Can a Smart Meter Increase Bills

Danny30

Hi, I am about to get a smart meter installed however have read a few places online where people are claiming that their bills went up after installing their meters. I just wondered if there is any truth to that, or would it run exactly like my current meter? Many thanks

MaryNB

Danny30 said:

Hi, I am about to get a smart meter installed however have read a few places online where people are claiming that their bills went up after installing their meters. I just wondered if there is any truth to that, or would it run exactly like my current meter? Many thanks

My first presumption would be that perhaps those people weren't giving regular meter readings. The only thing that would cost you extra is the display unit if you chose to plug it in but that'll just be pennies a year. 

The only change is that it gives the energy supplier meter readings more frequently. In the future we may be moving to day/night/peak charging like they they have in Ireland. A smarter version of an economy 7 tariff. 

I like data and being able to see my day to day consumption has helped me reduce my usage so it had a positive impact on my bills. 

[Deleted User]

wittynamegoeshere said:

The meter itself does inevitably use a tiny amount of power, as ALL electric meters have always done.  But this power is taken from the supplier's side, before it flows through the meter so you will not pay for it.

If you have a smart meter you can also have an OPTIONAL in-home display, which you can put anywhere in your house.  This shows your usage in a nice pretty display, it's genuinely extremely useful.  If you don't want to use it, just unplug it.  Like any other electronic gadget, this uses a TINY amount of power, which will come from your metered supply.  Any in-home display probably uses far less energy than the typical conspiracy theorist uses to write a load of twaddle all over the internet.

The meter is powered from the Grid side of the meter: that is, there is no cost to the consumer. The IHD runs off metered electricity.

Swipe

My old mechanical meter was reading slightly slower than my smart meter so my usage did go up by a couple of units a day in winter when I use 70 odd units overnight on economy 7.

booshya

Danny30 said:

Hi, I am about to get a smart meter installed however have read a few places online where people are claiming that their bills went up after installing their meters. I just wondered if there is any truth to that, or would it run exactly like my current meter? Many thanks

Oh. I'd expect them to at least double as you try to get that silly IHD to register as high as possible.

And consider how much energy that silly IHD consumes itself!

That's presumably why so may people though it in a drawer some where and forget about it.


Tell us. Why have you decided to get a smart meter installed???

Danny30

Thank you for the replies. I am getting the meter to keep more of an eye on my usage with the spiralling energy costs. I think maybe some of the older mechanical meters ran slower so that may be where people noticed a difference. I have a 12 year old digital meter so hoping won't be any such issues.

Petriix

I suspect that my old mechanical meter was slightly under reporting, but my new smart meter doesn't seem to be doing anything wildly outside expectations; it still reads about 5-10% under what the Myenergi app reports from the CT clamps which monitor the solar and grid feeds.

The people who will notice the biggest difference will be those with solar who had backwards running meters. for everyone else it will make negligible difference.

Curiousgirl1

The only people who complained were the ones who’s old meters were either faulty or if E7 the reads were transposed the energy company were unaware until the smart meter was installed. 

meinnit

Danny30 said:

Hi, I am about to get a smart meter installed however have read a few places online where people are claiming that their bills went up after installing their meters. I just wondered if there is any truth to that, or would it run exactly like my current meter? Many thanks

Short answer: no

Swipe

wittynamegoeshere said:

Swipe said:

My old mechanical meter was reading slightly slower than my smart meter so my usage did go up by a couple of units a day in winter when I use 70 odd units overnight on economy 7.

2 units in 70 is a tiny difference.  Storage heaters will vary by more than this amount normally anyway, depending on how cold they were to start with, and normal variation in thermostat performance.  You can't accurately conclude that the old meter was running slower from this sort of result.

I calculated the increase using the day rate. I'd taken daily readings in a spreadsheet for quite a while and my daily rate was very consistent and saw the daily rate increase from the day the meter was installed. Old mechanical meters are inaccurate when there is a very low load.

brianposter

meinnit said:

Short answer: no

I would not be quite so definite.

We won a court case against our electricity supplier in Spain on the basis that our smart meter software was faulty and had been adding extra consumption to our readings.

We have never come across anyone else with the same problem, but as the supplier refused to discuss the meter readings we do not know if this analysis was correct. However if the analysis was correct it would be very surprising if there were no other meters with the same fault.