Utilities
Electricity
As soon as you buy or rent a property you should sign a contract with the local electricity company. Electricity is cheap in Spain and Grupo Endesa (www.endesaonline.com) is the biggest supplier. The second biggest, Iberdrola (www.iberdrola.es) serves Madrid, Catalonia, the Costa Blanca and Northern Spain.
The electricity supply in most of Spain is 220 volts AC with a frequency of 50 hertz, although some areas still have a 110 volt supply.
If you live in an area where power cuts are frequent and you depend on electricity to operate a computer and other equipment for your livelihood, you may wnat to install a backup generator. Most companies offer the choice of registering online or by telephone rather than having to go to their offece. You will need some form of ID (passport or residence card), the reference number for your electricity supply (see the left hand corner of an electricity bill under Contrato de Suministro Nº) and the contract and bills paid by the previous owner.
You will be billed every two months, usually after a meter reading but sometimes on the basis of an estimate, so learn to read your meter toc check your are not overpaying.
The best way to pay is by direct debit from a Spanish bank account. You can also pay at a post office, local banks listed on the bill or at the electricity company’s office (in cash).
Waste disposal
Spain is slowly gettin into the idea of recycling and you will see bins dotted around most towns to collect glass, paper, cardboard, aluminium, cans, plastic, batteries and other materials. Many municipalities also recycle garden waste, which is the sold as compost. Bins are usually emptied every night, except on Sundays.
Depending on whether you live in an urban or rural area, you will be charged for rubbish collection, from €30-150 a year. Check with your town hall and set up a direct debit arrangment with your bank to avoid fines for overdue payment.
Gas
At present, you will only have access to mains gas in major cities in Spain. When you move into a property with mains gas, contact the local gas company to switch the gas on, read the meter an provide a supply contract. You will receive a bill every two months, including VAT (IVA) at 16%. The most efficient method of payment is by direct debit from a Spanish bank account.
There are various gas companies in Spain but Gas Natural (www.gasnatural.com) is the main supplier to all the regions.
In rural areas, bottles of gas are delivered to homes. They are incredibly heavy and can run out just when you need them, but they work out about half the price of mains gas in most northern European countries. To be supplied with gas bottlles, you need to set up a contract by Repsol Butano (tel. 901 100 100).
Water
A hot topic given the dire lack of the stuff in certain regions, Spain has enough water to supply the country. The problem is, it’s unevenly distributed. Areas likely to see water shortages are the Mediterranean coast and the Balearics, where usage is heavily restricted.
If you need to transfer a water contract into your name, go to the town hall with ID and previous bills from the former owner. Non-residents will need to give their foreign address too.
If you need to install your own water heater, it must be at least 75-litres capacity. Water is controlled by local municipalities, and you will usually be charged anything from €50 to €300 to installl water in a new home, or up to €1,500 in an isolated area.
Tap water in cities is often a dubious rust colour and has a chemical taste, which would account for the millions of litres of bottled water consumed every year in Spain.
Around the home
Installing a telephone
Spain has the lowest landline phone ownership in the EU. Having a homes phone is considered a luxury and most people rely on mobile phones.
Although Telefonica no longer has the monopoly on the telephone service and there are six other componies who provide call services including Tele 2, Uni 2, Auna and Jazztel.
If the property you have moved into already has a phone line, transfer it immediately into your own name and ask Telefonica to read the account on the day that you want your account start and the previous tenant’s to end so you do not find yourself paying for calls made before you moved in.
Ask for the English department if you do not speak Spanish, or see their English website www.telefonicainenglish.com.
Television
Most Spanish television sets receive five terrestrial channels: the state run TV1 and TV2, independent stations Antena 3 and Telecinco and film and sport subscription channel Canal Plus, for which you can buy a decoder at supermarkets. Regional channels include Canal 9 in Valencia, Tele Madrid, Barcelona TV y Canal Sur in Andalucia.
If you don’t speak Spanish or you are not a fan of chat shows, one solution is to go out or to subscribe to satellite TV.
