Changing to non Economy 7 meter

EachPenny

Please don't call me 'stupid' House Martin, it is rude and insulting an has no part in a fact-based discussion about E7 meters.

I have not used the phrase "eco 7 meters are enemies of the state" and certainly didn't attribute it to you. Perhaps if you took more care in reading what people are saying you would be a bit less angry?

I'd like to remind you of some of the statements you have made so far:

"rid themselves of the two rate meters at the cheapest possible price"
"night storage heating is very rare but horrible eco 7 meters are not"
"an Eco 7 robbing meter is nt justified"
"had the meters ripped out for good"

Can you understand the confusion when you then say:

House_Martin wrote: »

I am not attacking Eco 7 meters

House_Martin wrote: »

One poster has just said that Scott ish Power , one of the giants , cannot total the two rates.

No, they didn't, the poster said they won't total the two rates. You also ignored the point the same poster made that Iresa will total the two rates, despite being one of the small suppliers you said cannot.

House_Martin wrote: »

Eco 7 is ideal for all electric properties and of course night storage heaters..but that is it.
...
Eco 7 meters in properties with GCH are out of place and should not be there and in many properties they should never have been installed in the first place

You are simply wrong on this. As a 20+ year experienced meter reader you should also understand why you are wrong.

House_Martin wrote: »

All suppliers can see the usage of someone on Eco 7 and they know to the penny when a user is overpaying against a single rate tariff.

Interesting - you say suppliers cannot add two figures together to produce a single-rate bill, yet they can calculate a penny-accurate comparison? How can they do the comparison if they cannot add the two figures together to work out the equivalent standard-rate bill?

House_Martin wrote: »

What YOU need to get into your head Eachpenny is that MOST people do not understand gas and electric bills.They do not know what a KWH is, they do not understand their bills...

Again, you know nothing about me and what is in my head, so you cannot say what I need to get into it. I've known those facts for 30+ years. It is an indictment of the UK education system, not a justification for removal of all E7 meters. Unfortunately Ofgem's priority is to tailor the UK energy market to suit people unwilling to educate themselves and save money, and in consequence other people have to pay higher costs.

House_Martin wrote: »

In my job I have a position to see what you posters cannot envisage

Now that does sound interesting, do you mean a bit like "Confessions of a Window Cleaner"?

So when you call at somone's house and see they have an E7 meter and GCH do you tell them to get rid of the meter, or are you just part of this apparent conspiracy to keep on making people pay more than they should for their electricity to keep the power stations busy?

ChaunceyGardiner

EachPenny wrote: »

Unfortunately Ofgem's priority is to tailor the UK energy market to suit people unwilling to educate themselves and save money, and in consequence other people have to pay higher costs.

Not this again. When a Conservative Prime Minister proclaims that the market is not working for many consumers, for whatever reason, you know there is a serious problem.

System

Eachpenny, posters who dissect each line and then give their little halfpennyworth for paragraph after paragraph are the most annoying and irritating..Have nt you got anything better to do with your time.I won t be wading my way through that lot so don t waste your time on me...I said "don`t be stupid " which is not "calling " you stupid.Do me a big favour mate and butt out of replying to my posts please.You are getting a little bit tedious and you don t know what you are talking about.

EachPenny

No 'mate', the most "annoying and irritating" posters are those who claim professional expertise on a subject, then talk a load of b0ll0x.

First time ever I have had the pleasure of chatting to someone who is pretending to be a meter reader

System

EachPenny wrote: »

No 'mate', the most "annoying and irritating" posters are those who claim professional expertise on a subject, then talk a load of b0ll0x.

