Supplier Not Offering a Smart Meter

iheoahaheh

I've had a request in with Scottish Power for a Smart Meter to be fitted.  I rang them today to be advised that they are not fitting them in my area. I thought that providers had to offer a Smart Meter.

I have discovered that end of March 24 the RTS meters are being phased out therefore shouldnt the electricity provider be installing a Smart Meter and appropriate infrastructure before this so that i can still get economy 7 tariff.  They have advised that they cant confirm a date when a smart meter can be offered.

I've had solar panels fitted and need the smart meter to set up a SEG agreement otherwise the electricity provider will benefit from free electricity from my system which they will sell on for a profit and me the generator gets nothing.

Are the suppliers dragging their heals to benefit from situations such as this. 

When you have the solar system installed you can monitor and record the amount of power that gets gifted into the grid, so why cant you be compensated for this electricity in the interim period while the energy providers take their sweet time to get a Smart Meters and SEG agreements approved / processed.  No SEG agreement means no compensation for producing electricity for some company to benefit from and make profit at no cost to themselves.

I've been in this situation before where it took 6 months to get a SEG agreement and all the while someone was benefiting from getting free electricity which i assume is sold on, hardly seems fair.

Its new to me that you cant actually get a Smart Meter because the infrastructure may not be suitable to support this.  You get told about the benefits and savings of Smart Meters and Solar Systems but not about the important elements i.e. that the system / infrastructure is not there to support it.  Who is benefiting from this at the customers expense? 

MWT

Your energy supplier is not getting any benefit from energy you export without an export MPAN, it simply goes into the pot of unallocated energy consumption and production which is handled by the DNO.

Do your neighbours have smart meters?

There are some areas where there are technical issues preventing the proper functioning of smart meters, but if the neighbours have them, and they are working, that that is not likely to be the case...

Gerry1

iheoahaheh said:

I have discovered that end of March 24 the RTS meters are being phased out therefore shouldnt the electricity provider be installing a Smart Meter and appropriate infrastructure before this so that i can still get economy 7 tariff.

Most unlikely, that's just scaremongering.  The RTS contract has been extended several times and will almost certainly be extended again; negotiations are continuing.

Even if R4LW disappeared tomorrow you probably wouldn't see a difference.  It would be like not setting a digital watch by the pips, it would only be a minute or two out a year later.

QrizB

iheoahaheh said:

I've had a request in with Scottish Power for a Smart Meter to be fitted.  I rang them today to be advised that they are not fitting them in my area. I thought that providers had to offer a Smart Meter.

Scottish Power aren't the best, by quite a long measure. As MWT says there are a few areas where smart meters can't currently be fitted (usually because of local radio conditions), but it might just be that SP are focussing their efforts elsewhere. Which doesn't really help you.

iheoahaheh said:

I've had solar panels fitted and need the smart meter to set up a SEG agreement

SP's arrangements for SEG are legendarily poor. See this 14-page thread of despair:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6371751/scottish-power-and-seg

Have you considered switching to a less-worse supplier? Octopus, perhaps, who are reputed to have the best smart meter team in the business and who have a selection of decent export tariffs for solar power owners?

(Full disclosure: I'm a very happy Octopus customer.)

ArbitraryRandom

I would also suggest Octopus has a better range of ToU tariffs to help you make the best use of the free electricity you will be generating.  

And, if you happen to know an Octopus customer, you can both benefit from a £50 referral fee - warning, don't ask on the forum though as soliciting/giving referral codes is against the forum rules. 

Scot_39

iheoahaheh said:

I've had a request in with Scottish Power for a Smart Meter to be fitted.  I rang them today to be advised that they are not fitting them in my area. I thought that providers had to offer a Smart Meter.

I have discovered that end of March 24 the RTS meters are being phased out therefore shouldnt the electricity provider be installing a Smart Meter and appropriate infrastructure before this so that i can still get economy 7 tariff.  They have advised that they cant confirm a date when a smart meter can be offered.

I've had solar panels fitted and need the smart meter to set up a SEG agreement otherwise the electricity provider will benefit from free electricity from my system which they will sell on for a profit and me the generator gets nothing.

Are the suppliers dragging their heals to benefit from situations such as this. 

When you have the solar system installed you can monitor and record the amount of power that gets gifted into the grid, so why cant you be compensated for this electricity in the interim period while the energy providers take their sweet time to get a Smart Meters and SEG agreements approved / processed.  No SEG agreement means no compensation for producing electricity for some company to benefit from and make profit at no cost to themselves.

