I cannot get my head around (much like people drinking lager at the airport at 6am) making a conscious decision to switch the heating on or off - that's what your thermostat is for. If you have to make that decision, your thermostat is set at the wrong temperature no?
Yes, indeed, but Great British Central Heating normally has both a timer and a thermostat in conflict with each other controlling tiny radiators that are heated so hot that they glow, which prevents the heating source running efficiently (thereby giving the energy companies lots of income, which made the turnover look good when they were nationalised and attractive to investors when they were privatised) and maximises the stress on the heating system (thereby giving the plumbers who usually installed them lots of work fixing things), plus generates a never-ending stream of whinges about how much it costs and people finding the same building too hot and too cold in the same day, and an obsession with the weather and especially whether any hot and cold times of day will line up with when "the heating's on".
If more people used modern computer-controlled heating systems with sensible algorithms, efficient heat emitters and lots of monitoring, then some non-cycling Brits may run out of things to talk about before the end of winter, so it serves a social function(!)
It's somewhat easier for us European scum who have no such hang-ups about learning what works from abroad. The heating control is set to the same program as usual and it hasn't been for months, but the house has been slowly cooling over the last week and it looks from the long-range forecasts like it might start heating this week or almost certainly next.