First time ever I have had the pleasure of chatting to someone who is pretending to be a meter reader

ok, apologies for calling you stupid, but can you not accept what I say is the truth that Eco 7 meters are fitted to houses built as new with gas central heating. Worksop is awash throughout the town with Eco 7 meters in properties with GCH as are many other Nottinghamshire towns. Towns close to the big power stations in the North seem to be singled out for these out of place meters. The reasons why they installed them was to encourage night rate usage as electricity cannot be stored and they need to keep running 24 hrs.
Its nothing to do with education why people cannot make head or tail of utility bills.Ann Robinson, on her program on BBC Watchdog many years ago used the winner of that years Mastermind to try and understand the electric bill..he failed ! . They were using block tariff metering in those days which really did confuse virtually everyone. Last week I helped two of my friends in their utility bills after big price rises .One has a science degree and works at Sheffield Uni, the other is a senior nurse with a nursing degree.They are both lost when dealing with kwhs and all that guff ! I ve seen it all my working life with all manner of well educated people.. They do not understand the billing systems properly..Meter readers in general don t neither , most of my colleagues hav ent the faintest idea how to read many Eco 7 meters correctly , hence that is why reversed rate billing is so common.. They can t tell day from night. One reason why I m so keen on smart metering.
Personally I don t think OFGEM , or anyone for that matter, have any data on just how many Eco 7 meters have been installed in the UK. .We can t trust suppliers like Scottish Power or Npower to be truthful and steer users away from eco 7 billing on to single rate because they are making a lot of money overcharging

EachPenny

Ok, apology accepted. Truce.

I'm quite happy to accept that new homes with GCH are fitted with E7 meters, I've never denied it, and furthermore I'd say it was a great idea - all homes should be fitted with an E7 (more specifically dual-rate) meter as standard.

That way consumers would be able to see how much energy they use peak vs off-peak. Then make a decision whether it makes sense for them to be on an E7 tariff.

What you and I are disagreeing on is the use of storage heaters being necessary for an E7 meter to be appropriate. I don't have storage heaters, neither did my parents, but we both save money on E7 vs standard tariff and that doesn't involve always running dishwashers/washing machines at night.

If you are telling people who have GCH and no storage heaters that their E7 meter is wrong for them then you may be misinforming them.

They will be on the wrong tariff if their split of day/night usage doesn't reach the break-even point, but they have other options including changing supplier, or some minor lifestyle adjustments, which could make E7 the cheapest overall tariff. The first thing for them to do is check their E7 times match the timers on any appliances they do run at night - it is obvious on this forum that people have high consumption appliances like immersion heaters running in peak hours either because the appliance timer is wrong or they have made incorrect assumptions about off-peak times.

All Ofgem need to do is demand that suppliers print on bills the comparison between E7 charges and standard charges for that particular bill - if the consumer ignores that, like many ignore the advice that switching can cut bills then what more can be done to help them?

The education system has to take a lot of the blame. Having a degree means nothing when it comes to understanding basic maths and calculations. Kids come out of school now with a lot of interesting information, but very few lifeskills - how many school leavers know how to change a fuse in a plug for example? Let alone wire a plug onto a flex. But it is ok, they can look it up on the internet. And that is the problem - unless you know to look something up on the internet then why will you? So the modern young adult goes to switch on the kettle, it doesn't work, they go out and buy a new one. Grandad meanwhile would have whipped the plug open and got a new fuse in to see if that was the problem. I'm not saying improved education is the only thing required, but if people aren't able to apply the basic things they learn in school (like science and maths) to real-world situations then we have a big problem in this country.

I'm more skeptical than you about smart meters, but lets not get into that. One of the reasons behind the deployment of smart meters is energy policy needs them. Not so consumers can look at the pretty IHD, but so the energy companies can implement greater levels of demand management than the relatively benign E7.

It has got to happen. The country will never build enough generating capacity to meet future demand - a substantial and entirely new part of which will be charging electric vehicles. The situation today with people coming home from work and sticking the dinner on is one thing, but imagine the load on the grid if everyone comes home from work, sticks their car on charge, then sticks the dinner on. Early EV's recharged on 13a plugs. It was recognised that to be practical, EV's need to be fully recharged in under an hour or so - rapid charging was seen as the future.

Do the maths on how much electricity you need to supply to give a 2 ton car sufficient charge for say a 200 mile endurance, then push that through the wires in an hour. Multiply by the number of cars per household, the number of households per street, the number of streets per distribution zone, the number of distribution zones per region, and the number of regions in the UK. Any idea what the voltage drop on the grid would be with even a tiny fraction of that load coming on? It is only going to work with a 'smart' electricity supply that rations consumers at times of peak demand. Your electricity meter is going to tell you when you are allowed to charge your car, and quite probably tell your fridge and freezer when they are allowed to run as well. Demand-led pricing is also going to be part of the mix.

