Electrickery

The electrician who said the supply was only 20 amp phoned EDF for me. From her email:
"You have 20 Amp per phase with a 3 phase subscription.
In residential house, we usually put monophase, which makes it way simpler to wire the house. No need to have the 3 phases equilibrated. EDF will do the change on a phone call within 2 to 3 weeks for 135.26 euro. Then you can adjust your power for your need. It will depend on your heating system mostly. If all electric, I will recommend 9 KW."

135 euros, oh ouch.

So today I spent just over 30 minutes on the phone to EDF - admittedly mostly on hold, with a repeating 8 bars of clanking piano and Disney choir, which wound me up quite a bit.

Talking about strange electricity supplies in furrin is hard work for someone who doesn't understand them in any language[0]. I thought I was doing ok, but the agent decided to get a colleague who speaks a litte English to help out. We giggled quite a lot but in the end I had to go back into French for it because she couldn't even remember the numbers, let alone the word for appliance, and I can't remember what "heures creuses" is in English! She wanted to know the floor area of the house, too... it's somewhere in these papers...

Anyway, I'm booking an appointment for the changeover.

Previous owner said earlier (also a phone call in French) that there was no need to swap to monophase but it is a bit cheaper for ordinary domestic purposes. He'd had 3-phase for the woodsaw (sawmill?).

[0] Huge thanks to people who explained things on LJ and in irc