A test like that is not accurate unless the parameters are tightly controlled and all contributing factors noted. The meter reading includes all household electric use, not just the heat pump. Cooking? Bathing? Dishwashing? Laundry? Sunshine vs. overcast? Wet vs. dry weather (affects heat pump defrost frequency)? Did the 3°F recovery involve use of auxiliary heat strips? 2°F and 3°F setback is very minimal. More savings is potentially garnered with larger setbacks. I'm in TX. We had a rare snowfall during a wet norther on Dec 4. After that Dec 4 weather incident, I didn't run the central heating (heat pump) for several weeks. Instead, I used a space heater only in the bedroom at night. I noted that even with occasional nighttime temps into the upper 30°Fs, the unheated rooms in my house rarely dropped below 60°F. So ... if I had been running the heat pump at 70°F normal with a 2°F setback (68°F), it still would run to maintain 68°F during the setback periods ... but an 8°F to 10°F setback (setpoint of 62°F or 60°F), it would run very little during the setback periods, if at all. That'd make a difference on KWH usage in regards to setback vs. none.

I personally have no problem with a customer following me around. I prefer to educate them on certain items they can do themselves. A little communication goes a long way to make a user feel warm and fuzzy as long as they don't get in the way. I have clients that only need me or one of my techs. to come around every 3 years or so to do real maintenance and checks. The residential maintenance agreements do help me keep technicians busy during gaps in the schedules. I actually have clients who want someone to come out and change their filters. Most are elderly or afraid to touch anything. We usually try to schedule those when a tech. is going to be passing by and we can do it gratis if the customer provides the filter. It's amazing how that "value added" service has helped business. But as you can see, for some people those maintenance agreements are worthwhile to some while others can save their money and do certain things themselves. Of course, for commercial clients, it's cheaper for them to buy an agreement than it is to hire someone full time to do it. And what's great is they can call the shop, ask questions and if the office Administrator can't answer a question (she does great), a tech. will call back. Even many handy types buy the agreement just to have resources (we also sell parts). These extras have allowed me to pretty much lock in whole neighborhoods.

I agree with you guys, defrost on demand is the way to go. As for which mode....heating or cooling causes the most heaviest demand on the compressor....If you were to leave out the fact of the defrost cycle in the heating mode, I would judge the cooling cycle to be more demanding. I've found the head pressures to be less in the heating mode. Through the years, I've noticed several innovations with heat pumps that have come and gone. I suspect, due to complexity and reliability, some were cast aside. One that intrigued me most was first used by Coleman. There were a series of low wattage heat strips incorporated through the condensing coils. The defrost was accomplished by the heat strips being engaged in stages according to outside temperature. The unit never went into a defrost mode using the reversing valve and the need for Aux heat was minimized. If you've been in the business a while, you remember the GE's which are now Trane. Just as an experiment about 20 or so years ago (the unit was about 10 or 15 years old then), I zig zagged 2 sets of 100 watt pipe heating wire through the fuzzy condensing coils on a friends unit. One of these was permanently energized and the other was intended to be used if needed, by manually engaging it. We disconnected the timer motor and made sure a portion of the heat strip went past the defrost thermostat. The unit never went into reverse defrost mode and the Aux heat didn't come on as often. We found that when the outdoor temperatures were between 28 and 35 degrees, ice would form but when the unit would shut off after satisfying the thermostat, the ice quickly melted. The second heat strip was never needed or used. Under 28 degrees, there was minimal frost that went away just about immediately when the unit shut off. Over 35 degrees never had noticeable frost. Mind you, we didn't keep scientific data as I wish we would have. It was more of a "lets see what happens". I don't remember the wattage rating of the unit Aux heat strips so I can't give real data now. The 100 watt strip added to the outside coil ran 24/7 (should have set up for off/on) so I suspect overall, it probably would have matched the Aux strip usage but, electricity was cheaper then. However the unit never went into defrost mode and we left it that way for 5 more years when I finally replaced the whole unit for him. He indicated his electric bill stayed pretty much the same. We de-enegized (manually via a switch) the heat strip during the cooling season.

For the electricity it seems you are buying the electricity from another provider. There is delivery charge from National grid for $61.49, and a service charge of $75.71 from another supplier. The average cost for 701 kWh is $0.196 per kWh. That is is expensive. You probably would get a better rate if you bought your electricity from National Grid. National grid also offers other types of billing. You should call them and ask about all the available options. The gas chart is showing a price of $0.22 per therm. That is very low so I suspect that is only the delivery charge. Are there more details on your bill showing the service charge?