Economy Seven Dual rate meter

doningtonphil

Hello


I posted an enquiry on the in my home section but maybe it is better asked here.


We have a dual rate meter and have an economy 7 tariff. At off peak times, the whole consumer unit was fed at the off peak rate as was a separate fuse board which fed storage heaters.


Our electrician came to install a new consumer unit and remove the feed to the night storage heaters. He assumed the separate time clock was just to feed those so disconnected it from the meter (yes, I know he shouldn't have done). Since then, although thetime clock was busy 'clicking over' at the right times, the indicator wasn't moving on the meter. It was stuck at Peak rate.


The electrician installed the consumer unit with one neutral and one live going from the meter to the consumer unit.


Following advice on the other forum I left well alone and asked our supplier (Scottish gas) to come and put it right.


NOW HERE IS MY REASON FOR POST:


He said, there should be two lives from the meter to the consumer unit- one for the electricity to flow along at peak rate, with the other being used for off peak. As there was only 1 liver from the meter to the consumer unit he said he wasn't allowed to install a 2nd tail, so had to remove the dual rate meter and put a single one in.


Is that right, does the electricity need to flow up separate cables at different times of day? I thought the meter would just have a mechanism so that the different dials were affected as each time of day but the electricity followed the same route.


He has said he can come back and install a new dual rate meter along another tail with an isolator ready for our electrician to run a 2nd cable to the meter!!!


Other people have said you can have a dual rate meter with only one cable going to the board !!! he electronics inside the meter switch which dial is affected at what times.


Frustratingly, if a new dual rate meter is put in it is likely to be an actual economy 7 (ie 7 hours off peak) rather than the economy 9.5 we used to have! Someone told me in this neck of the woods (Dumfries and Galloway) they had a 'comfort plus' tariff of 9. hours.


Can anyone set me straight about how many cables should go between meter and consumer unit?


Many thanks


Phil

Nada666

No idea about the wiring but many customers prefer an E7 tariff to more unusual ones as that gives them a greater choice of supplier. Every supplier offers one whereas E10 or 9.5 may be tied to your regional supplier and with only one tariff. Have a look at the prices of E7 tariffs in your postcode and you may find them cheaper than with your current tariff even accounting the fewer hours.

[Deleted User]

I ll have a look today. I usually see a few even though they now have gas central heating and are not even aware of the high day rate price.

molerat

How do you heat your house / hot water ? E7 is unlikely, in the majority of cases, to be cost effective if not using storage heaters.

DREKLY

there should be a third feed back to the dual rate meter, that tells it when the cheap rate switches on, by sending a LIVE feed back to the meter.
when on off-peak, the dual meter should show a "2" flashing on/off next to the off-peak KW reading - that is how mine is with an EDF dual E7 meter.
- and when on daytime reading, a "1" should show alongside that Kw reading.


It's not rocket science to re-connect the live + neutral back to the timer, then just the third live feed back to tell the meter when it switches to off-peak.


I guess the engineer couldn't figure that out !

doningtonphil

molerat - central heating is from solid fuel stove. We use an immersion heater to heat the water which is on in the early hours


drekly- the problem is that the electrician removed all of the cables between the time clock and the meter. The Scottish Gas guy said "there are all sorts of ways it could have been wired so I can't be sure I will wire it up correctly" so as he was unable to reinstate the wires between the meter and the timeclock, hence he had to swap to a single rate meter!!!!!!

ChumpusRex

Economy 7 meters have either 1 or 2 live wires from the meter to the consumer unit.

1 live is permanently active. The 2nd live (if fitted) is active only during cheap rate.

The meter will record all energy according to the prevailing rate. So at off-peak times, all energy used is registered as off-peak rate. During peak hours, all energy is charged at peak rate, but the secondary live wire (if fitted) is disabled.

Normally, storage heaters would be installed so that they are connected to the secondary live wire. This way, the meter has control of the storage heaters, and it's impossible for the heaters to run up a massive on-peak bill.

Because the meter accounts for peak/off-peak internally according to the time, you can still use timers to shift energy use to the off-peak rate.

With only a single live connection, however, you don't get automatic control of storage heaters, etc.