Power struggles

Anyone who has followed this blog for any time will know that we have a piddling electrical supply of just 2.2 kW or some 10 amps. Not technically sufficient to run the kettle and the iron at the same time. Nonetheless because of the tolerances of the system we get by.

Things change though and we recently got a letter to say that our power supplier, Iberdrola, is on the verge of fitting a smart meter with a built in cut-out. We decided that we couldn't be sure that more modern kit would be as elastic as our ancient equipment so I started an email correspondence with Iberdrola to see if we could up the power.

The last time I asked I was told that 3.45kW was as high as we could go. This time, because Iberdrola replaced the supply cables a little while ago, we were told that we could have up to 15kW. There was a snag though. The boletín, the thing that shows that we have wiring to such and such a standard, would only allow us to have 3.45kW unless we got an electrician to test and certificate the system for more.

There's a lot of fuss in Spain about the price of electricity and one way to reduce costs is to reduce the power contracted. That's because the standing charges are a big component of the bill. Consequently there are lots of ready reckoner type websites to tell you how to calculate how much power you need to contract. I tried one and it said we needed 3.75kW, another two gave very similar results. I don't think it's true myself but people who know better than me say it's enough. Maybe it's to do with the tolerance of the system. So I checked with Iberdrola, If we went to 3.45kW and it wasn't enough could we still go up to more kilowatts if we got the appropriate certificates. The answer was yes.

We're now on about email number six or seven by the time I finally say yes to go ahead. This time Iberdrola, and the emails have become much more chatty by now, come back and point out that we will lose the Social Bonus. This is an automatic 25% reduction on the total bill because we contract so little power. I know, I tell them, go ahead anyway. It hurt to send that email I can tell you.

And today, probably now on email number 10 or 11 Iberdrola come back and say that even to go to 3.45kW we'll need to get a new boletín. I've reminded them that they said we were OK with that at the start of the process.

A couple of days later and Iberdrola say whoops! Yes we can have 3.45kW without any paper formalities.

And, just to finish it off on the 5th July, about a week after I wrote the bulk of this, I got a call out of the blue from the Iberdrola man who was five minutes away. He fitted one of the new intelligent meters, checked that the fuses were OK and left us with the increased power supply. So far the circuit breakers haven't popped.

Strange and bizarre

We'd popped in to town to do some exciting jobs - buy screen wash was one of them. I was also going to bank some money. Take note of the opening sentences and be warned now that this blog is not going to be the usual emotional roller coaster ride of an entry.

My phone rang when I was in the bank queue. It was our next door neighbour to say that Iberdrola, the electricity supply people, wanted to get into our garden. You will remember I talked to Iberdrola about moving some supply cables that were either menacing or being menaced by our palm tree. Nothing has happened for months. The discussion that I'd had with some Iberdrola employed tree trimmers had suggested that we were talking thousands of euros if we got the cables re-routed and I'd quietly let the whole thing slide.

We hurried back from town. I feared the worst. I could imagine the euros flowing out of that bank account to pay for new cables, new installations and a new meter. The three blokes said they wanted access to our garden. The three blokes said they were replacing the uninsulated supply to our house, and those of our neighbours, with a beefier insulated cable. There was no mention of the palm tree, there was no mention of me having asked for the work. So far as I could tell, and I didn't want to ask too many questions, it is a simple, routine upgrade of cables that haven't been changed for thirty or forty years.

We left them to it, in fact I couldn't get away fast enough. When we came back, they had happpily run the new cable through the palm tree branches and left enough slack in the wire for it to be able to deal with a bit of a pumelling from a palm tree thrashing around in the breeze. They are coming back tomorrow to connect it all up. How strange. Provided that there are no last minute hitches it looks as though our palm tree has just been saved and our electricity supply ensured.

I went back to the bank. As I've said in an earlier post I've been driving to the nearest branch of my bank to pay in cash at the start of each of the last few months. Last month though I read an article about the huge differences in fees charged by the different banks. It seemed that a bank with an office in Pinoso would only charge me 2€ in transaction fees. That seemed a lot better deal than driving 30kms to stand in a long queue to pay the cash in at my own bank. It was a short queue in Pinoso but the man wouldn't take my money. He said I couldn't pay the money in to another bank from their office. I was amazed. I explained that I understood there was a fee. No it's just not possible said the man. Why don't you go to the Santander office around the corner?

Now it is true that there's an office in Pinoso that has a Santander Bank sign outside. I'd tried to do some form of banking there a couple of years ago without success. The chap behind the counter told me they only sold financial products and did not offer banking services. Today I poked my head around the door of the empty office but for the man at his desk playing some sort of game on his phone. "Can I pay money in to a Santander account here?," I asked. "You can indeed," he replied. I was pleasantly surprised and handed over a piece of paper with my 20 figure account number on it. "Ah, it's an old Banesto account," he said, "I can't pay into that." I asked him if it were possible to pay into the account from other banks. "No, you have to go to a Santander branch, an old Banesto branch," he said.

Now Banesto had been largely owned by the Santander Bank since the early 90s though both banks continued to have a high street presence till 2012. It was then that the Santander bought up the last of the Banesto shares and combined the two entities closing down various branches of both. The Banesto logos disappeared. Later the websites, account names and everything else took on the Santander name and look. Everywhere that is but for the office in Pinoso where the division was still alive and well. I have to give the man his due he did try to access my account but his computer said no and that was the end of it,

How bizarre. A banking system which won't, apparently, let you pay money in except under very strict conditions. I don't understand. I've done it in the past. It seems crazy if it is no longer possible.

I drove to Monóvar and paid the money in there. "Oh," I asked the teller as I was about to leave, "Can I pay into this account from other banks?" "Course you can," he said. "They usually charge you to do it though."

Aaargh!!

Ho ho ho

I mentioned that one of the local political parties "employs" a chap to help the Brit community. Today he sent around information about legislation that says we need to fit a limiting device to the electric supply. Apparently this limiting device was supposed to be installed by January 2010 with the power companies having an obligation to send a letter informing us of that responsibility. Obviously we haven't received the letter but I suppose it will be on its way soon.

I was vaguely aware of the legislation from some mumblings on the letters pages of the newspapers and from a conversation in a Spanish class but until the information today I hadn't checked the detail.

Lots of Spanish houses have really miserable power supplies by UK standards. Our house, for instance has a contracted supply of about 2.2kw which means that the circuit breakers should pop when we plug in the 3kw electric kettle. They don't because when we moved into the place we had it rewired and the sparks put in a board that would deal with about 5.5kw.

The main problem that we have is that the wire that brings power to the house is thin - it simply can't carry more power. The combination of the thin cable and bigger board means that we can run more than we are supposed to but that lights dim, kettles run slowly etc when we try draw more power than the cable can provide.

When we first moved in I tried to get the power company to upgrade the supply but the maximum we could have was 3.3kw. I talked to a Spanish electrician and his advice was to leave well alone. If we wanted a decent supply we would have to get the power company to beef up the supply and we were talking thousands of euros.

What's happening now is that the new device will limit us to the power we're contracted for. Try to draw more and the circuits breaker will pop. If we don't get the device fitted the bill will start to carry a penalty of around 15€ per month. We also probably need to get a certificate to say that our power supply is safe as the original certificate (which I've never seen) is obviously out of date because we had the wiring installation changed.

This could all get a bit sticky. Do as we should and we end up with stone age electricity. Do nothing and the fines will start to add up. Try to sort it out properly and it will certainly costs hundreds and maybe thousands.

Ho, hum.