A Decade in the Energy Markets and how to Protect Your Purse Strings Going Forwards
The way we both generate and consume energy has undergone vast changes over the last decade. As natural fossil fuel resources have depleted and the demand for renewable, environmentally friendly energy sources has increased, a seismic shift in domestic energy consumption is well underway. Between 2010 and 2018 coal powered domestic energy reduced by almost 90%, with gas and oil seeing similar drops over the same period. Of course, consumers are seeing the impact of this most keenly in their pockets. As new providers of renewable energy appear on the market and old fossil fuels become increasingly defunct, the energy …
How Likely is Your Boiler to Breakdown in Your Area?
An unexpected boiler malfunction is one of the most costly and disruptive domestic incidents that can happen in the home, sometimes leading to potentially catastrophic damage to the entire plumbing system. Of course, forewarned is forearmed but can we really predict the likelihood that your boiler might break down based simply on the part of the country you call home? Where are you most at risk? Over the course of a year, homes in London suffered the most boiler breakdowns with 6.08% of repairs happening in the capital. This was followed closely with 6.04% of boilers in the West Midlands …
Preparing Your Home for an Unexpected Cold Snap
Who can forget those big old March snowstorms of three years ago? The ones that ground the UK to a halt and huddled the whole country under a frozen blanket. The weather in the UK, and further afield, is getting increasingly unpredictable with cold spells like that one seemingly coming from nowhere, potentially causing all kinds of problems in unprepared homes. The good news is that however unexpected a cold front might be, there are some easy things you can do to make sure you don’t end up forking out for damage that is easily preventable. PressureSentry It’s important to …
Protecting the heating system in your holiday home
If you own a holiday home or rental property, the last 12 months have been a worrying time. Many second homeowners often live a good distance from their property, meaning that restrictions through lockdowns or the distance you are able to travel to and from in a day have led to problems or a reduction in checking, maintaining and keeping an eye on your asset. This can be particularly problematic during the winter months, when colder temperatures lead to a frozen and burst pipes. The damage, should this happen to your property, can be extremely large; consider that each day …
Tackling Fuel Poverty in 2021
In England one in every nine households (2.4 million) live in fuel poverty. A further 500,000 live within just £30 of going into fuel poverty. This year the energy regulator Ofgem has lifted its cap on fuel bills in the UK, allowing providers to increase tariffs which could cost millions of households an extra £100 per year. In fact, one of the biggest energy suppliers – British Gas – has already implemented the increase among its customers. Those who simply cannot afford such a price hike will of course look for other ways to reduce their energy costs, which generally …
Frost Sentry – perfect for holiday homes and those unable to visit their properties
The uncertainty of the last twelve months has seen holiday homes and second properties up and down the country sitting empty for long stretches of time. Whilst this was certainly an inconvenience during the scorching summer months, your beloved bolthole faces many more challenges during the winter and start to a new year. Historically, these next couple of months are the cruellest of the British winter. Over the last 130 years, the average ten coldest days of the year are spread out between 3rd January and 20th February with temperatures potentially falling to -10 C. And of course, this could …
The real cost of frozen pipes and a simple solution during the coldest time of the year
We all love those beautifully crisp, frosty mornings or an unexpected bit of snow to play in but the associated plummet in temperatures can spell disaster for your plumbing system. With UK temperatures historically falling to their lowest between January and February each year (having reached a bone achingly cold -10 C) is your system ready to weather the snowstorm? One of the most common reasons for an emergency call out at this time of year is frozen pipes and the associated damage they can cause. This is particularly prevalent in holiday or second homes which might have been standing …
Three things you can do during a lockdown
No matter how much we may love our homes, did any of us think we’d be spending quite so much time in them over the last 12 months? Whilst the first lockdown was all about the outside space and getting those gardens ready for a long, hot summer of staying at home, Lockdown 3.0 is a different beast altogether. January and February, commonly the coldest months of the British year, bring with them plummeting temperatures and escalating heating bills; at a time when many have found themselves redundant from work, or on reduced furlough wages, a lot of people across …
Don’t let your boiler fail you this Christmas
Christmas is normally a time of great comfort for people; getting to spend quality time with your family, enjoy a few days off work, exchange presents and eat a delicious Christmas dinner. Yet that reassuring safety and familiarity is under threat this winter, in one of the most tumultuous and unpredictable years in living memory. With swathes of the UK living under high level restrictions due to Covid-19 and the looming threat of a second wave of the disease, it’s difficult to know what is going to happen in the weeks and months leading up to Christmas. The current tougher …
Prepare your pipes ahead of frost season
Although the weather has felt really mixed this autumn, we’ve yet to truly enter the coldest days of autumn and the even colder months ahead in winter. As we enter what’s usually the coldest months of the year, there’s every chance that we will experience severe cold snaps, general cold weather and potentially disruptive snowstorms as the UK has almost every winter for several years now. With the colder weather approaching, the Association of British Insurers has urged people to act as quickly as possible to avoid frozen and burst pipes this winter. The ABI states that the average cost …
