Switching to gas for hot water and would appreciate advice on how to find a provider for cheap bottles. We don't have gas coming to our street, unfortunately. Thanks!
How to Find Cheapest LPG
gotmilk on 23/02/2022 - 12:05
Comments
Also worth noting that if you do buy your own gas bottles they have an expiry date.
Generally 10 years from the date of manufacture. Still usuable after this time but you won't be able to refill them and generallty not worth the cost of having them retested/certified.
You can still swap them though, as long as the bottle doesn't have significant rust or is degraded in any way.Yep - I make sure that, if I get a bottle with a relatively short date, I use it first and get it swapped again.
I have had multiple bottles for many years (oldest one I bought was at least twenty years ago, and the newest more than ten years), and currently the oldest on I have at home is only four years old if I recall correctly.
I'll add that I was specifically talking about the large 45kg bottles here, not your standard 9kg swappa bottles. If you're going for the 9kg ones, you may still be able to find a bargain for refills (one gas station in Orewa north of Auckland does 9kg refills for $25 each last I checked). And yes, once every few years you can pay a bit more to swap the rusty old one for a brand new one ;)
I just tried a few places around us - both swaps and refills (price-wise there was almost nothing in it), and went with the lowest at the time.
If / when they change their prices, I would just do the same exercise again, and settle on the new lowest (which might be the same place again I guess).
Our interior gas is only for the stove top, so we stick with the 9kg bottles (same as for the BBQ), and I have three 9kg bottles (one for the stove, one for the BBQ, and one spare) plus a smaller (4.5kg?) camping bottle that is my 'backup' in case both the stove and BBQ run out at the same time (highly unlikely, so almost certain to happen soon!)
Given we only have to swap each of the stove and BBQ maybe twice a year, it is so cheap that even if I paid $5 more than I needed to, it would only lose me $20 a year, so not a real big deal, although I would have to hand in my CC card if I didn't at least try to get a good price :-)
Alan.
I'm in AKL, we were with Rockgas but went with Matagas since Rockgas increased their rates twice last year. So far I'm happy with them.
The price of these 45KG LPG bottles is a complete rort that seems to be being ignored by the general public, media and Government. We live near Whangarei and have rented 2 * 45KG bottles from Elgas for nearly 5 years.The charge per bottle over this period is:
July 2017 - $127.95
June 2018 - $129.00
Oct 2018 - $131.25
Mar 2019 - $135.13
Apr 2019 - $140.85
May 2019 - $146.00
Jan 2020 - $151.00
Aug 2020 - $154.00
Jan 2021 - $160.21
Jun 2021 - $169.41
Aug 2021 - $176.31
Oct 2021 - $184.82
Jan 2022 - $195.68That's an over 50% increase in under 5 years, the majority being in the last 3 years. Elgas blame it on the ETS and supply chain increases but if electricity prices showed the same level of increase there would be rioting in the streets! Time to shop around I think.
Are those monthly rental charges?
If so, seems like you'd be better off just using 9kg bottles like us?
No idea what your usage is of course, but we only change the 9kg bottles about twice a year for the stove. If you are using it for hot water and / or heating (say) then it would be more often obviously.
Sorry, no that's not the monthly charge but the charge to get an empty 45KG bottle replaced with a full one by Elgas. The rental charge for 2 bottles is $77 per bottle per year.
In Auckland, Matagas seems to be the cheapest, $100 for one 45kg bottle swap, delivered. We bought the bottles, therefore, no rental/annual charges.
That looks like a good price to me - cheaper than I get for 9kg bottles (around $20 vs $23).
Depends on what you paid up front for the 45kg bottle and how much you use though.
Alan.
Where are you getting your 9kg bottles refilled for $23?
That was at Caltex I think - I guess it is possible it has gone up since I last got a refill (Jan 2022 if I recall correctly).
@Alan6984: Which one? New Lynn is $29.99 now or a dollar less. The cheapest I know of is matagas at $24 and they guarantee they're the lowest price.
Except don't bottles have a limited life, and don't you have to get them checked? I found Frank energy to be one of the cheapest for a full service and they give a $50 signup discount if you use the referral link at https://www.cheapies.nz/deals/frankenergy.co.nz#refinfo114 Some companies were nearly double this.
When you say limited life? Do you mean time before they need to be recertified?
I can remember filling 9kg ones at servo and they had to be within a certain data range but could get recertified and a new date stamped on.Last time I asked, it wasn't really worth getting a 9kg bottle re-certified.
