British Gas asking for meter readings when we have Smart Meters

lstar337

Norman_Castle wrote: »

Its waved in front of customers to distract them from the £X billion they're paying to save suppliers £X billion.

And keep the lights on.

mac.d

Norman_Castle wrote: »

The in house display is like a free Meercat toy but much less fun. Its waved in front of customers to distract them from the £X billion they're paying to save suppliers £X billion.

Don't they estimate it will save you around £20 per year IF you cut your energy use from using these to monitor it? *cough* just ignore the cost everyone has to pay for the installation of these meters *cough*.

What a bargain. How can people not be excited.

lstar337

mac.d wrote: »

Don't they estimate it will save you around £20 per year IF you cut your energy use from using these to monitor it? *cough* just ignore the cost everyone has to pay for the installation of these meters *cough*.

What a bargain. How can people not be excited.

Smart meters benefit the public indirectly.

There were a few choices:

1. Don't bother to do everything and wait for all the lights to go off as the grid fails to keep pace with the countries usage. [Public left with no power]

2. Increase capacity to meet the pace of usage increases (which would have been too slow anyway), and pay those power stations to sit idle while we don't use the power in off-peak times. [Public subjected to power shortages followed by an increase in bills to pay for standby capacity]

3. Improve grid efficiency through monitoring/management (smart meters), and trying to educate people on how to reduce their consumption. [Public subjected to slightly higher bills, but the lights probably stay on (for now)]

In reality they are combining a few ideas to keep us in power for the next few years. Neglect of the grid and capacity have put us in a crummy situation. Renewables are adding capacity (at least), but they are very intermittent. This is why real feedback is required in order to improve the grid. How can improvements be made with no real information on where the problems are?

So smart meters are helping the public, whether you see it or not. The way they are being rolled out is the usual government shambles, but the meters themselves and their purpose are not to blame.

zerog

I have a smart meter installed by my current supplier, but they sent me estimated bills for an entire year.

The estimates were significantly under my actual usage, so I didn't bother to correct them.

About 14 months afterwards I got a bill with the actual reading, so the meter does work, but they don't seem to be bothering with it most of the time.


To Bogof_Babe, why don't you submit a quick complaint and maybe they will give you a tenner to move the car

r2015

Didn't know it showed the current meter readings as well as the cost of what we are using. Presumably that information is buried deep within a series of menus or similar?

If it's anything like my IHD it's only a few button presses
Menu scroll down to meter readings.

Lot easier than moving the car