Please tell me about smart meters

Petra_70

Hubby wants to swap to them as his buddy at work swears by them... 'you can see how much it costs to boil your kettle and how much you're using when you have the fan on!' Etc etc...

But I saw on watchdog last night that people have been having problems. Not sure why, or what problems. Or if it is any particular energy provider that has the most problems.

Can people please help/advise me?

Are smart meters good? Bad? Anything else?

And what 'problems' could are people having?

And is it with any particular provider?

We are with British Gas.

Many thanks. .

[Deleted User]

I watched that BBC Watchdog 10 minute hatchet job. I work with smart meters all day and they hardly showed a correct picture of a normal smart meter.The one they showed not working properly was a business smart meter with an attached module not a normal domestic smart meter. I wish the BBC had been as impartial as they are supposed to be by interviewing a few people like me who have flawlessly working smart meters for the last few years.
Get them fitted, they re fine, you will lose interest in the energy monitor after a few months I bet.
British Gas use the sim free Landys and Gyr smart meters, very reliable. Ovo and Utilita are using the unreliable and complicated Secure Liberty smart meters capable of prepay or credit mode.

Sterlingtimes

Regrettably, OVO's smart metering installed in June has been a failure to date.

Ovo could read the meter remotely at first but can do so no longer.

The smart monitoring was partially successful but has failed completely.

Therefore Ovo cannot read and I cannot monitor.

Ovo says that it has so many failures that I am on a waiting list to have mine fixed.

A "relay" (what ever that is) will now be fitted in November.

The other downside is that I have lost my right to deemed export payments for my solar with a cost to me of £50 a year.

Let's just be clear. It has been a total failure. Ovo's subcontractors have been unable to make the Smart Meter or the Smart Gateway work. Ovo must be pretty cheesed off with this bad publicity.

Ovo is an odd company. Very good front end customer service but inability to deliver technology.

emv

Our bill has gone up to 5 times previous usage since having a smart meter installed!! I have tried looking into it, apparently it may be to do with energy peaks as appliances are switched on which don't register on old meters but do on smart meters, :-(

[Deleted User]

emv wrote: »

Our bill has gone up to 5 times previous usage since having a smart meter installed!! I have tried looking into it, apparently it may be to do with energy peaks as appliances are switched on which don't register on old meters but do on smart meters, :-(

Smart meters are revealing the faulty old meters when they are installed.The smart meters are very accurate and very unlikely to be faulty themselves.

Retired_at_55

Hello sacsquacco. (I hope you don't mind me joining in to ask some questions, Petra.) I changed to Ebico (SSE) and I have the option of stating that I am interested in a Smart Meter although I haven't done anything about it yet. If you know about the type and reliability of the Smart Meters fitted by Ebico I would be interested to know, please.

Do you know if their Smart Meters are for Gas and Electricity or just for electricity? (I still have the old style gas meter ? Imperial where I multiply by 32 to get the approximate number of kWhrs used and not the newer ? Metric type. My electric meter seems to be a newer one.) Do you know if there is a choice of type/ brand of Smart Meter being provided because you mention that some Smart Meters are better than others, thank you?

I have not been with Ebico long enough but, so far, everything seems to be going well. If, later, I decided to move away from Ebico what would happen about the usefulness of their Smart Meter?

Many thanks.

Retired at 55

Petra_70

That's cool 'retired at 55;' I don't mind.

Thanks folks for the info, although I am still none the wiser really as people's opinions and experience appear to be differing LOL.

I am a bit worried about Sterling saying their bills went up 5 fold :eek: Why would THAT happen?!

Also, I did read this on an old MSE report on them.

http://www.moneysupermarket.com/gas-and-electricity/smart-meters/

This bit concerned me a bit:

How much does a smart meter cost?

There is no upfront cost to the consumer. However, the meters aren't free. Instead, customers will pay for the meter and its maintenance through their energy bills.

The Public Accounts Committee has recently calculated the cost to be £43 a year over five years, a total of £215 for every household.

So if you do have one, you pay £215 for it! And so it's £430 if you have both meters changed...

I would be interested to hear from more people who have had them.

Thank you.

