Gas - Southern Electric

Steve_xx

Terrylw1 wrote: »

You need to be very careful about your billing. If the metering company submit a reading to the Supplier causing a rollover as Cardew has advised, it will cause a massive jump in your bill.

If it exceeds a certain threshold (likely if you are a domestic customer) then they will be sent a High AQ from Elexon who will expect them to clear the issue inside 30 days. Whilst it's a licence commitment that they clear the High AQ, they can take longer if needed.

So, you may get lucky and have a specialist clearing the High AQ side which will speed it up.

It's going to come down to you being careful though.

I'm not familiar with the "High AQ" acronym you use?

Whatever happens I'm sure it will be rectified. This is a new gas supply with a new meter. It probably read 00000, but when the fitters had installed the gas appliances on Friday we looked and noted it reading 99999. Of course, had it been operating properly, then it would have been reading 00001 at that point. We thought it had been set at 99999 and that it would click oer and start at zero. It was only over the weekend that we noted it drifting backwards.

You would not believe the palava with the installation of this meter. It was installed initially on 12 November, and then removed 20 minutes later by the guy who had fitted it! He said something about the job missing from his pc or something. Another guy came the following day and put it back again. Since then there have been at least 3 cards left by meter fitters, saying they are coming to fit it, when of course it had already been fitted!!

No wonder fuel is so expensive with these buffoons running the show.

Terrylw1

They do sound a bit confused! Oh well, as long as they don't cost you anything, let em mess themselves about.

I understand now, I thought it had started at 99999. There is still a very good chance that they will put a meter change though and charge you from 00000 to say 99993 if it came out on that.

So, best to monitor your bill.

The High AQ stuff is just what the Supplier is getting billed by the Distributor. So, a high one gets reported to them monthly as it causes a spike to the industry which the monitoring bodies make them fix. I just meant that if that happens, there will be extra pressure on them from a regulator to sort it so you wouldn't be alone.

Sounds like a manufacturer fault so all they would need to do is come out to verify it as running backwards, change it and tell your Supplier. Suggest you take the readings when they remove it though so you know what to expect for billing.

Good luck

Steve_xx

Yes I'll be sure to note the reading when and if it is removed. I wont be paying for anymore than is actually used. They can cough up some compensation for the hassle too. They've already agreed to credit the account with £25 because of the meter fitting debacle.

I'm wondering if a meter fitter could remove it and alter the direction and then refit it?

Cardew

Steve_xx wrote: »

I'm wondering if a meter fitter could remove it and alter the direction and then refit it?

With the old meters it was possible to run them 'backwards'. People used to reverse them for a few weeks each quarter and there were people taken to court for tampering.

I thought that the new meters were designed to stop that happening.

Terrylw1

Steve_XX

It is illegal for anyone to break the seals on a meter except the manufacturer for recertification or diagnostics or Ofgem's independant meter examiner who's word is final in court on any meter accuracy cases.

A Supplier or Metering company is not allowed by law. This prevents them winding the meters back as Cardew pointed out.

There is absolutrly nothing in it for an engineer to even bother anyway since he/she doesn't see a penny of it anyway. Coin meters years ago were prime targets as the engineer could work out how far to wind them back and steal some coins.

Any meters found with broken seals are reported after a visit and legal action can be taken against the householder.

stimpo

Terrylw1 wrote: »

Any meters found with broken seals are reported after a visit and legal action can be taken against the householder.

The fuse on the meter will be pulled pretty much straight away. If further tampering takes place the supplier will dif up the street outside your house and disconnect there. If you thought Warrant charges were excessive you havent seen anything!

Terrylw1

stimpo wrote: »

The fuse on the meter will be pulled pretty much straight away. If further tampering takes place the supplier will dif up the street outside your house and disconnect there. If you thought Warrant charges were excessive you havent seen anything!

Yeah, if they suspect customer tampering. I've seen lots of meters with broken seals and nothing gets done with them as the tampering party will be difficult to prove. If the customer is paying and the usage pattern seems reasonable they will often just replace the seals.

If the Distributor spots a pattern of abuilder doing it, they tend to put the word out about them. Seen one like that before.

Distributors have been really lax over the years and just not bothered with this stuff even just threatening builders when they intentionally slice cables to force them to disconnect quicker on building sites. It seems now though that they are waking up and now taking legal action.

Yes, in the case of damage to equipment the costs are very high. When they slice cables intentionally the LDNO's can slap thousands on them for the cables alone. About time to...got a bit sick of builders doing this to me and then complaining about it!!!