Any suppliers who'll put single tariff on 2 meters without a smart meter?

System

This discussion was created from comments split from: Moving from Economy 7 to single rate tariff?.

old_antelope

I have two meters, was on Economy 7 with storage heaters. Had storage heaters removed, and now using modern electric radiators.

I recently switched to Ebico/Rebel Energy, and at the time of the switch quoted me a price for standard tariff. But my bills show me on E7 with two tariffs, hardly any usage at night, lots of usage on day, so they are charging far more than they should, and not in line with their original quote.

I have contacted them several times already, but the staff at Rebel seem to have a very poor education. They cannot understand the simple request of having one tariff on two meters.

So, any recommendations for switching to an electricity supplier who will put a single tariff on two meters, and without requiring a smart meter?

FrugaiMacDugal

Bungle73 said:

 I don't have storage heaters (my memory from childhood is that they were a pita), and have gas central heating.

Bungle73 said:
Why I'm on E7 in the first place I have absolutely no idea. I inherited the house from my parents.

Could be that change from storage heaters to gas wasn't notified to provider.

Gerry1

old_antelope said:

I have two meters, was on Economy 7 with storage heaters. Had storage heaters removed, and now using modern electric radiators.

I recently switched to Ebico/Rebel Energy, and at the time of the switch quoted me a price for standard tariff. But my bills show me on E7 with two tariffs, hardly any usage at night, lots of usage on day, so they are charging far more than they should, and not in line with their original quote.

I have contacted them several times already, but the staff at Rebel seem to have a very poor education. They cannot understand the simple request of having one tariff on two meters.

So, any recommendations for switching to an electricity supplier who will put a single tariff on two meters, and without requiring a smart meter

Welcome to the forum.

Unfortunately you seem to have made a big mistake and are not using the correct terms which can result in others being confused.  (Not having a go at you, just trying to understand what's gone wrong and how it can be mitigated or put right).

If you changed from Night Storage Heaters to panel heaters or convectors that was a huge mistake.  It's a widespread misconception that 'modern' heaters are more efficient.  They're not,1kWh of electricity in always gives 1kWh of heat out.  (However, modern High Heat Retention NSHs only blow out heat when it's needed rather than leaking it out through the night and when you're out, so they can cost less to run if correctly programmed.  Heat pumps give out more heat than the electrical energy put in because you're 'stealing' it from the air or ground outside.)  There's no getting away from it, if the NSHs have been removed then your bills with panel heaters or convectors are going to be much higher.

Right now you probably need to move away from E7, but you need to use the right terms.  Do you really have two physical electricity meters, i.e. two boxes on the wall?  Some old complex metering systems did have two meters but they were usually legacy tariffs such as Total Heat Total Control rather than Economy 7.  What I suspect you have is one multi-rate meter, probably with two registers, which may be labelled R1 and R2.  They correspond to Day and Night (or Normal and Low) although there's no standard defining which is which.

At present you have a dual rate tariff but you want it to be billed at single rate without a meter change.  They'll understand that.  Most suppliers will happily oblige, but IIRC Ovo are unhelpful and no longer do so.  Octopus do offer single rate but you have to email or call them.

If you own the property and plan to stay there a reasonable time then you should consider HHR NSHs such as Dimplex Quantum or a heatpump if your property is suitable.  Neither are cheap to install but you'll save in the long run.  There's a £7500 grant available for heat pumps and Octopus are reported to be offering good deals.

Ildhund

Gerry1 said:
At present you have a dual rate tariff but you want it to be billed at single rate without a meter change ... Most suppliers will happily oblige, but IIRC Ovo are unhelpful and no longer do so.  

I'm not sure that's the case, Gerry. I went through precisely that exercise a couple of years ago with no bother at all. What is problematic is the reverse: switching from single-rate to dual-rate. The OVO billing system still doesn't seem able to cope with that, although improvements have been anticipated for a long time now.

Stubod

old_antelope said:

I have two meters, was on Economy 7 with storage heaters. Had storage heaters removed, and now using modern electric radiators.

......

..... just out of interest, why would you do that ????

Gerry1

Ildhund said:

Gerry1 said:
At present you have a dual rate tariff but you want it to be billed at single rate without a meter change ... Most suppliers will happily oblige, but IIRC Ovo are unhelpful and no longer do so.  

I'm not sure that's the case, Gerry. I went through precisely that exercise a couple of years ago with no bother at all. What is problematic is the reverse: switching from single-rate to dual-rate. The OVO billing system still doesn't seem able to cope with that, although improvements have been anticipated for a long time now.

Ovo themselves seem very confused; perhaps that's only to be expected, given they're right at the bottom of the latest Which? ratings.  They say 'Unfortunately, we don't currently have the functionality to change Smart Meters from Single Rate to Economy 7 or vice versa.  On the same page they go on to say 'Although we're unable to physically change the functionality of meters right now. We can offer an Economy 7 to Single Rate plan! This means you’ll be paying the same rate for each register.'  No mention of whether they can bill non-smart meters at single rate.

However, MSE (section 4) says that Ovo will let you switch from an Economy 7 tariff to a regular single-rate tariff without the need to change your meter.

Ildhund

Gerry1 said:
'Unfortunately, we don't currently have the functionality to change Smart Meters from Single Rate to Economy 7 or vice versa.  On the same page they go on to say 'Although we're unable to physically change the functionality of meters right now, we can offer an Economy 7 to Single Rate plan! This means you’ll be paying the same rate for each register.'  

That seems clear enough to me: they're unable to make the change to the meter, but they can change a dual-rate tariff into a single-rate one [but not vice versa yet]. I don't see that they rule this out as a possibility for a non-smart Economy 7 meter - have you any evidence that it can't be done?

Gerry1

Ildhund said:

Gerry1 said:
'Unfortunately, we don't currently have the functionality to change Smart Meters from Single Rate to Economy 7 or vice versa.  On the same page they go on to say 'Although we're unable to physically change the functionality of meters right now, we can offer an Economy 7 to Single Rate plan! This means you’ll be paying the same rate for each register.' 

That seems clear enough to me: they're unable to make the change to the meter, but they can change a dual-rate tariff into a single-rate one [but not vice versa yet]. I don't see that they rule this out as a possibility for a non-smart Economy 7 meter - have you any evidence that it can't be done?

I haven't the foggiest, it's clear as mud to me.

QrizB

@old_antelope this is your thread now, can you help us to help you?