Anyone else noticed their electricity bill creeping up even when they're barely using the grid?

Standing charges are the real villain here — mine went up again last quarter and I've got a 10kWh Fogstar battery bank sat there doing most of the heavy lifting while the grid connection just quietly bleeds me dry for the privilege of existing.

Ran the numbers last month and I'm paying roughly £28/month just to be connected, before a single electron gets pulled through the meter. Absolute racket.

The irony isn't lost on me that I spent good money on Victron kit precisely to reduce my grid dependency, and yet here we are. My static van setup with the solar array covers probably 80% of our usage across spring/summer, drops off a cliff come November obviously, but the standing charge doesn't care what season it is.

Anyone else actually done the maths on whether it's worth ditching the grid connection entirely vs. just absorbing the standing charge? I've been going back and forth on it for the EV charging setup — feels like you need a fairly serious battery bank before the numbers stack up in your favour year-round in the UK, especially up north where "sunny day" is basically a mythological concept.

The suppliers know exactly what they're doing making these fixed costs invisible in the headline rate comparisons.

What's everyone else running for standing charges right now — has anyone actually switched tariffs and seen a meaningful difference, or is it all just shuffling deck chairs?

@Rob1963 this is exactly what pushed me to rethink the whole setup at my static. Standing charge was quietly eating £8-9 a month before I'd used a single watt — felt like paying rent on a connection I barely needed.

Ended up sizing the battery bank properly (Fogstar Drift cells, similar to yours) and a Victron MPPT to manage charging, and now I'm genuinely weighing whether the grid connection earns its keep at all.

The maddening bit is the standing charge exists partly to fund grid infrastructure I'm actively trying to avoid using. You're essentially subsidising everyone else's consumption.

Worth actually logging what the grid contributes versus what it costs you annually — might surprise you how close the numbers are to just cutting it loose entirely.

@Rob1963 this is the exact calculation that finally pushed me to fully commit to the van build rather than a static setup. No grid connection means zero standing charge — full stop.

Worth running the actual maths: at current rates you're looking at roughly £300-400/year just to have the connection before you've drawn a single watt. Depending on your Fogstar capacity and solar input, that standing charge money could be paying off a decent MPPT controller or a second battery inside of two years.

The grid connection is essentially a subscription fee for a backup service most of us rarely need once the bank is properly sized. If your 10kWh is genuinely doing the heavy lifting, it's worth modelling what full independence would actually cost versus what you're haemorrhaging annually just maintaining the hookup.

@Rob1963 living this on the boat — standing charge on my shore power connection is an absolute joke relative to what I actually pull from it. Had a proper look at the numbers last winter and realised I was paying nearly as much in standing charges as actual units consumed.

What's frustrating is there's no real middle ground with the grid — you're either paying to stay connected or you're fully off it. My Victron setup handles probably 85-90% of my needs through solar + Fogstar storage, but that remaining 10% keeps me tethered to a monthly fee that makes zero economic sense.

@Lefty28 the van route sidesteps this completely which is genuinely appealing. Tiny house / floating home situation is trickier because you still want that safety net for grey winter months when generation tanks.

@Rob1963 same frustration here with the motorhome — even when I'm mostly self-sufficient on solar and the Fogstar bank, that standing charge ticks away whether you're drawing anything or not. It's essentially paying rent on a connection you barely use.

Worth actually logging what you pull from the grid over a month and comparing it against the standing charge alone — for me the maths got embarrassing pretty quickly. Most of my grid usage was just topping up during a bad patch of November weather when the panels weren't pulling their weight.

Some folks go full DNO disconnection but that's a big commitment. Others just downgrade their connection if that's an option where you are. No perfect answer but at least knowing your actual numbers makes the decision clearer.

@Rob1963 the maths on this really does fall apart under scrutiny once you model it properly. I've been tracking mine on a spreadsheet — standing charge represents roughly 40% of my quarterly grid bill despite the static caravan pulling almost nothing once the Victron MultiPlus handles the base load. The grid connection essentially becomes insurance at that point, and quite expensive insurance at that.

Worth noting that Octopus and a few others now offer tariffs specifically structured around low-usage scenarios, which can shift that standing charge burden somewhat. Not a complete solution but it does change the equation marginally.

The more uncomfortable question is whether maintaining a grid connection purely for emergency backup actually pencils out versus a properly sized second battery bank. I've been running that calculation for six months and haven't reached a comfortable conclusion either way.