If consumers cannot work out whether they are paying more or less than they should on an E7 tariff, then how will they get on with a far more complicated system of demand management which is not many years away from becoming reality?

So educating people about a simple two-rate demand-based tariff and how they personally could use it to save money should be a priority for Government, Ofgem, Suppliers, Supplier's staff, everybody.

System

Here is another scenario. In these towns with enforced Eco 7 meters in place there are areas where I d guess at 70% prepayment meters..the rougher areas shall we say. I would wince when I went into one of these single parent families houses and pressed the blue button to get a prepay reading and see the tariff in place at over 20p/kwh for the day rate ( especially Spark Energy or Ecotricity rates ) when my own tariff was less than 8 p/kwh for single rate. Their night rate use was minimal..after all they are going to bed when the cheap rate comes on. They would have had GCH of course.They also would be trapped onto prepays with debts owing.Up to last April Scottish Power wanted over £200 per meter to even rid them of prepays meters for a switch to credit meters. Those poor young women ( mostly ) with kids faced absolutely scandalous electric bills because of the system they found themselves in.
I do hope the Torys do get to grips with how the system has failed these people who were paying 150% more than me for their electricity. Something has to be done if only the smart alecs ( like us lot on here ) are the winners.. Its time for a ban on all cheap fixed yearly rates and make everyone stay on standard variable..and of course, get the suppliers sparkies round to wire the meters up properly for those whose night rate consumption proves it is not needed.
A smart grid will make the whole caboodle much cheaper to run, lower prices...Less call centres, billing systems will be exact and fully automated with no problems, electricity thieving down to a minimum instead of what it is now..rife !! Switching should be seamless.. I would like to see lower overall prices and less switching.Every time someone switches its £70 paid to the comp sites. That is money wasted to be repaid in higher prices..Enough money is thrown away in wind turbines where they are paid for the turbines having a downtime day !
There is no evidence of Time of Use charging coming into force in the UK .Difficult to do when 15% to 20% ( thats a guess ) are refusing smart meters anyway. Presumably if I wanted I could enforce my right to have the supplier remove my smart meters if I paid the costs

EachPenny

House_Martin wrote: »

There is no evidence of Time of Use charging coming into force in the UK .Difficult to do when 15% to 20% ( thats a guess ) are refusing smart meters anyway. Presumably if I wanted I could enforce my right to have the supplier remove my smart meters if I paid the costs

It is already with us in the form of E7, E10 and various legacy tariffs on the domestic side. On the commercial/industrial side it is also spreading.

The evidence is being hidden in plain sight. Mass time of use charging only works if you have a smart energy system, and that needs smart meters. In typical government fashion, consumers are buying smart meters on the basis they will personally save lots of money. The Government actually wants them for another purpose, but if it tells people too much about that then people won't want a smart meter, and "hey guys, you have a choice about it anyway". Smart meters will not remain optional for ever. Certification of legacy meters will expire and certification facilities will be closed. Then, as much as you want one, you will not be able to get a non-smart meter.

If you think this is all conspiracy theory then take a look at this:
https://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201617/cmselect/cmsctech/161/16107.htm

A few quotes:

62.DECC’s report suggests that the significance of the demand side response can be expected to grow with electrification of heating and transport, and predicts that in the future “consumers could choose to set up smart appliances (e.g. heat pumps, dishwashers and washing machines) to respond automatically to price signals from smart meters and use energy when it is cheapest”. It also suggests that electric vehicles could automatically charge in this way when demand is low, and function as a means of storing electricity for managing times of peak demand.

63.BEAMA told us that the electrification of transport will “create challenges for network management”, given that “future EV [Electric Vehicle] fleets could add c.28GW peak demand in 2050 if no charging management solutions are in place”. BEAMA points to smart meters as a way of meeting the challenges of increased pressures on grid infrastructure, explaining that they would enable a “smart charging system”

67.It is unclear whether the Government’s primary aim of the smart meter rollout is the establishment of a smart energy system (and the realisation of the corresponding benefits of this for efficient energy generation, both now and in the future), or to save individuals money on their energy bills.

That last one, a conclusion by a Commons Select Committee, is political code for "liar, liar, pants on fire"