Eon Next Economy 7 metering issue

Monkston

I'm trying to resolve an issue with my mother's Economy 7 smart meter and want to check i'm not missing something obvious.  She uses night storage heaters, with the meter responsible for when they charge (the storage heater circuit is wired into the 5th port of the meter). 

The meter is charging the storage heaters in the period 00:30 to 07:30.  I have observed this on the meter display (it indicates when the 5th port live), and confirmed with a clamp meter on the tail from the 5th port.

However, the meter is displaying the off-peak night rate tariff in two periods, 22:30 to 00:30 and 02:30 to 07:30.  This means 2 hours (00:30 to 02:30) of the storage heater charging period is occurring in peak day rate, and is inflating winter bills (there was no issue under the old Economy 7 meter..).

This is definitely wrong and the charge period should be in alignment with the off-peak night rate hours, right?  And that is entirely the responsibility of the energy provider, Eon Next?

CSI_Yorkshire

Yep.

There have been a couple of threads on this before where they've set up the ACLS time matrix differently from the tariff matrix.

Monkston

Thanks for confirming & the additional info.  I've spent 6 months trying to get Eon Next to acknowledge this issue, including a complaint which is about lapse with zero progress (and that they spontaneously closed mid-process at one point).  Off to the ombudsman we go!

Scot_39

It seems a bit silly but it appears the meters from a few recent posts are in fact capable of being set differently for tariff and load switching.

And it appears from at least 1 of those posts -  that been changed to mismatched by an over the air update with price cap.

So I'll be keeping my eyes on mine - bit easier with 2 of my off peak switches - the 5am end of night a bit of a kicker to check though.

That's what happens when you build in flexibility and don't apply a level of common sense via an understanding of the  application.

Any sensible specification for meters should in my opinion have insisted used the same parameters for both.

There is one region that many users are on that split 2+5 timing - eastern ?  oops South Eastern - so you can see why there may be confusion - but others have posted they had theirs changed.
"Oops will bow to @Gerry1 and South Eastern"
Contacting supplier should be able to get it fixed. 

And you could try asking for compensation.

As peak rates are over double.  And 2 hours of all 3 nsh at my house would be nearly 14KWh - at a 20p+ rate difference - £3 a day.

Gerry1

Another good reason not to have a smart meter !  😈

The South Eastern region (19) has E7 switching times of 2230 - 0030 and 0230 - 0730 GMT.

Make sure the times don't diverge when the clocks go back.

Monkston

Yup, her DNO region (10) is Eastern England so 2+5 timing for the off-peak night rate makes sense.  She's had this system for 20+ years, and those are the hours it has always operated on (you could hear the old meter time click over at 22:30 for the first off-peak period).  Her meter time switch code (MTC) is 142, but I can't track down what off-peak schedule that represents.

Eon Next are also telling me her off-peak night rate hours have always been 00:30 to 07:30.  They've produced an internal record that shows a night rate time pattern regime (TPR) for the OLD meter of 00:30-07:30.  That meter was in place from 1997 to 2022.

I can't explain this (I suspect they're not accounting for the MTC), and they can't explain why the new smart meter tariff is running 2+5 off-peak tariff hours.  Big coincidence that those hours correspond to how the old meter worked though..

 At this stage I don't really care when the cheap rate hours are so long as they are aligned with the storage heaters.  Getting someone to take responsibility for that is proving very painful.

CSI_Yorkshire

Gerry1 said:

Another good reason not to have a smart meter !  😈

The South Eastern region (19) has E7 switching times of 2230 - 0030 and 0230 - 0730 GMT.

Make sure the times don't diverge when the clocks go back.

Just to clarify this - many customers in the South Eastern region are set to split switching time like that.

Not all are, nor do they need to be.  There is no rule that says your switching times are determined by the region, and they can be set by the supplier to whatever they want - as long as it is the right number of cheap hours in the 10 hour allowed window.