I've been in this situation before where it took 6 months to get a SEG agreement and all the while someone was benefiting from getting free electricity which i assume is sold on, hardly seems fair.

Its new to me that you cant actually get a Smart Meter because the infrastructure may not be suitable to support this.  You get told about the benefits and savings of Smart Meters and Solar Systems but not about the important elements i.e. that the system / infrastructure is not there to support it.  Who is benefiting from this at the customers expense? 

Perhaps there are other reasons - why Scottish Power are not currently fitting in your area - meter or staff availability etc  (it can be a bit of a postcode lottery - some seemingly can get appointments within weeks - others wait months).

According to DCC - 99.3 % homes have WAN coverage.

https://www.smartdcc.co.uk/our-smart-network/network-data-dashboard/

Which seems high considering there are reportedly  c3m + of the c33m smart meters - installed in domestic and small businesse actually operating in dumb mode.

And then their's the pending issue of priority against official targets and theoretical RTS switch off.

Havent seen any Ofgem official notice of extension - YET(*).

Some of Scottish Power's RTS tariffs are not simple fixed time / 2 rate e7 - they are currently saying that they do not have suitable smarts meters to replace some of the special configurations.

They also have - or at least had - the highest number of RTS meters still in service as of late last year - 164,000 of c0.94m remaining as of Nov 23 according to Elexon (who AFAIK are monitoring only to control grid level billing for RTS costs etc - not the replacement of meters etc).  About 20% of nationwide total.

https://www.elexon.co.uk/data/trading-operations-report/metering-data-trading-operations-report/

As such they are one of several suppliers who have been actively lobbying for yet another extension to the RTS radio signals until they decide how they are going to treat those folk.

(*) As @Gerry1 - with elexon charts showing c0.94m total remaining last Nov - and a low replacement rate - the progress doesn't look that impressive - so perhaps Ofgem will just have to sanction another extension (and I guess may soon if not already be fining operators for the delays).

Reed_Richards

When I contacted my supplier (not Scottish Power) about getting a smart meter fitted I was told there were no appointments available in my area.  Then a few weeks later I tried again and was able to get an appointment.  I think their booking system only covered a certain number of weeks ahead and if there were no appointments in your area then you were just told "No".  

iheoahaheh

thanks for the responses but someone must benefit from free electricity being fed into the system, it doesnt just dissipate, it goes somewhere, used by someone.  If it goes into the system whether it be the DNO's or the National grid someone is using and benefitting from that free electricity but who ?

QrizB

iheoahaheh said:

thanks for the responses but someone must benefit from free electricity being fed into the system, it doesnt just dissipate, it goes somewhere, used by someone.  If it goes into the system whether it be the DNO's or the National grid someone is using and benefitting from that free electricity but who ?

Think of the grid as a big bucket of electricity.

The power stations put electricity into the bucket, and get paid for it.

The consumers take power out of the bucket, and pay for it.

But the bucket has leaks; something like 30% of the power that is put into the grid is lost in transmission, making that hum you hear at substations and keeping birds' feet warm when they perch on cables.

Your surplus is put back into the bucket, but you're not paid for it. Nor is anyone else. It just seems like the losses on your part of the network are smaller; less leakage from the bucket.

MultiFuelBurner

Not forgetting at times when the bucket is full such as when the sun is out and shining the extra those with Solar put in can actually cost the National grid to get rid of out of the bucket.

It's not all bucket half full 😂😂

Get my bucket I'm off.

MeteredOut

QrizB said:

iheoahaheh said:

thanks for the responses but someone must benefit from free electricity being fed into the system, it doesnt just dissipate, it goes somewhere, used by someone.  If it goes into the system whether it be the DNO's or the National grid someone is using and benefitting from that free electricity but who ?

Think of the grid as a big bucket of electricity.

The power stations put electricity into the bucket, and get paid for it.

The consumers take power out of the bucket, and pay for it.

But the bucket has leaks; something like 30% of the power that is put into the grid is lost in transmission, making that hum you hear at substations and keeping birds' feet warm when they perch on cables.

Your surplus is put back into the bucket, but you're not paid for it. Nor is anyone else. It just seems like the losses on your part of the network are smaller; less leakage from the bucket.

So, think of the electricity being put back as a sort of wildlife heating subsidy. If people didn't give free energy back to do this, Ofgem would have to add it to the standing charge!