help me with my electricity meter readings! IMP R01 or IMP kWh?

abeebee

I'm confused with my meter readings (and the bills I've received).

I pay a single rate and have a smart meter. With my previous supplier (Green) I pressed 9 on the meter and gave them this reading and everything seemed ok. Now I am with Shell they seem to want to use IMP R01 number (press 6 four times on the meter). The readings differ by a significant amount, and this has resulted in Shell saying my start reading has been "invalidated within the industry" and I have been re-billed. Can some explain where I am going wrong? What are the differences between the IMP and the R01 readings / what are they for?

[Deleted User]

Smart meters have 4 registers. The reading that you see on the IHD is the sum of these 4 registers.

Sadly, there is no agreed convention as to which register has to be used by a supplier. My supplier records my offpeak on the R1 register and peak on R2.

You need to provide the supplier with both the R1 and R2 readings if these registers have been used in the past - as would seem to be the case. The supplier will then decide which register to use for a single rate tariff.

SAC2334

Are you using a Secure Liberty meter Dolor ?  because all our meter reading teams only ever pressed button 9 on the keyboard to get the total kWh for single rate meters and we did this for years ..It took a few years for suppliers to get Eco 7 users on the Secure liberty meters and our instructions were then to press button 6..I would nt trust any supplier to know much about which rate to use on any meters because it's all done automatically with no input from a sensible human..I would advise the OP to just use the same button as we did for years and that is button 9 .second screen to scroll round is the 8 digit reading with a hard to see decimal point after the 7 th digit..Secure Liberty meters are a horrible meter .The worst smart meter by a long way..Unreadable by anyone with poor eyesight. The OP says he is a single rate user not dual rate 

[Deleted User]

I haven’t offered any advice so far on how to read a Secure meter but this is what it states on the Octopus Energy website:

To take a meter reading on an Economy 7 electricity tariff:

• Press 6 on the keypad four times.
• Wait a moment – your day/peak and night/ off-peak readings will show up on the screen one after the other, starting with off-peak.
• For your off-peak reading, you'll see “IMP R01” onscreen. A second later, you'll see your meter reading: eight digits, with “kWh” towards the bottom right of the screen.
• For your peak reading you'll see “IMP R02”. A second later, you'll see eight digits, with “kWh” towards the bottom right of the screen. You'll only need to take the first 7 digits when taking each of these readings (i.e. nothing after the decimal place).

All I am suggesting is that the discrepancy might be explained because two registers have been in use. For example, when BG offered its free weekend tariff, all the weekend units were recorded on the R2 register. Many consumers were unaware of this until they switched suppliers. If two indexes have been in use, then both index readings need to be provided to the supplier: NOT the total import.

tghe-retford

I have known of suppliers that have asked for single rate customers to give their readings using IMP R01 only, have reads sent from the meter using IMP R01 only and then send out meter readers who read the IMP kWh rate. You can imagine the discrepenacy causes a big bill and the IMP kWh reading gets verified by the "mysterious third party" and your complaint goes nowhere and if you go to the ombudsman, you lose. You're now out of pocket. What a mess. Consumers haven't a clue about all of this and yet it could cost them dearly out of the blue.

abeebee

It is a Secure liberty meter. I was told to just press 9 when it was installed.

Is the IMP kWh reading a combination of the IMP R01 and IMP R02? Though I have no R02 reading on my meter as far as I can see. As far as I'm aware I've never been on an on/off peak billing system, I've always been a single rate payer. I have been through several suppliers that went bust one after another though so perhaps I just don't remember. I don't understand why the overall reading (the 'IMP kWh') is much higher than the R01, but that seems to be the case. I can see that although they are different numbers, they are going up at the same rate at the moment.

I have to say that dealing with this has been confusing and a massive waste of time emailing back and forth with Shell and trying to decipher all the cancelled bills. 

QrizB

abeebee said:

Is the IMP kWh reading a combination of the IMP R01 and IMP R02? Though I have no R02 reading on my meter as far as I can see.

Yes, ther IMP on button 9 is the sum of the (potentially four) separate IMP R0x readings on button 6.

