ovo energy meter problems

jay1181

Hi we have just had a tenant move out and upon checking the electric meter we have discovered it is a new meter belonging to ovo energy. I think its a prepayment meter but their is no key part.

I am wondering are the new tenants free to switch with this type of meter or will it have to be replaced at cost. I have new tenants lined up but she asked me re ovo energy and she said she wished to have it switch to British gas/ Scottish gas as this is where she works and she will qualify for a better tariff from them.

She advised me that she may be charged for replacing the meter. I am wondering if anybody else has had trouble with these meters and switching and were they charged for replacing. If so I will fit the bill and recharge the old tenant before i give them the deposit bond back.

Many Thanks

brewerdave

Could be a smart meter ??Believe that OVO have installed quite a high %age of customers.

Sterlingtimes

Is the meter a "Liberty"? If it is then British Gas could read it as a "dumb meter". The tenant may have the inconvenience of meter readers calling round.

jay1181

Hi I have call ovo and bg since i posted and they both confirm that a meter change will be required thats after being past to one agent and another as the first lot of agents couldn't confirm at bg if they could take over the meter or not. I have been told as the meter was installed by ovo its a prepayment meter and thus not compatible with bg systems and has to be replaced.

I have informed them if they charge the tenant that i will call up and pay for it. They seem happy with this arrangement as am i as i will recharge the outgoing tenant for the replacement. Many thanks for the reply as i was getting nowhere from bg when i posted.

The new tenant is going to contact bg today to get things moving.

Thanks again

[Deleted User]

The Ovo meter is a smart prepay.Maybe only Utilita , who use the same Liberty meter, can support it. You are stuck with Ovo until they switch you back to a standard credit meter.There will be a cost.. On another forum I read that a charge of around £100 would be levied to get rid of the meter. . I ve seen the tariff on Ovo meter when I occasionally read their meters and its higher than anyone elses but have a weekly standing charge of only 69p..Great if you re a low user. Ovo are getting away with touting for business with their hopeless prepay meter saying they are cheaper.They re not if you re an average or high user, as many unemployed are and they don t easily make it clear in their T/Cs about the cost to switch back to credit meters if the prepay option does nt work out. i ll be very interested in hearing myself what they charge. I ve had enquiries from a few Ovo customers as well once they realise they re feeding even more money into the meter than they were on BG or EDF

jay1181

Hi I have left it to the new tenant to talk to bg re this as they have stated they will change it but at a cost.

As soon as I am made aware of the cost I will update it on here. This meter was put in without our knowledge by one of our tenants who was having money issues.(only found out last week they were in trouble and left in a great hurry without any notice)

The new tenant works for centrica (sgas/bgas) and she is going to talk to the call center today to see what they will charge to remove it. When she is aware she will either pay it and i will refund her same day or i will call up and pay it on her behalf. The price of doing business i guess

macman

Your new tenant is still in a deemed contract with Ovo, whether she works for BG or not. BG won't change the meter until she is their customer, so that will require her to register with Ovo for an account and only then apply to BG to switch, will will take 3-4 weeks. If she works for BG she should be aware of this.

jay1181

Yes sorry i should have made this clear she has taken over the electric account from ovo now she is arranging with bg to take over the property electricity supply in 3/4 weeks then and only then will the meter be replaced.
Sorry for the confusion.

I am at a loss re this as bg stated to me that the meter that is in the property is not compatible with their said systems but my new tenant has stated as per a poster here is that they will make it dumb on their systems to enable them to take control of the account and switch it out when practical. She has stated they will be a charge to change it to a credit meter of 60 pounds plus x amount move it if it needs moved etc or free is she is keeping it payg.

macman

Any smart meter should be compatible with any supplier, but it won't be smart any more-it will simply need to be read conventionally as a 'dumb' meter. In this case you need to change and pay because you want to revert to a credit meter from a PPM, not because you are changing supplier.

jay1181

Hi yes she told me that they could in theory keep the meter as a dumb meter and just get it checked with the meter readers but they would and usually do change the meters to their own type.

The small cream one for credit and the normal key one for prepayment. It must be something to do with running costs or something. She has applied for bg to take over the supply and will here in the next few weeks what date it is. Until then she will top up with ovo.

I must admit she has better contacts in bg than i do as i couldn't get a straight answer from them but she has now done all the leg work so to speak and we will see if they charge her to replace it when the time comes.

I thought she could apply to get the meter changed and pay upfront for the change of meter from bg that day and wait until they had taken over the account then change it. But it seems that they will take payment from her once they come out to check the meter and establish if it needs to be moved etc.

Thanks for replying

kpearsoncj

when we moved into a place the company we were with eon came and replaced it for free as we had a long history with them