Economy 7 GMT / BST clock change

coffeehound

Does your Economy 7 timing change to compensate for the move to British Summer Time, so that the off-peak rate time-of-day is always the same?

Having recently advised a poster that it always remains on GMT I've since seen a couple of sources saying some areas do compensate for the clocks changing.

Since you cannot trust the energy provider for this sort of info (my last one suggested times that were a) wrong, and b) didn't add up to 7), it would be useful to know if it still happens and in which region(s).

House_Martin

No, it remains the same . They stay in GMT so the off peak times drop an hour, so if your time rswitch is correct the 7.30 am end of the cheap 7 hours end will go to 8.30 am. This is the same with radio teleswitch and meters with built in timers.
I m not sure if Eco 7 smart meters can adapt to BST. Currently I only know of Secure Liberty smart meters who can use Eco 7 timings.
you certainly can t trust a supplier to have the faintest idea about how your Eco 7 timer switch is set up.
The suppliers sit back in their offices and in the main have nt the faintest idea how the Eco 7 timer switches are doing and most meter readers do not understand them and take any notice of them.
Scottish Power are the only supplier who ask us to examine the timings.
Most of the old analogue ones are miles out and the cheap 7 hours could be anywhere in the 24 hrs. All they know is the published times for the area s, and thats itt

coffeehound

That's interesting info, HM. So when the energy market was opened up to competition, the suppliers mostly lost sight of the timings of their customers. Presumably smart meters are seen as a way of eventually getting that back under central control.

Anyway, no one's come back to say otherwise so it looks that as you say most/all meter timings stay on GMT.

.

PeterPerfect13

Further to the comments about clock changing times, I have an original 1980s Economy 7 meter and Radio Teleswitch and I can confirm that my clock does change with BST and GMT.



I have a relative who in the 80s used to work in the BT department involved in the Teleswitch agreement with the BBC. The clock timings and any changes are made via the BBC Radio 4 transmitter.

PeterPerfect13

Further to my earlier post, I perhaps should mention that the teleswitch can be a bit flaky in terms of the timings. My E7 night rate is from 01:00 to 08:00 and this has worked fine in the 2 years I have lived here, changing more or less on the GMT/BST changeover days. However, in June this year I had an electricity failure that lasted for a fraction of a second and this caused the teleswitch to throw a wobbly and the night rate changed to 09:22 to 16:22 (weird I know).


Then in September the local power company had a planned outage for maintenance and I hoped that when the power was switched back on it would reset the clock. It did - to 11:22 to 18:22 which is where it currently sits.


The clocks went back last night and I'm hoping that the teleswitch signal finally corrects the error.

[Deleted User]

coffeehound wrote: »

That's interesting info, HM. So when the energy market was opened up to competition, the suppliers mostly lost sight of the timings of their customers. Presumably smart meters are seen as a way of eventually getting that back under central control.

Anyway, no one's come back to say otherwise so it looks that as you say most/all meter timings stay on GMT.

.

Suppliers have never had control of timer switches. The old 24 hr circular timers are usually so far off the official night rate time, (12.30 to 7.30 in my area ). that the cheap rate can be coming on at anytime in the 24 hrs.
I ve had 20 years meter reading having a look at them and a laugh when I see night rate set to come on at say, 2 pm in the afternoon and off at 9 pm. Not good when the occupiers are waiting for what they think is cheap rate to do their showers/washing/drying etc.

Suppliers are not very interested in correcting this and only Scottish Power have shown an interest in checking them.They ask us to see if they are within 2 hrs of the published times. BG and the others who we work for could nt give a monkeys about them.
I think you must have a rogue radio teleswitch if its switching the 7 hrs around.
Hopefully smart eco 7 can change to BST or GMT. I have nt seen any in operation to check as of yet. I don t know why they can t do smart Eco 7, it would stop the huge numbers of transposed day/night readings