High gas bill

Gerry1

TL;DR -  Sarah, it seems that you do have a smart meter, but it's probably gone dumb.  You've probably sent gas kWh readings instead of cubic metres, so your usage will be 11.1 times the correct value, leading to massive bills.  Full reasoning given below.

So that we can check, please can you post the original bill again.  You only need to redact the Meter Point Reference Number (MPRN) and the Meter Serial Number to protect your personal data.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

sarahfaith399 said:

I'm really sorry I don't understand.
We don't have a smart meter.

It seems you do - AFAIK a normal gas meter can't display in kWh and wouldn't display show a HAN (Home Area Network) icon.

Robin9 said:

Google is your friend 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R46UuQflhiM

What an utterly absurd meter that is !

• At 37 seconds it shows 01465  You pick up your pen and paper and put your specs on.
  

• At 40 seconds you write down the reading, 016442.49  You go online and send a reading of 16442.  (Just as well you spotted the tiny decimal point; many people would miss it.)

• In those three seconds, the meter flipped from displaying cubic metres to kiloWatt hours.  But the energy company will be expecting your reading to be in cubic metres, so it will convert it again, multiplying it by about 11.14 so you'll be massively overcharged, getting a bill that's £4736.41 too high in the video example !

I wonder why the Youtube meter shows a 'Gas flame' icon ?  Does this mean that a gas smart meter can also display readings from the electricity smart meter?  This might be useful for meter readers because gas meters are often outside and can be seen at all times, whereas the electricity meter usually requires entry to the property.  But highly confusing for the customer !

Therefore, my guess is that Sarah's red paper readings are as follows:-

   05681.6387 is the Gas reading at 10:10 in cubic metres

   063751.114 is the Gas reading at 10:10 in kWh (but was erroneously recorded as 06371.114)

   013086.10 is the Electricity reading at 10:10 in kW

   05682.2704 is the Gas reading at 13:34 in cubic metres

   063758.222 is the Gas reading at 13:34 in kWh

   013093.24 is the Electricity reading at 13:34 in kWh

The only red paper gas readings that should be sent to SSE are 05681 or 05782.  Any other figures will generate massive bills.  It seems that Sarah may have sent gas kWh readings instead of cubic metres, so the usage will be 11.14 times the correct value.

Sarah, please can you post the original bill again.  You only need to redact the Meter Point Reference Number (MPRN) and the Meter Serial Number.

The good news is that the bills will sort themselves out after you have sent the supplier the correct readings, or a meter reader has called.

matelodave

What you've got is a smart meter although it probably isn't presently working in a smart mode - the letters HAN refer to the Home Area Network which allow it to communicate withe the leccy meter and probably the extra box that you've got is to facilitate that networl and communicate back to the original supplier.

It does appear that you've been sending random figures back to your supplier - probably some in M3 and some in kwh (even your first post with the pink paper shows randomness between m3 and kwh) - you must only use m3 for gas and kwh for leccy. The energy supply will do the m3 to kwh conversion on the bill.

Robin9

The supplier will take this as 63783 and as your last figure was about 6000 a consumption of 57783 m3 which is 635000 kWh and a bill of £16,000 

sarahfaith399

Oh my days. I'm going to cry. I'll post the original bill and the video of the meter 

sarahfaith399

The original bill

sarahfaith399

OK so this is the m3 reading. 

[Deleted User]

Hi,

good, so 05684 against an estimated 6277, there's the problem.

Talldave

frugalmacdugal said:

Hi,

good, so 05684 against an estimated 6277, there's the problem.

Which is what I said pages ago!! The gas bill should be about £73 when you've sorted out this mess!
And to sort out the confusion of gas or electricity readings, can you read the electricity meter directly?

Robin9

sarahfaith399 said:

OK so this is the m3 reading. 

Good that's what we want to see - don't cry you are not the first to get these meters wrong.  They are very unfriendly - fine when in Smart mode but dreadful to manually read.

sarahfaith399

I will have a look at the electricity one tomorrow. Thank you all so so so much xx