Comms Problems with Aclara Smart Meters

liviboy

Hugo still isn’t getting my electric data but Bright kicked back in to life in August and Loop the other day…

Ildhund

Hugo piggyback on n3rgy (I learned yesterday) like Loop do. If n3rgy.com works for you, it might be an idea to remove and re-establish your Hugo account, or even delete and re-install the app to refresh its connection to the data source.

Qyburn

Anyone else seen these problems recurring? I've not been checking on a daily basis, but I just noticed that Bright has nothing since 01:30 on 5th October. It may be a different issue as Octopus is also stalled, although their data stops an hour earlier.

Reed_Richards

Qyburn said:

... Octopus is also stalled, although their data stops an hour earlier.

Or is that just the difference between the time stamps?  There is BST vs GMT; not to mention the fact that Bright has an amazing power of precognition and gives the time followed by the usage data for the half hour after that time. 

Ildhund

Bright has been working for me, just a bit more sporadically than before these problems started back in May. Yesterday's are still not available, for example, at 10am. They'll turn up in a few hours' time, I expect.
n3rgy is working as usual these days. 

Phones4Chris

Bright working fine here, fully upto date, no gaps. You tried a refresh I assume?

Qyburn

Reed_Richards said:

Qyburn said:

... Octopus is also stalled, although their data stops an hour earlier.

Or is that just the difference between the time stamps?  There is BST vs GMT; not to mention the fact that Bright has an amazing power of precognition and gives the time followed by the usage data for the half hour after that time. 

Octopus last data is 00:30 to 01:00 BST. So that's the preceding midnight. Bright's last data is timestamped 01:30 so if I understand your comment that means 01:30 to 02:00. One hour later than Octopus, or two if Bright sticks to GMT.

Neither has moved on at all. Either all comms are down or Octopus isn't even trying.

Qyburn

Just phoned Octopus and asked them to give the meter a kick, since they've paid no attention to emails. It's beyond me why the protocol doesn't retry of it's own accord and instead relies on two manual processes (1) the customer noticing missing data and (2) Octopus manually retrying.

As a side issue it's disappointing but maybe not completely surprising that the agent told me that the meter relies on "4G mobile signal" even though we're in Scotland. 

Reed_Richards

Both n3rgy and Bright stick to GMT but the n3rgy timestamp is the end of the half hour whilst the Bright timestamp is the beginning of the half hour.  So currently 01:30 on Bright should be the 02:30 to 03:00 BST.

Phones4Chris

There's an ongoing issue with the DCC affecting some of these "third party user" Apps eg. Bright as one, and has been affecting data retrieval with some Aclara meters from time to time.
This issue seems to have raised its ugly head again. It's got to be some problem with the DCC.

Currently, I'm aware of one with no data retrieved since Friday 1330.
The same meter doesn't seem to be affected by data retrieval by n3rgy at this time! (Or data retrieval by Octopus).
(see also https://forum.ovoenergy.com/smart-meters-136/third-party-access-to-smart-meter-data-recent-failures-18114 link sent to me by Hildebrand). 

Edit: Even stranger, using @Ildhund 's homebrew link, the meter has an expired security certificate! but this isn't affecting n3rgy's own data retrieval at present!!