Smart Meter is not compatible with Solar Panel

SilverQueen

I had Solar Panels fitted in December 2012.  I then had a smart meter fitted in February 2013.  
I have been having extortionate electricity bills, which presently are approx £700 per month.  I have complained to British Gas my supplier, they arranged to check the meter is accurate.  The engineer found the meter was over reading by 13-14%.  The engineer said that they were not suppose to upgrade homes to smart meters if you had solar panels as they were not compatible until recently. He suggested that the meter may be reading more than it should because the electricity is being added instead of deducted.  Has anyone else experienced this problem?  Who/where do I start to make a complaint and try and get compensation?

QrizB

Welcome to the forum.

SilverQueen said:

The engineer said that they were not suppose to upgrade homes to smart meters if you had solar panels as they were not compatible until recently.

Smart meters are designed to work with solar panels.

I had Solar Panels fitted in December 2012.  I then had a smart meter fitted in February 2013. 

The UK smart meter rollout didn't officially start until 2016; exactly what model of electricity meter do you have?

The engineer found the meter was over reading by 13-14%.
Who/where do I start to make a complaint and try and get compensation?

If your meter is over-reading, you should complain to your energy supplier (British Gas). They might offer to fit a check meter, or they might accept the engineer's diagnosis and remove your meter for workshop testing. (They might even have done this already, it isn't entirely clear from your opening message.)

British Gas are responsible for accurately metering your electricity use, and it will be British Gas who you will ask to compensate you for any overbilling.

I have been having extortionate electricity bills, which presently are approx £700 per month.

Even with 14% off, those are still very high electricity bills - over £7000 a year.

jennifernil

The Smets 1  meters were not suitable for those homes with solar panels, apparently they were often adding the export to the grid as import.  Take a look on the Green and Ethical board where it has been discussed.

We had panels fitted in November 2011, and refused a smart meter until we were sure it would work properly with our panels.  We just had  both gas and electricity smart meters fitted 8 days ago, the electricity one works fine, but the gas one is still refusing to communicate.

Our annual generation is in the order of 3400 kwh, and at least 50% of it is exported, so adding that on instead would add a lot to our bills!

Dogbyte009

jennifernil said:

The Smets 1  meters were not suitable for those homes with solar panels, apparently they were often adding the export to the grid as import.  Take a look on the Green and Ethical board where it has been discussed.

Not all SMETS1 meters. I had a SMETS1 meter installed in 2016 and solar panels in 2020 and they work together quite happily, the meter generates separate import and export readings.

Ectophile

There was one brand of non-smart meter that would add up all electricity that went through it, whichever direction it was going.  Most meters would just stop when electricity was being exported, often displaying the message "red".

QrizB

Until @SilverQueen comes back to update the thread and answer some of the questions, I'm not sure there's nuch more we can do?

Keep_pedalling

My SMETS 1 meter works fine with the panels we had installed back in 2011, but as has already been said even allowing for 14% those bills are massive, about 10 x more than I pay a year including my EV.

SilverQueen

Thank you for your comments so far.
In answer to your questions, I am not sure what the make of the meter is but is has the following written on it: Mercury Residential Smart Meter and Installed by: On Stream.
I have been offered a new smart meter by British Gas (my present supplier) to recertify the 14% over read, they said once this is done they will look to refund overpayments.  However, I have been with numerous suppliers since having the meter installed, how would I go about get refunds from previous suppliers?
The engineer that tested it, suggested I did a month of readings before it was removed, a week with the solar panel switched on followed by a week with it switched off.  I have done this for one week so far and can see a difference of about 6-8 units per day.

Would you recommend I get the meter checked before it is removed and if so, who would I go to, to get this checked.  Once removed it will be difficult to prove the is anything wrong with the meter.

Any advice much appreciated 

[Deleted User]

However, I have been with numerous suppliers since having the meter installed, how would I go about get refunds from previous suppliers?

You will have a fight on your hands. Arguably, until PV solar was installed, you had a perfectly good meter. It was your decision to install PV solar so the supplier cannot be held responsible: they will no doubt argue that they would have been happy to change the meter had you brought the problem to their attention.

  I have done this for one week so far and can see a difference of about 6-8 units per day.

If your meter is adding 6 to 8 kWh a day then this increase is not consistent with solar output. The last week has been pretty poor - yesterday was an exception - the output from my 6.35kWp array has varied from 300Wh to 12kWh. What are you basing the 6 to 8kWh on?

QrizB

SilverQueen said:

Thank you for your comments so far.
In answer to your questions, I am not sure what the make of the meter is but is has the following written on it: Mercury Residential Smart Meter and Installed by: On Stream.

One of these?

That's a very early smart prepayment meter. It later became a Landis & Gyr model and, according to the dates on this pdf, the design pre-dates the general UK smart meter rollout by almost a decade.

https://sse.co.uk/v3/assets/blt09078e271abddd45/blt7925d49c71313d34/5b4defc2d0af7f6e0ba4adb0/energy-e470-tokenless-smart-prepayment-meter.pdf

I have been offered a new smart meter by British Gas (my present supplier) to recertify the 14% over read, they said once this is done they will look to refund overpayments.  However, I have been with numerous suppliers since having the meter installed, how would I go about get refunds from previous suppliers?

I would accept BG's replacement smart meter, and would hope their offer of a refund of overpayments has been made in good faith. Previous suppliers will be more of a problem and obtaining a refund is likely to be difficult.

Would you recommend I get the meter checked before it is removed and if so, who would I go to, to get this checked.  Once removed it will be difficult to prove the is anything wrong with the meter.

I'm not really in a position to recommend anything.

You could fit a check meter between your smart meter and your consumer unit; this will measure both import and export and will give you info you can compare to the smart meter. This will require an electrician and will cost someone money. I would have expected BG to have offered this to you before now, but it seems they already accept that the meter is over-reading and all that you'd get from a check meter is further confirmation of that.

chris_n

The bigger problem is, it may only be a couple of kWh a day at this time of year, it could well be 25 on some of the better days in summer!