A single electrical appliance was costing one family hundreds of pounds a year - and made up a fifth of their energy bills.
David Miles, 46, made the shocking discovery when he bought a basic smart plug online to assess which items in his home were using up the most electricity. As energy bills rise across the UK, many people are looking at the most costly appliances to run in their homes.
But the dad got a shock when he used the plug on his 25-year old American-style fridge freezer, the Express reports. “Incredibly, it ate up a fifth of my entire electricity bill. It's the same as my friend's hot tub", David said.
Read more: Households could be asked to limit energy use to avoid blackouts this winter
Over a year, it was using 1,600 kilowatt hours (kWh) of power. Each kWh of electricity currently costs 28p, according to regulator Ofgem, meaning David's fridge is costing him £448 a year to run.
From October, when the energy price cap jumps from £1,971 a year to £3,549 a year for the average home, electricity will jump to 52p per kWh, a rise of almost 86%. This will drive up the cost of using his fridge freezer to £832 a year.
He has now pledged to upgrade this fridge to save on bills in the long run.
He said: "Buying a new one will save me at least £624 a year, so upgrading my fridge freezer will pay for itself in two or three years, plus I will also slash my home's carbon footprint.”
David is also upgrading his gas boiler which he reckons will cost £4,000 but cut his gas bills by 20%. “We could get our money back in four or five years."
David, whose company The PPC Machine helps mortgage brokers and financial advisers generate high quality leads from their own websites, says his toughest job is to get the message across to his children. “I'm teaching them that light switches can turn off as well as on.”
Research from consumer champion Which? showed that American fridge freezers are the second most expensive household appliance to run, after condenser tumble dryers. Dryers will cost the average household more than £262 a year from October, while American-style fridge freezers will cost on average £223 a year to run from the autumn.
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