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Smart meter with Octopus Home Mini
I’ve recently had a SMETS2 smart meter installed, replacing an old SMETS1 with British Gas. My old SMETS1 meter was communicating with the IHD but not Octopus itself after switching providers. After the install, the engineer gave me an Octopus Home Mini. It’s setup and working but I liked having the IHD to have a glance at the daily cost/usage without needing to open my Octopus app. This also allowed others in my home to do the same.
My questions are:
1. I still have my old British Gas IHD. Is it possible to connect this to my new smart meter?
2. If not, can I buy an IHD and connect this to the meter? If so, what would people recommend?
3. If not, will I have to go through Octopus to obtain one?
My questions are:
1. I still have my old British Gas IHD. Is it possible to connect this to my new smart meter?
2. If not, can I buy an IHD and connect this to the meter? If so, what would people recommend?
3. If not, will I have to go through Octopus to obtain one?
Thanks in advance.
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Comments
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Hi
1. No, there are security settings to prevent this
2. I use a Hildebrand Glow which was very easy to set up
Hope this helps :-)1 -
You could contact Octopus and push the line that having a visible IHD helps with energy use management as it reminds others in the household to turn things off etc, particularly at peak times - that might play to their eco-friendly credentials, and score you an IHD from them. I hadn't realised they were now giving the home minis instead of IHDs though - and with that being the case it may be that they simply aren't having IHD's supplied for new meter installs now.🎉 MORTGAGE FREE (First time!) 30/09/2016 🎉 And now we go again…New mortgage taken 01/09/23 🏡
Balance as at 01/09/23 = £115,000.00 Balance as at 31/12/23 = £112,000.00
Balance as at 31/08/24 = £105,400.00 Balance as at 31/12/24 = £102,500.00
£100k barrier broken 1/4/25SOA CALCULATOR (for DFW newbies): SOA Calculatorshe/her2 -
EssexHebridean said:You could contact Octopus and push the line that having a visible IHD helps with energy use management as it reminds others in the household to turn things off etc, particularly at peak times - that might play to their eco-friendly credentials, and score you an IHD from them. I hadn't realised they were now giving the home minis instead of IHDs though - and with that being the case it may be that they simply aren't having IHD's supplied for new meter installs now.2
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Got a Home Mini, and to be frank, not impressed with it. Whilst I can get data for electricity fairly quickly, gas lags behind usage by a good 4-8 hours. And the app is currently quitting as soon as it is opened <grrrr>.
Her courage will change the world.
Treasure the moments that you have. Savour them for as long as you can for they will never come back again.0 -
mmmmikey said:Hi
1. No, there are security settings to prevent this
2. I use a Hildebrand Glow which was very easy to set up
Hope this helps :-)2 -
Mark2019 said:EssexHebridean said:You could contact Octopus and push the line that having a visible IHD helps with energy use management as it reminds others in the household to turn things off etc, particularly at peak times - that might play to their eco-friendly credentials, and score you an IHD from them. I hadn't realised they were now giving the home minis instead of IHDs though - and with that being the case it may be that they simply aren't having IHD's supplied for new meter installs now.🎉 MORTGAGE FREE (First time!) 30/09/2016 🎉 And now we go again…New mortgage taken 01/09/23 🏡
Balance as at 01/09/23 = £115,000.00 Balance as at 31/12/23 = £112,000.00
Balance as at 31/08/24 = £105,400.00 Balance as at 31/12/24 = £102,500.00
£100k barrier broken 1/4/25SOA CALCULATOR (for DFW newbies): SOA Calculatorshe/her0 -
Phones4Chris said:mmmmikey said:Hi
1. No, there are security settings to prevent this
2. I use a Hildebrand Glow which was very easy to set up
Hope this helps :-)Thanks @Phones4Chris , you make a good point, my answer lacked clarity.What I was meaning to say was that it isn't something you can do yourself because of the way the security works.I'm not sure if there are technical differences between SMETS1 and SMETS2 smart meters that would stop this, but as you point out otherwise it's presumably something that could be done, I suspect that this would involve returning the IHD to Octopus for re-configuring as I doubt the on site engineers have the equipment/training to do this. As such, I'd imagine that sending out a new one is probably a more cost-effective option.0 -
@mmmmikey If there aren't "technical differences", then it wouldn't be a case of returning the IHD, it's just a case of getting the IHD's GUID correctly registered with the address and the SMETS2 meter. Something Octopus ought to be able to do (remotely) and had one been wise to this at the time, the installer of the SMETS2 should have been able to do it (again assuming there wasn't any technical limitation with the IHD itself).1
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Presumably there's no way the Mini could continue to work if you switch away from Octopus.0
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Qyburn said:Presumably there's no way the Mini could continue to work if you switch away from Octopus.
"The Octopus Home Mini is a small, palm-sized device that beams live readings from your smart meter to our cloud-based platform Kraken, so we can show you up-to-the-minute smart insights via your Octopus Energy app"Never under estimate the power of stupid people in large numbers0
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