I assume you've found this video by now?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFeQ_y5LRrM

abeebee

SAC2334 said:

[...]I would advise the OP to just use the same button as we did for years and that is button 9 .second screen to scroll round is the 8 digit reading with a hard to see decimal point after the 7 th digit..Secure Liberty meters are a horrible meter .The worst smart meter by a long way..Unreadable by anyone with poor eyesight. The OP says he is a single rate user not dual rate 

I can't do this is as Shell won't accept the readings; they changed the start reading I provided to what I assume was my R01 reading (I didn't take one at the time as I didn't know what / where it was on the meter) and the subsequent bills also all use the R01 reading.

abeebee

tghe-retford said:

I have known of suppliers that have asked for single rate customers to give their readings using IMP R01 only, have reads sent from the meter using IMP R01 only and then send out meter readers who read the IMP kWh rate. You can imagine the discrepenacy causes a big bill and the IMP kWh reading gets verified by the "mysterious third party" and your complaint goes nowhere and if you go to the ombudsman, you lose. You're now out of pocket. What a mess. Consumers haven't a clue about all of this and yet it could cost them dearly out of the blue.

this is what I am worried about. And it's taken a lot of emails back and forth to get to the stage of being advised to press 6 by Shell customer services. At least now I know a little more about the readings. I'm unclear why Shell wouldn't just use the total figure.

I assume at some point in the past the meter has been remotely configured to no longer display or record a R02 figure? But as my IMP and R01 figures are different (with the IMP being higher), then there must have been a viewable R02 figure at some point in the past?

[Deleted User]

'I’m unclear why Shell wouldn't just use the total figure. 

If they did that it would cause confusion down the line when you change suppliers. 

Some BG customers were on a free weekend tariff. Unknown to them, the free units were being recorded on the R2 register. Chargeable units were recorded on the R1 register. 

When they switched to a new supplier (and the meter went dumb on switch), the new supplier used the R1 and R2 readings to open the account and then billed against R1. One consumer found that when he gave his first monthly meter reading of Total Import, the new supplier charged him for all the R2 units that were previously free!

My advice: provide the supplier with a photo/or video of what you are seeing on your meter. I assume that the actual meter serial number agrees with the meter serial number shown on the statement? (Sorry if this has been asked before)

SAC2334

Dolor said:

'I’m unclear why Shell wouldn't just use the total figure. 

If they did that it would cause confusion down the line when you change suppliers. 

Some BG customers were on a free weekend tariff. Unknown to them, the free units were being recorded on the R2 register. Chargeable units were recorded on the R1 register. 

When they switched to a new supplier (and the meter went dumb on switch), the new supplier used the R1 and R2 readings to open the account and then billed against R1. One consumer found that when he gave his first monthly meter reading of Total Import, the new supplier charged him for all the R2 units that were previously free!

My advice: provide the supplier with a photo/or video of what you are seeing on your meter. I assume that the actual meter serial number agrees with the meter serial number shown on the statement? (Sorry if this has been asked before)

Possibly this is the only reason why the IMP 02 has any reading on it , a combination of total kwh plus some free units from a temporary trial on BG s free weekend. The free units had to be recorded to monitor excessive use as it was one of BG s T and c s 
 . I used to read a few of the BG Free weekend tariff when it first came out .Rare to find one and they were always on BG s own smart meters installed before the DCC took over , on Landis Gyr meters only 

. It was nt a free weekend tariff but a free 8 hours on either Saturday or Sunday with free electricity between 9 am and 5 pm  .Customer selected the preferred day . It only paid the customer to try it   if they planned a high usage 8 hrs 

Secure Liberty meters started to be installed around the same time but BG have never used them but occasionally someone would switch to them usually from Utilita who were the first to use this Indian made meter which was really a SME meter as it shows the Kvah reading on one of the screens on button 9 .Kvah is only on business meters never a domestic meter 

I dont trust First Utility aka Shell at all to get it right, as I doubt they are even aware og the old BG free weekend tariff  .They are using the register with the highest units on it for their own reasons but historically at least from when the meter was commissioned its been read on the standard industry single rate button 9 as all single rate customers and meter readers used 
I think I would risk an Ombudsman decision on this case