Meter and Tariff Help!

marliechiller

Was hoping if someone could shed some light on my situation…

I have lived in a 1 bedroom fully electric flat with my partner since last July. Our energy is provided by utility warehouse on an off-peak tariff. Essentially, this means that between the times of 02:00-05:00, 13:00-16:00 and 20:00-22:00 the electricity is on a rate of £0.07/kWh with the rest of the day at £0.22/kWh.

Whilst our energy rating on the flat is poorly ranked at a D grade, during the winter we were getting energy bills of nearly £300p/m (which was more than someone that I know pays for a 5 bed with a pool!). So I reduced our energy usage to be utilised even less we currently were using in our cheaper energy windows (mainly in the form of reducing central heating and heating the boiler for showers to the absolute bare minimum - we got down to 12 degrees in our house for a sustained 2 week period in Jan!). Even now, in summer our energy usage is still over £150p/m which seems really high given how small the flat is.

I decided enough was enough and to try and get a better idea of what was going on and booked a smart meter installation with the idea of shedding light on what time of day was causing the price increase and if any appliances were directly responsible to see if I could limit the cost further.

Today, I had the smart meter installed to try and investigate and the engineer informed me that my meter was on a dual rate that essentially only flipped to the night tariff at 23:00-05:00 i.e it has no concept of an off-peak tariff built in.

This means for over a year any precious heating, cooking, showers etc that I did within what I thought would be £0.07kW/h window, fell outside of the night rate defined by the meter. Instead the day rate would be ticking up. In essence, our off-peak tariff was only able to be utilised at night rather than the advertised day time hours due to the meter.

The engineer said that since the new meter was installed, I would now be placed on a single Tariff and would need to renegotiate pricing. My question here is really: am I responsible for the fact that the Tariff that was advertised was not actually compatible with my meter or does that fall on utility warehouse?

Thanks for any input in advance!

Gerry1

Stop thinking in £ and start thinking in kWh consumption obtained by accurate (i.e. not estimated) meter readings. What was the usage on your old tariff?

Secondly, it seems to have been a dreadfully expensive tariff, especially if you are not using storage heaters. When you have found your usage figures, shop around and see whether anything else would be cheaper.

You could ask for the old meter to be reinstated, or for your smart meter to emulate the tariff and switching times. Ultimately you can go to the Energy Ombudsman if they refuse. You can use a cheap clip-on energy monitor to see your real time consumption, you don't need a smart meter for that.

Is there any way you can get gas? It's far cheaper than electricity, especially at daytime rates, but the capital costs may be a problem especially with rented accommodation. If it is rented, the least worst option may be storage heaters on Economy 7.

Carrot007

Why did you think that was your tarrif. It does not look like anything available to me. There are split tarrif, but they are rare , and not available to new customers as afair none of them are for exactly 8 hourse off peak.



Did you chaneg the tarrif or just assume it from somewhere? TArrif changes generally need a meter chage (or reprogramming for modern ones) so you would know changes occured from a certain day.


Whatever the reasons if I was on electric only I would have watched the meter and assessed when each rate was going up myself as you can never be sure what is occuring. Especially with companies like UW who know nothing about legacy tarrifs.

[Deleted User]

The night rate switch over times are bonkers. I have never heard of such an odd timings as if someone has been messing with timer switch or its faulty
The old Eco 7 is an Eco 8 ! and the smart meter is an Eco 6. !.
Npower and Eon and SSE run complex metering set ups , I was nt aware that Utility Warehouse could support timings like the OP has.
The off peak timings vary slightly by area but are typically 7 straight hours from 12.30 to 7 .30 am GMT which in BST are 1.30 am to 8.30 am if the timerswitch is accurately set using RadioTeleswitch
Many of the old timers are way out especially the 24 hr circular analogue timers.
Sounds to me as if Utility Warehouse have taken over an old complex tariff when they should have not done that.

Carrot007

I have further had a look on my list of legacy tarrifs and the nearest I can come up with is SSC 0935 Split 10 hr E10, which was generally set up as 00-05, 13-16 and 20-22.


But as per Houbara UW should not ever supply it as they cannot support it.

marliechiller

Good advice. Talking to my partner who has spoken to UW recently, it seems that UW could possibly be thinking we have an economy 10 meter which utilises a different rate pattern i believe. We inherited the energy company from the previous tenants so I wonder if that has a role to play. For reference, our current usage in the last 12 months is estimated to be 11313kWh...

Gerry1

marliechiller wrote: »

For reference, our current usage in the last 12 months is estimated to be 11313kWh...

I repeat...

Gerry1 wrote: »

Stop thinking in £ and start thinking in kWh consumption obtained by accurate (i.e. not estimated) meter readings.

Your consumption does not appear to be excessive, but with so little info it's hard to advise.

How are you heating your flat?

• What were your moving-in readings (both rates)?
• Have you tried getting price comparisons?

Sorry to pontificate, but you need to follow a logical analytical routine based on facts rather than imagining there's an energy black hole devouring all your money !

Also check for the obvious problems such as wrong meter (serial number on meter doesn't match that on bill, meter supplying a different flat), high and low meter readings swapped, etc.

BTW, did you get your landlord's permission to change the meter? That might be a problem if it breaches the tenancy agreement: the landlord would be rightfully aggrieved if the loss of a cheap E10 tariff no longer available to new customers makes the flat less attractive to future occupants. You might even lose your tenancy deposit.

Ectophile

Unless it's a private meter - and it sounds like it's not - then the landlord has no say in the matter. The meter belongs to the electricity supplier, and they can change it for another one whenever they see fit.

Gerry1

Ectophile wrote: »

Unless it's a private meter - and it sounds like it's not - then the landlord has no say in the matter. The meter belongs to the electricity supplier, and they can change it for another one whenever they see fit.

Citizens Advice don't share your view !

If you rent your home

"You don’t need your landlord's permission to change your meter.
"Your landlord can make you change it back when you move out. If you refuse to change it back they could keep some of your deposit.
"You’ll have to pay any fee that’s charged by the supplier for changing the meter."