However, as above, just make sure if you have any that are getting to the end of their life, that you swap them out.
@Alan6984: Yeah it was often cheaper to do a swap a bottle with a refill, than to get it recertified. In the old days they didn't have swap a bottle system, but it was very cheap to fill a bottle.
@nzmax: True - I've only been using swaps for maybe ten / fifteen years or so (hard to remember exactly).
@Alan6984: iirc only worth if you have an aluminium can that you use for boats
not worth for home use
Thanks! Ended up signing with them using the referral code
how much to buy the bottle? and the bottles stay outside the house?
how to much to connect the bottle to your stove?
Not sure who you are asking, but for us, it costs about $23 to get the bottle filled (9kg). It lasts us about six months, and we cook dinner (at least partially) on the stove probably at least five out of seven days, plus probably four lunches, and one breakfast a week, so call it an average of about ten stove uses a week, or about 250 uses per bottle, or about 10c a go. I have no idea if that would apply to you or anyone else though!
The bottle sits outside the house, and the piping was fitted when the stove was installed (new build), so no idea what it would cost if you were retrofitting, but I would guess it would not be worth doing in that situation.
I believe you can buy a new 9kg bottle (empty) for about $50, but I haven't bought one for so long that you might want to check that out at Bunnings or M10 or similar. I just make sure that if I have a bottle getting within a couple of years of expiring, I swap it, rather than getting it refilled, to get a younger bottle, then go again.
The bottle hire that jonnochen quotes (albeit for a 45kg bottle) of $10 per month would significantly increase our costs from about $50 pa (2 x $23 rounded up) to about $160 pa ($100 for 45kg pro rated to about 18kg would be $40 pa plus $120 of hireage = $160 pa), but if you are using a lot more gas (oven, hot water) then it might stack up I guess as the actual gas is slightly cheaper.
E&OE!
Alan.
where is 9kg refill for $23? Caltex South Auckland does it for $25
I think we paid $200 for each 45kg bottle (i.e. paid for itself after 2 years), spent about 3K to get a licensed gat fitter to convert from electric to LPG (continuous hot water (included) + gas stove not included (connection included)). The gas fitter will produce the relevant certificate at the end of the project. That was 3-4 years ago. I think Matagas stopped selling the 45kg bottles now for some reason (could be due to shortage), only renting them.
We just swapped to matagas as they were $100/45kg bottle as opposed to rock gas $115. About $10/month for bottle hire from both.
Further to my post above where LPG prices had increased to $195/45kg as at Jan 2022 I've received 2 further increases from Elgas; an additional $10.67/45kg effective 18th March 2022 and $10.36 effective 4th April 2022. It's a complete rip off.
Wow, that's really expensive. Sometimes, I don't understand what the point of the so called "competitions", doesn't seem to work in this market (power and gas).
competition only work if people are willing to vote with their feet
When I looked at their pricing they seemed really expensive when compared to Frank Energy or even rockgas. I thought they were supposed to be one of the cheaper suppliers too
frank energy $90.xx for 45 KG? (+$10/year bottle rental)?
is about $25 refill at your local gas station,
tempting
Yes - as I posted above, for our usage (about 18kg pa) it costs about $50 pa.
If we went with 4kg bottles, the bottle hire of $10 pm would be $120 pa before we even accounted for the actual gas.
You quote $10 pa for hire but above jonnochen quotes $10 pm - the difference would change the calculations significantly, but I have no idea which is correct.
We are with genesis for LPG and were considering switching to a cheaper company a few years ago. Got a call from them offering us a discount to stay so letting them know you're considering switching could get you something. We have both LPG and electricity with them so get a few other discounts.
We pay $120/45kg + $11/month rental for 2 bottles but get a 23% discount (1% eBill, 2% direct debit, 5% dual gas and 15% discount).
So it comes down to $92.40/45kg and $8.47/month so even though the rates are more expensive we're better off.
Location? We found Frank Energy (formerly Energy Online) was cheapest last year, but it will probably depends where you live. I'm not aware of any online tools to compare bottled gas suppliers.
Being the cheapie that I am, I also looked into buying my own bottles and finding a cheap place to refill. Even with second hand bottles (45kg) and the cheapest refills I could find it only worked out a few dollars cheaper a month to do it myself, but at huge inconvenience every time I had to get it refilled.