Management company will not allow my supplier to replace my old meter with Smart meter l am on E7

Artlover96

Advice needed please , l live in a retirement block of flats all privately owned by owner occupiers. The building is electricity only meters are in a locked meter room on the ground floor. Several residents have had smart meters fitted. The management will not allow any more smart meters to be fitted. I am on E7 and need a smart meter to retain my tariff after June 2025 when RTS is switched off. My supplier Octopus are only able to fitted a smart meter as they do not have a  supply of other older meters due to being a young company. 

I am extremely anxious about this as l have new storage heaters and will lose the E7 rate and l cannot afford to replace these heaters . I am home most of the time and need the heating on.

Any advice would be appreciated 

QrizB

I don't know your specific situation but generally, in order to have an electricity supply you have to grant your supplier permission to install their meters on your property. It's not clear to me that the management company have any right to deny Octopus access to fit a smart meter.

Have your management company said exactly why they won't allow Octopus access?

Gerry1

You don't have to have a smart meter to have E7.  It should be possible to fit a multi-rate non smart meter, pethaps one reclaimed from another customer if necessary.  If Octopus are unhelpful, try switching to another supplier.

Assuming you are an owner occupier, I'd challenge the management company.  Unless there's insufficient room it's hard to understand why everyone having a smart meter is any concern of theirs.

Newbie_John

What's the reason to not allow smart meter? Apart from the word "smart" it's a meter like any other, you don't need IHD (little screen device showing usage) in your property, if there's bad reception then it will work like an old-school meter. 
So yeah, it would be good to know their reasoning?

doodling

Hi,

If the "management" are saying no more smart meters then they are effectively saying that you cannot have an electricity supply as a condition of having one is that you let your supplier fit metering equipment of their choice (more or less).

What does your lease say about you having access to electricity?  I suspect that the "management" may be in breach of your lease in not allowing access or meter replacement.

EssexHebridean

I too would take the line of challenging the management company - or in fact, in the first instance, writing to them formally to tell them that your meter requires changing in order to maintain your electricity supply, and thus your heating, lighting and hot water. The supplier has offered you an appointment on X date and accordingly could they confirm to you that access can be arranged on that date. Don't make a big thing about it being a smart meter - that is irrelevant in any case. See what they come back with. Ask them to respond to you within a set timeframe -  maybe 7 working days. 

debitcardmayhem

I will start a conspiracy theory, meters in a locked meter room, management co. won’t allow new meters.
Theory says when others had theirs fitted they realised that they are paying for someone else’s electricity, management co. allocated meters to wrong flats. 
Far fetched?……

Scot_39

Are you really sure you actually have RTS metering.

Many e7 systems have no RTS components / signal dependency.

But some articles have confused the two.

Not only current smart, but many later generation digital rely on own timers - no external clocks, RTS interface etc.

Do you know your current meter model number - or have any photos.

(My RTS system was twin meter - the RTS digital meter itself - was bigger than the full sized analogue meter - the digital replacement - took about half the height of either block - excluding the tails / bend radius.  My smart meter reclaimed the full height of just one of the two blocks.  In my case my standard meter tails were same size - but my RTS tails were smaller - so its not just the mter that could be the space issue - if thats the reason for refusal.

And we regualrs here have all seen posts of single let alone multiple meter cabinets that were space constrained for smart meters)

DullGreyGuy

Are the freeholders on site often? 
Have you checked what the door is locked with? Normally communal meter cupboards in flats use a FB1/FB2/FB3 key or similar so the fire brigade can get in in an emergency and so the meter readers can get in without the freeholders. 

Our freeholder was reasonable and said they could send a FB2 key but charge £40 but pointed out you can buy FB keys from Amazon for a couple of quid. 

What could they do if Octopus turned up, got in with a standard key and replaced the meter?