[Deleted User]

Retired_at_55 wrote: »

Hello sacsquacco. (I hope you don't mind me joining in to ask some questions, Petra.) I changed to Ebico (SSE) and I have the option of stating that I am interested in a Smart Meter although I haven't done anything about it yet. If you know about the type and reliability of the Smart Meters fitted by Ebico I would be interested to know, please.

Do you know if their Smart Meters are for Gas and Electricity or just for electricity? (I still have the old style gas meter ? Imperial where I multiply by 32 to get the approximate number of kWhrs used and not the newer ? Metric type. My electric meter seems to be a newer one.) Do you know if there is a choice of type/ brand of Smart Meter being provided because you mention that some Smart Meters are better than others, thank you?

I have not been with Ebico long enough but, so far, everything seems to be going well. If, later, I decided to move away from Ebico what would happen about the usefulness of their Smart Meter?

Many thanks.

Retired at 55

I dont know what meter Ebico have chosen, hopefully its not the Secure Liberty. I think I d give it a miss if its that model.I ve read about people having to imput a 60 digit code trying to load a manual prepay credit in when its in prepayment mode.Anything which requires that ridiculous number of digits to imput has failed for me before Its started..
I ve only ever seen the Landys and Gyrs electric smart meter in Mk1 and Mk2 models fitted by British Gas and First Utility and Eon. The gas smart is a small Siemans e6 gas meter seen all over the UK, fitted with a module to send its reading to the nearby electric smart meter once a day.They are fit and forget meters, very reliable. Not really necessary to look at them again. We come and give them a look every couple of years.
Personally I ve not noticed any extra added to my bills at all. Theres no indication of a smart meter levy on my bill because I would nt be so keen either of a £43 a year increase which increases the suppliers profits . They are the big winners with smart meters and we should nt be expected to fund their decreasing metering costs. I ve been told lately that BG have reduced their metering costs down from 11% to 7% in the last few years since they ve been at the forefront in smart meter fitting.
.

poppellerant

What I will say is this. If, like me, you keep a sharp eye on your energy usage by taking regular, monthly readings, be prepared to be underwhelmed by the display unit supplied with OVO's smart meter. I thought it might at least show my current meter readings, meaning it would be easier for me to take readings. No, I still have to go to where the meters are and read them.

For the first few months that the smart meters were installed, OVO couldn't access my readings from the smart meters. I would suggest that you record and provide OVO your readings during this period for accurate bills and usage monitoring. After that, OVO take readings monthly which I am happy with - these show on my bill.

Nada666

Petra_70 wrote: »

So if you do have one, you pay £215 for it! And so it's £430 if you have both meters changed...

No, not individually. Everyone pays for it collectively regardless of whether you have the meter changed or not.

Eg, if ten percent of meters are changed each year over ten years then everyone pays an extra £43.

Retired_at_55

sacsquacco wrote: »

I dont know what meter Ebico have chosen, hopefully its not the Secure Liberty. I think I d give it a miss if its that model.I ve read about people having to imput a 60 digit code trying to load a manual prepay credit in when its in prepayment mode.Anything which requires that ridiculous number of digits to imput has failed for me before Its started..
I ve only ever seen the Landys and Gyrs electric smart meter in Mk1 and Mk2 models fitted by British Gas and First Utility and Eon. The gas smart is a small Siemans e6 gas meter seen all over the UK, fitted with a module to send its reading to the nearby electric smart meter once a day.They are fit and forget meters, very reliable. Not really necessary to look at them again. We come and give them a look every couple of years.
Personally I ve not noticed any extra added to my bills at all. Theres no indication of a smart meter levy on my bill because I would nt be so keen either of a £43 a year increase which increases the suppliers profits . They are the big winners with smart meters and we should nt be expected to fund their decreasing metering costs. I ve been told lately that BG have reduced their metering costs down from 11% to 7% in the last few years since they ve been at the forefront in smart meter fitting.
.[/QUOTE

That's really helpful, thanks. I pay EBICO/SSE once a month with direct debit and I try to keep an eye on how much I use.

I'll think about it better informed now thanks to the good information here.

Retired at 55]