The main digital provider is Digital Plus (www.plus.es) owned by Telefónica y Grupo Prisa. Digital Plus offers a complete package with over 40 channels for €51 a month.
Auna (www.auna.es) is promoting a television, internet and phone package for €57 a month. It offers regional packages for Catalonia, Madrid, Alicante, Andalucía y Aragón.
Ono (www.ono.com) is promoting a television, internet and phone package for €56 a month. You can watch Ono Television in Valencia, Mallorca, Murcia, Castilla León, Castilla La Mancha, Cadiz y Huelva.
Nearly 3 million homes in Spain have satellite TV –and no doubt a large proportion of them belong to expats. Through Astra you can watch Sky One, Sky Sports, Film Four, UK Gold, Channel 5, Eurosport and many more in Dutch, German, Swedish and other languages.
Bristish expats can feel at home by installing Sky satellite TV for about €60 a month and soak up a taste of home with BBC1, BBC2, BBC3,BBC4, CNN, Sky News and BBC24. You need to subscribe to Sky and pay through a UK bank account or you can buy an instant viewing card for €200 to last 2-6 years. Contact a satellite instalation company for advice (www.satellitesuperstore.com). You can also import your own satellite dish and receiver and install it yourself. Before buying a system, ensure that it can receive programmes from all existing and planned satellites.
Video, TV and DVD
Due to differences in transmission standard TVs and video recorders which operate on the British system (PAL-I), French (SECAM) or American (NTSC) won’t work in Spain which uses the PAL-BG system. But you can buy a multi-stabdard European TV and video recorder which can adapt to different systems. Some can operate using the American system too, but check before purchasing.
Videos and DVDs films are pricey to buy so you are better off joining a local video shop for about €3 a day.
Internet
Growing numbers of exparts in Spain has meant an increasingd demand for easy internet access from home. Telefonica is the largest internet service provider –and even if you don’t choose to use it, other companies still have to ask their permission to use the phone line to install ADSL Broadband, so the process is invariably a long and painful one.
For 24-hour usage, ask for the ‘tarifa plana’ package. It usally cost about €40 a month and is 10 times faster than dial-up.
Post Offices
There are some 6,000 post offices scattered across Spain which offer the potencial for a wide range of modern services such as sending telegrams and faxes, accessing the Internet, and dealing with various international giro money orders.
If you want to guarantee the letter arrives, pay about double the ordinary price to send it by registrered post or get proof of delivery.
To send a basic letter or card up to 20g cost 0.28 within Spain or €0.53 for EU and €0.78 for the rest of the world.
If you can’t face the queues, you can also buy stamps in tobacconists shops. Postboxes are yellow with red stripes around the bottom and two slots, for local and national/international post.
Telephones
International calls
International calls are very expensive from Spain. Instead, buy a pre-paid phone card such as Europa or Eurocity for €6 from various outlets. You tap in the code on the card and you call for at least 200 minutes at any time of the day.
See Direct Telecom’s webside (www.direct-telecom.es) for details of how to make cheap international, as well as local and national, calls in Spain. Or Cellhome (www.peoplecall.com) offer a way of making internatinals calls at nationals rates by dialling 902 055 123 then entering the number you want to call following by # .
Mobile phones
Mobiles are big business in Spain. The Spanish may not like landlines but they love their mobiles and own more than any other EU country. They use them a lot too, given calls are cheaper from mobile to mobile than from mobile to landline.
There are three digital networks – Movistar (owned by Telefónica), Vodaphone and Orange. You cannot get a contract with a mobile phone company if you do not have a residence card, so you need to use a prepaid phone cards either in your existing mobile brought from abroad (if it will take a Spanish SIM card) or you can buy phones without contracts from about €60, including free calls.
Pre-paid cards are available from supermarkets, petrol stations etc... Or you can top up your phone directly from ATM machines.
Telephone numbers
Mobile phone numbers in Spain begin with a 6 and landline numbers with a 9. Numbers beginning with 90 are for special services. 900 is freephone numbers and is used (along with low.cost 901 numbers and standard-cost 902 numbers) by businesses as a national number.
