Switching Energy Supplier With a Smart Meter On Prepayment

martin_hop

Hi,

Looking for some advise.  Our house has always been on a prepayment meter for electric (no debt owed etc.) We have a smart meter installed and from what i have read our energy supplier SSE will be able to remotely switch our meter to a credit meter (subject to credit checks etc.)

My question is if thats the case can i switch to another supplier with the smart meter as it currently is (set to prepaid) and take out a credit tariff or will i need SSE to remotely switch us from a prepaid to credit first?

nottsphil

I can't advise you on this but I suspect whoever can will need to know if it's smets2 or first generation before giving their advice.

MWT

The answer does depend on which type of meter you have.

If it is SMETS2 then as long as your new supplier is properly set up to access the meter via the DCC then they will be able to switch it to credit mode.

So you would need to avoid any of the very small suppliers that are not very far into the process of rolling out SMETS2 meters and using the DCC.

If it is SMETS1 I would advice you to have it switched to credit mode by SSE first.

nottsphil

MWT said:

If it is SMETS1 I would advice you to have it switched to credit mode by SSE first.

That made me smile, even though I am unsure if the target was me or the OP!

martin_hop

MWT said:

The answer does depend on which type of meter you have.

If it is SMETS2 then as long as your new supplier is properly set up to access the meter via the DCC then they will be able to switch it to credit mode.

So you would need to avoid any of the very small suppliers that are not very far into the process of rolling out SMETS2 meters and using the DCC.

If it is SMETS1 I would advice you to have it switched to credit mode by SSE first.

I've just been researching this online and the type of meter we have installed was SMETS1 originally put in 2018 but apparently the firmware was updated to make it's SMETS2 (not sure if thats the case though and when).  The meter we have installed is a Aclara SGM1311 and serial number starts 18M if that means anything to anyone.

MWT

The SMETS1 meters are in the process of being adopted into the DCC, but for simplicity I'd still suggest you have SSE switch it to credit mode before you switch away from them.

nottsphil

MWT said:

The SMETS1 meters are in the process of being adopted into the DCC, but for simplicity I'd still suggest you have SSE switch it to credit mode before you switch away from them.

Unless you're going to Utilita maybe, because they actually prefer SMETS1 meters.

MWT

nottsphil said:

MWT said:

The SMETS1 meters are in the process of being adopted into the DCC, but for simplicity I'd still suggest you have SSE switch it to credit mode before you switch away from them.

Unless you're going to Utilita maybe, because they actually prefer SMETS1 meters.

They certainly prefer the ones they install, and they also prefer pre-pay, so not an obvious good choice of destination to get away from pre-pay and unless you know they can handle your particular brand of SMETS1 ...

nottsphil

MWT said:

nottsphil said:

MWT said:

The SMETS1 meters are in the process of being adopted into the DCC, but for simplicity I'd still suggest you have SSE switch it to credit mode before you switch away from them.

Unless you're going to Utilita maybe, because they actually prefer SMETS1 meters.

They certainly prefer the ones they install, and they also prefer pre-pay, so not an obvious good choice of destination to get away from pre-pay and unless you know they can handle your particular brand of SMETS1 ...

Indeed,  although if the OP is a very low user then their  tariffs would be attractive. They also offer credit on all but one of their tariffs, and these can to be slightly favourable so I don't see why they would do this if they prefer prepayment to direct debit.
If the OP fails the SSE credit check then they could try building a better record using Utilita. 

martin_hop

nottsphil said:

MWT said:

nottsphil said:

MWT said:

The SMETS1 meters are in the process of being adopted into the DCC, but for simplicity I'd still suggest you have SSE switch it to credit mode before you switch away from them.

Unless you're going to Utilita maybe, because they actually prefer SMETS1 meters.

They certainly prefer the ones they install, and they also prefer pre-pay, so not an obvious good choice of destination to get away from pre-pay and unless you know they can handle your particular brand of SMETS1 ...

Indeed,  although if the OP is a very low user then their  tariffs would be attractive. They also offer credit on all but one of their tariffs, and these can to be slightly favourable so I don't see why they would do this if they prefer prepayment to direct debit.
If the OP fails the SSE credit check then they could try building a better record using Utilita. 

Thanks for the replies.  Don't think credit check will be an issue only on prepay as hasn't been changed since the old days when you had to put 50p in the meters (obviously the meters been changed).  

We have a koi pond and are quite heavy users we use on average 750kw per month so thinking changing to monthly credit will give me a better choice of tariffs.  Think i will contact SSE and try to get them to switch me across first.