Monkston

Well, this has now gone to the ombudsman as i've got precisely nowhere with Eon Next in their complaints process - literally zero progress.  I don't think they understand the problem and are certainly not interested in investigating it.  At one point the metering department told me through the claims handler that it was my responsibility to get an electrician to resolve it.  Phenomenal.

dealyboy

Monkston said:

Yup, her DNO region (10) is Eastern England so 2+5 timing for the off-peak night rate makes sense.  She's had this system for 20+ years, and those are the hours it has always operated on (you could hear the old meter time click over at 22:30 for the first off-peak period).  Her meter time switch code (MTC) is 142, but I can't track down what off-peak schedule that represents.

Eon Next are also telling me her off-peak night rate hours have always been 00:30 to 07:30.  They've produced an internal record that shows a night rate time pattern regime (TPR) for the OLD meter of 00:30-07:30.  That meter was in place from 1997 to 2022.

I can't explain this (I suspect they're not accounting for the MTC), and they can't explain why the new smart meter tariff is running 2+5 off-peak tariff hours.  Big coincidence that those hours correspond to how the old meter worked though..

 At this stage I don't really care when the cheap rate hours are so long as they are aligned with the storage heaters.  Getting someone to take responsibility for that is proving very painful.

Monkston said:

Well, this has now gone to the ombudsman as i've got precisely nowhere with Eon Next in their complaints process - literally zero progress.  I don't think they understand the problem and are certainly not interested in investigating it.  At one point the metering department told me through the claims handler that it was my responsibility to get an electrician to resolve it.  Phenomenal.

Hi Monkston ... I don't know if this helps and I'm sorry I didn't see your post before.

I'm in the DNO Eastern region (Area Code 10) currently supplied by EDF but before that (until March 2023) E.ON Next. I have a SMEGS 2 smart meter configured for an E7 tariff. The Eastern off-peak time is 00:00-07:00 GMT. It would be interesting to know what your mother's supply number: profile class and MTSC are. Mine are 2 (Domestic E7) and 807 (00:00-07:00 GMT).



The reason I left E.ON Next was their extremely poor customer service and their administrative and technical incompetence. Somehow I was on two different tariffs and two different tariff types dependent on whether I interrogated the meter, which part of the dashboard I consulted and who I spoke to. Prompted by your post I looked at the supply number on my final bill, this shows profile class 4 (Non-Domestic E7) and MTSC 807.

I presume you have seen the E.ON Next Community page 'What are my Economy 7 times?' ... https://community.eonnext.com/threads/4195-What-are-my-Economy-7-Times??p=10438&viewfull=1

I don't know anything about E7 switch split times, but I have the highest regard for @Gerry1 and @CSI_Yorkshire who may want to chip in.

Monkston

Thanks.  It's profile class 2 for two or more rates, so I believe that part is correct.  The MTSC though is 142 and I can find no reference anywhere as to what schedule this correlates to.  It's presumably the split 2+5 off-peak periods that i'm seeing at the meter, but at no stage have Eon Next acknowledged this. 

They repeatedly tell me it's 0030-0730 GMT but are apparently unable to recognise the distinction between the tariff schedule in effect (2230-0030 and 0230-0730) and the aux port schedule driving the storage heaters (0030-0730).  When I say the tariff hours displayed at the meter are not those they are telling me we just go round in circles again.

Gerry1

CSI_Yorkshire said:

Gerry1 said:

Another good reason not to have a smart meter !  😈

The South Eastern region (19) has E7 switching times of 2230 - 0030 and 0230 - 0730 GMT.

Make sure the times don't diverge when the clocks go back.

Just to clarify this - many customers in the South Eastern region are set to split switching time like that.

Not all are, nor do they need to be.  There is no rule that says your switching times are determined by the region, and they can be set by the supplier to whatever they want - as long as it is the right number of cheap hours in the 10 hour allowed window.

There are maps that suggest that switching times are regional.

https://switchd.co.uk/images/guides/economy7.jpg