Providing opening meter readings to E.on - what units to use?

SidewaysToTheSun

Hi all,

I'm in the process of switching from Octopus to E.on, and have a smart meter that was fitted by the previous owners of this flat while they were with Ovo Energy. E.on are asking for meter readings, but don't say what units they're looking for. I'm assuming they need kWh for electricity, which is fine because that's what the smart meter gives too, but the smart meter also shows kWh for gas, and Octopus always used cubic metres on our bills. Do I need to give E.on gas meter readings in cubic metres too? I can't find anywhere on E.on's website showing what units they use.

I'm hoping someone here can shed some light on this for me. Thanks in advance!

Gerry1

Give the readings from the meters on the wall, not the portable toy.  kWh for electricity, cubic metres for gas.  E.On will convert the volume to kWh using the appropriate calorific value.

SidewaysToTheSun

Gerry1 said:

Give the readings from the meters on the wall, not the portable toy.  kWh for electricity, cubic metres for gas.

The gas meter on the wall is very difficult to get to...if it definitely needs to be cubic metres for gas, can I convert it from kWh?

Robin9

Use the readings from the Smart Meter itself not the In House Display.
The Electric is already in Kwh  (watch out for the decimal point)
The Gas is in M3 - just use the reading on the meter -  do NOT attempt to convert to Kwh !

If you meter has a mini keypad you will need to press 9 to get the reading

SidewaysToTheSun

Ok, thanks both - I'm going to need to enlist my husband's help and see if we can work out how to get to the gas meter. For the electricity meter reading, I already submitted the one from the in home display - is that likely to be wrong too??

Gerry1

SidewaysToTheSun said:

Gerry1 said:

Give the readings from the meters on the wall, not the portable toy.  kWh for electricity, cubic metres for gas.

The gas meter on the wall is very difficult to get to...if it definitely needs to be cubic metres for gas, can I convert it from kWh?

Don't even think of back converting.  The toy could have all sorts of old duff information, e.g. it won't know the correct calorific value.

matelodave

SidewaysToTheSun said:

Ok, thanks both - I'm going to need to enlist my husband's help and see if we can work out how to get to the gas meter. For the electricity meter reading, I already submitted the one from the in home display - is that likely to be wrong too??

If you are confident that what the IHD tells you is exactly the same as the the actual electricity meter then you should be OK but you should make sure by checking as they don't always so don't trust it..

As the others have said, do not try reading the gas meter with the IHD, any conversions, prices or other info is likely to be wrong or out of date (not always but sometimes) so the only definitive readings for both gas or leccy is what is shown on the meter not the IHD. 

MWT

All of that is true, but some if not all IHD can also display the gas meter reading in m3 so it is worth checking that if only as a sanity check that you've got the right reading from the meter itself, as they are not always easy to read either......

SnowTiger

Gerry1 said:

SidewaysToTheSun said:

Gerry1 said:

Give the readings from the meters on the wall, not the portable toy.  kWh for electricity, cubic metres for gas.

The gas meter on the wall is very difficult to get to...if it definitely needs to be cubic metres for gas, can I convert it from kWh?

Don't even think of back converting.  The toy could have all sorts of old duff information, e.g. it won't know the correct calorific value.

Yep, definitely don't rely on the in-home display unit.

Mine does display gas use in units and the figure matches the reading from the meter.

My unit also displays gas use in kWh every day, which seems to exaggerate quite considerably how much energy we use.

According to the in-home unit we've used 313.61kWh of gas since 1st May.  According to the meter we've used 19 units of gas during the same period. 19 units of gas is about 210kWh.  The unit seems to overestimate gas use by about 50%.

MWT

The smart meters measure gas consumption in m3, the kWh number is just calculated using an approximation for the calorific value.

It will not be accurate in kWh but it shouldn't be that far out so something is wrong with the way it has been set up.

It will not affect billing as that is always based on opening and closing period meter readings in m3.

You should be able to depend on the IHD for m3 accuracy, but always check against the meter and never regard the kWh reading for gas as accurate.