I want smart meters (EON Next)

Craig_79

Hello all,
 If i can wind back, we were moved over from npower to EON Next.

We have been in contact with both over the years to try to get away from prepayment meters, the electricity is now a classic credit meter and has been for the best part of a year. With this account i have flawlessly maintained a balance of £230 in credit which leaves about £80 when they take payment. I have since increased the balance to £250 When they take payment, it is about 2 days before i top it back up.

The gas is on a prepay card meter.

I have a LONG string of messages on facebook where i have tried to get them to change both meters over to credit meters wether classic or smart. With each message, the would say that they would get back to me when they have run this by someone else. They never did so i would have to push them for a reply to be told 'we will get back to you'
 This facebook to-ing and fro-ing nonesense has been going on since 22/12/2021. In all this time, i have discovered that for us to have smart meters we have to have the gas meter to be swapped for a classic credit meter so both gas and electric accounts can be merged. Thats fine, i'm happy with that. Its a waste of resources to have meters changed out twice but ok.

We got an appointment sorted!
I took a morning off work, disassembled the utility's cupboard to make easy access to the meters and so make the engineers visit as short as possible. The engineer arrived and shown me his screen to show that his instructions were to fit a smart prepay gas meter.

In disbelief, i contact EON Next again, on the engineers advice i contacted complaints. They said 'sorry, we have taken a business decision to no longer fit classic credit meters' and they told me that was there final word. It took 4 months to be told that.

They also said that i could go to Ofgem but they would be very unlikely to help because its a business decision, obviously if they say we have to fit one, then we will.

Don't be fooled by the websites ceo contact information, it seems to redirect to customer service who send out an automated reply and they don't even bother to follow up.

I can't tell you how many hours i have spent trying to get this done. Very frustrating as it seems we now have to wait on prepay for gas until the smart deadline if i understand it correctly. In the ceo email, i have asked how much will it cost me to pay for the meter swap but as said, no reply.

Sorry for the long post, i just wanted to vent!

MWT

Once you have a smart gas meter fitted, even if it is in pre-pay mode initially, it can be remotely switched to credit mode...

The suppliers have no obligation to fit a 'classic' meter.

wakeupalarm

So do you now have a Gas smart meter?
If so just ring them up and ask to swap your electric meter to a smart meter.
You can request to change from Prepay to credit account, but that will be a business decision based on your credit risk.

Craig_79

MWT said:

Once you have a smart gas meter fitted, even if it is in pre-pay mode initially, it can be remotely switched to credit mode...

The suppliers have no obligation to fit a 'classic' meter.

According to EON Next, we can't have smart anything until both are on the same billing method, either prepay or credit. Agreed, there is no obligation to fit a classic meter, but it was offered and that was what customer services said they would do. Classic is the term they used for old credit meters, the engineer was surprised by what i said and i shown him the facebook chat. He said those meters are hard to get and said engineers refer to them as  classic is jurassic.

Craig_79

wakeupalarm said:

So do you now have a Gas smart meter?
If so just ring them up and ask to swap your electric meter to a smart meter.
You can request to change from Prepay to credit account, but that will be a business decision based on your credit risk.

Electric is classic credit and gas is prepay.

Also, the only way to have any smart meter is to have both billed in the same way, credit or prepay. I'm reluctant to get the electric to prepay considering its a backward step and can't rely on them to switch it to credit considering how difficult they are to deal with now.

MWT

Craig_79 said:

MWT said:

Once you have a smart gas meter fitted, even if it is in pre-pay mode initially, it can be remotely switched to credit mode...

The suppliers have no obligation to fit a 'classic' meter.

According to EON Next, we can't have smart anything until both are on the same billing method, either prepay or credit.

From a technology perspective there is nothing stopping them from installing either or both as 'smart', so whatever limitations they are putting in the way have more to do with their own processes and procedures than it does with the capabilities of the meters.

I appreciate that doesn't help you much, but this might be one of the rare occasions where it would be worth trying to switch elsewhere to get it all sorted...

Craig_79

Thanks for the suggestions.
I've just messaged them and got a reply pretty quick. I asked about going all prepay with both. No can do, they are not switching prepay to smart prepay. I have tried all workarounds that i can think of, they have truly locked me in.

Mstty

Craig_79 said:

Thanks for the suggestions.
I've just messaged them and got a reply pretty quick. I asked about going all prepay with both. No can do, they are not switching prepay to smart prepay. I have tried all workarounds that i can think of, they have truly locked me in.

Time to raise a complaint, then wait to get a deadlock and then raise with Ofgem.

QrizB

Craig_79 said:

wakeupalarm said:

So do you now have a Gas smart meter?

Electric is classic credit and gas is prepay.

So, to be absolutely clear, you had a technician in the house ready to fit a smart prepay meter but you didn't let him? Or did he said he couldn't fit it and so he cancelled the install himself?

Craig_79

well he dropped his hands down by his sides as soon as he seen the set up we had in place so he cancelled it himself. Like i keep being told by EON to have smart, i would need to have the same billing method on both.

[Deleted User]

Mstty said:

Craig_79 said:

Thanks for the suggestions.
I've just messaged them and got a reply pretty quick. I asked about going all prepay with both. No can do, they are not switching prepay to smart prepay. I have tried all workarounds that i can think of, they have truly locked me in.

……… and then raise with Ofgem.

Not quite. I think that you mean Energy Ombudsman Services: a private arbitration company which suppliers are required to use if a complaint is escalated. Ofgem takes no interest in individual consumer complaints.