Solar Panel Guide Discussion

shafeeq

Hi Z

Thanks for your advise. Taking your advice I tried to talk with an advisor on line who wasn't really interested, now I have emailed mircogeneration team and asked them what step are they going to take to sort out the issue.

See what reply I get.

Shafeeq

zeupater

shafeeq wrote: »

Hi

I just went to Npower website to email and had a chat with a live person. They says it's not their department to contact microgeneration department with 084 number..... arrrrgggg

I saved the chat, I told the person that I have already mention about the meter going backward on the form and they havn't done anything. The person says it's nothing to do with them.

Shafeeq

Hi

Seems to be a training issue at their end then .... my reasoning for this conclusion is based on the following ... Your FiT partner could be another company, the microgeneration department has absolutely nothing to do with household meter provision. The company you deal with for the provision of grid connected supply is responsible for ensuring and satisfying themselves that the meter on which your payments are calculated is accurate and they cannot claim to be able to do this as your supplier considering the information you have provided them with ....

If it was me in this position I would not only keep the copy of the 'chat' you have already had, but go one further and ask that they confirm that they hold responsibility for meter reading & accuracy and whether they relinquish, on behalf of their organisation, any and all monetary claims against me for inaccuracies due to installed metering equipment which is inappropraite for purpose on my particular site ... I'd guess that they wouldn't, that it would be properly escallated and a new meter would be booked for fitting - but if they do, the information would be saved for future reference and dusted off if any usage estimate was received ... I consider that I would have taken more than what would be a reasonable approach and would simply raise this to rebuff any and all claims resulting from continued use of the equipment, allowing for a (reasonable) period of time for them to have arranged a replacement ...

HTH
Z

Martyn1981

shafeeq wrote: »

I had solar panel installed on 6th June 2012. My meter goes backward but only the last digit. It doesn't go any further back. So whatever I use it goes back.

Shafeeq

Hiya Shafeeq, my friend is in the same boat as you, he's just coming up to 2 years (Sept). Only the 'units' dial goes backward, but when it hits zero the 'tens' column refuses to move. So if it opens on a 9 with a good day it goes back up to 9, but if it opens on a zero, nothing happens.

The electricity company know, but 2 years on still haven't done anything. He suspects they don't believe him as his usage is still very high at around 7,000 pa, down from about 10,000 before PV.

No idea if this comes under the 12 month rule of not backdating bills too far. He's not too worried. Personally, I'd probably be stressing!

Mart.

shafeeq

Hi Mart.

Well since I had Solar panel installed just over 2 months, my meter is 3kWh less then I started with. I sent a meter reading to Npower on 13th July. They generated a bill. SO I assume so this period of 1 month and week, I had free juice . The next reading when I provide will be interesting because it will be same as previous reading, unless the weather goes so bad that that I will use 10 kwh in few days :0 my average usage before solar panels was 3.92 kWh a day.

I just had a reply to my email

"Thank you for your email.

I apologise for the length of time it has taken for the meter exchange department to contact yourself. I have passed your information through to them; unfortunately due to the high volumes of meter exchanges being requested at the moment, this has caused a 5-6 week backlog. If you don't hear anything from the metering team within this timescale, please give us a call and we will chase them for you."

Shafeeq

Martyn1981

shafeeq wrote: »

" ... If you don't hear anything from the metering team within this timescale, please give us a call and we will chase them for you."

Shafeeq

That's interesting, and fits in exactly with what Zeup was saying, since it kind of places some responsibility back on you, if they fail to do anything.

I think I recently read that smart meters were expected by 2018, but I'm also pretty sure that these dates are just being bandied around, with no real decision on what a smart meter is or will do, let alone when we'll get them.

Mart.

John_Pierpoint

WestonDave wrote: »

(Incidentally EDF don't have a box on their form - my case will be interesting as they are not only FiT admin and billing supplier, but also the area grid company so arguably they knew about my 4kWp system before it was installed due to having to get prior permission for it!)

Are you sure?

I cannot see EDF on here

http://www.nationalgrid.com/uk/Electricity/AboutElectricity/DistributionCompanies/

UK Power Networks began operations in October 2010 after the sale of EDF Energy Networks to the Cheung Kong Group for a reported £5.5 billion..[2]

WestonDave

John - clearly I'm wrong/out of date on that one!

Anyway the meter has been read this morning by a meter reader which will produce a negative consumption figure. We'll see what happens from here.

John_Pierpoint

Keep us in the picture.
I have a friend, in a similar situation, battling to get acceptance that he "exports 50%" and the other 50% must be reducing his day time consumption through the importing meter.

Nice to know that a percentage of our bills is going to Hong Kong as a profit.

Personally I have an importing and a generating meter both of which are side by side.
Thus I can count the number of flashes on the "fast one" relative to the slow one and instantly get a ratio of (say) 5 watts produced to 1 imported, as I turn on the hot water immersion.
[Watch this space for confused readings by meter reader and his tablet]

While trying to work backwards both meters (in turn) read "rEd" [ie the generation meter at night and the importing meter at sunny noon.]

This could be an opportunity to have your meter board/cupboard "rationalised" if you handle it right.

Are you on "economy 7" ?

WestonDave

Will do John. Sounds like there maybe some interesting discussions ahead - out of interest who is his supplier?

John_Pierpoint

I have forgotten - will ask again.

Update: nPower