as long as they only charge you the same as they pay for it from the suppliers.

On our Seasonal pitches we have this year installed metered hookup points.  You purchase a prepayment card from the site in nominations of £1, £5, £10 or £20.  This you insert into the meter and the credit goes on that particular hookup point.  This way people who use a lot of electricity pay for it, and those who do not use much dont pay for what they arent using.

We are considering putting these meters on our touring pitches, but not sure how that would go down, because if you put say £5.00 on the meter and use only £2 the next people would benefit but there is no way to refund the balance.

Sites are not supposed to charge extra for electricity, ie £2.00 per night.  But what they can charge for is the use of the hookup point.  Same thing in a way!!

Quote: Originally posted by Ang/Ken on 26/9/2009

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On our Seasonal pitches we have this year installed metered hookup points.  You purchase a prepayment card from the site in nominations of £1, £5, £10 or £20.  This you insert into the meter and the credit goes on that particular hookup point.  This way people who use a lot of electricity pay for it, and those who do not use much dont pay for what they arent using.

We are considering putting these meters on our touring pitches, but not sure how that would go down, because if you put say £5.00 on the meter and use only £2 the next people would benefit but there is no way to refund the balance.

Sites are not supposed to charge extra for electricity, ie £2.00 per night.  But what they can charge for is the use of the hookup point.  Same thing in a way!!

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fantastic idea and the way forward in my opinion.  We've not long been using ehu and only use it for coolbox, lights etc. I've often thought that there's no way we use £2 - £3 a night's worth of power but some would say we are subsidising those who use a lot more.  I for one would be more than happy to be metered.

Quote: Originally posted by craft lady on 25/9/2009

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I don't know how they come to £2 per night.  We are just back from a site where we were given a meter that you pluged into your hook up and for 10 days using everything from fridge, heating, kettles, toaster, slow cooker hair dryers and everything else you could think of that's electric cost us £7,20.  They must be making some profit.

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we just booked a site where the leccy is metered and she said a 1kw heater is approx 8.2p per hour  so that  is £1.96 to have heater on 24 hours which you wouldn't anyway i am expecting our bill to be no more than a tenner for 3 nights thats with cool box radio slow cooker and heater .............. this makes the site £18-30 per night for 2 of us.

i would rather pay for EHU before hand but this way be cheaper i will have to wait and see.

Quote: Originally posted by Ang/Ken on 26/9/2009

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On our Seasonal pitches we have this year installed metered hookup points.  You purchase a prepayment card from the site in nominations of £1, £5, £10 or £20.  This you insert into the meter and the credit goes on that particular hookup point.  This way people who use a lot of electricity pay for it, and those who do not use much dont pay for what they arent using.

We are considering putting these meters on our touring pitches, but not sure how that would go down, because if you put say £5.00 on the meter and use only £2 the next people would benefit but there is no way to refund the balance.

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So if prepayment cards can be purchased in units of £1 then surely those who don't use a lot of electricity need only buy what they are going to use anyway eg. start off with two quid's worth and top up by £1 each time if needed.

If you can do it then I would say go for it. Personally I would be quite happy to have my ehu on a meter, whichever site I am on.

Quote: Originally posted by Bob61 on 26/9/2009

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I can foresee is a similar problem that sometimes happens in rented accommodation...meters can be fixed to charge anything the owner/landlord wants.

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Legally landlords and site owners can no longer do this, electricity cannot be sold at a profit.
This is why sites charge an additional fee for a "Serviced Pitch" to recover their overheads.

Up until last year I was on a site that charged £2 per night electric (they put it up to £2.50 this year). Plus they changed their Hook-ups to only supply a maximum of 6amps so you can't even run a hoover because it "spikes" above 6amps when you switch it on. You can't run your blown-air heating on at 1500 and have the tele on at the same time because it blows. So freeze or be bored!

In their rules they state that Electric Heaters are banned - this originally meant the shop-bought type, but when I challenged them and told them we couldn't run our blown-air heating they said I shouldn't be using it because electric heating is banned - bit of a twist there! But at the same time, they reckon that "Most sites are going to 6amps now, which is ample to run a van on". They should try it sometime...  They say we should use our gas heater and a dustpan and brush and have no interest in keeping people happy, its such a lovely site that for those who leave, more come in behind - I myself recommend it to people!

They also reckon that each pitch cost about £8 in electric a night to run. I don't know a lot about charges but it doesn't cost that at home! 

I did wonder, because they charge extra for the leccy, whether they are supposed to have some sort of Quality they should be adhering to eg a minimum ampage supply. In the end, I couldn't find it out, and having got fed up of running back and fore to flick the switch back on in the rain I moved sites to a lovely one that includes leccy in the annual fee and I have 16amps, and its a relief to be able to switch the heating on if its cold. My friends are still on the other site and say its still as bad. You wouldn't mind paying the money if you got a good ampage.

I've never been one to take the mickey, even now I only use one or two things at once and I have a low wattage kettle, but they were just plain greedy.  I think meters are a good thing, they installed them for their Static vans, and it would be fairer if everyone had them.

Receipt??? You're having a larf!! Don't get one with deposit or the cost of overwintering. She gives a little handwritten pad thing with the main balance. Unlike our new site where everything is computerised and official. (And she likes to be paid in cash - could it be to avoid forwarding the VAT perchance.....?)

The cost of the leccy has been going up nearly every year, along with the site fees. Was £1.50 the first year we were there. They reckoned they had astronomical bills for the touring fields - again, it MIGHT be something to do with the fact that the external lights of the shower block are on all night and they are also on sensors internally. We reckon they were trying to claw a bit of money back for the cost of installing them, they kept moaning about how much they cost.

Its a shame because that's the only downside of that site, it has a huge open space and is immaculate. You just have to avoid the owners and keep your head down - people send their kids down to "book in" when they get there and pay for the leccy.