electric meter fire

froggy1

friend of mine had her meter catch fire which made her flat (COUNCIL) uninhabital this happened in july2019, she is now in temp accommodation which is at least two miles away and does not allow her to keep her pets there,she has children who now have a longer trek to school and she has to walk to work 2 miles as she is a carer and on split shifts its 2/3 times a day and walking home alone at 10.30pm she is finding it difficult to cope and gets the run around when she phones to find out when the repairs including the meter will start!!! also the council are threatening court action over unpaid rent on the burnt out flat,but she is paying rent on the temp one(how does that work)
it would be helpful if someone could tell her WHO IS RESPONSIBLE for the repair to the meter as she was not at fault fire service blamed old meter
i am cross on her behalf that no one seems to be doing anything:mad:

Ectophile

The meter is the responsibility of the electricity supplier. The cut out (main fuse) that feeds it belongs to the DNO for the region. Any other electrics are the responsibility of the landlord.

Robin9

Your friend should contact the Council Member for the district where her damaged flat is. Just keep to the facts - name, address and date of the fire.

A burnt out meter does not usually make a flat uninhabitable - perhaps there is more damage.

https://www.gov.uk/find-your-local-councillors

thorganby

Old electric meters do not simply burst into flames without interference, so I suspect that you may not be aware of the full facts and without knowing the full facts, any advice given here is pure speculation.

It is likely that the meter has been tampered with at some time, not necessarily by your friend e.g. a previous tenant.

Nobody here can possibly help and the delay is more likely due to establishing who was actually responsible for the fire damage to the flat for insurance and not who is responsible for replacing the meter, which is a minor issue in comparison to refurbishing the flat and the cost involved.

Swipe

thorganby wrote: »

Old electric meters do not simply burst into flames without interference, so I suspect that you may not be aware of the full facts and without knowing the full facts, any advice given here is pure speculation.

It is likely that the meter has been tampered with at some time, not necessarily by your friend e.g. a previous tenant.

My elderly father's old style electric meter fuse caused the chipboard it was housed upon to start smoldering. He smelled smoke in the adjacent cupboard and a day later the electric went off. Western Power came out and fitted a new fuse so, albeit rare, it can happen without tampering. My father has lived there since 1974 so I can safely say it had never been tampered with.

He was very lucky as that smouldering chipboard could have easily escalated into a full blown fire.

Uxb1

A relative had their cut out fuse go up in flames a couple of decades ago.
This was a large electric only house and I guess the incoming fuse (100amp) was being overloaded.
The whole place really needed a 3 phase supply
These fuses do not blow at 100A - they will take quite a bit more for short time periods...clearly though the the rest of the assembly could not and it caught fire.

I would repeat though like the above post this was the incoming cut out fuse and not a meter itself going up in flames.

Owain_Moneysaver

There are known problems with smart meter installers (particularly in the early days when there was a push to install meters quickly and training was poor) not tightening terminals properly leading to overheating and fire. Whether it's the cutout or the meter is irrelevant really.