Faulty electric Smart Meter? or something more at play?....

Netexporter

Why don't you switch off at the main switch, when going away? Seems to suggest that there something you need to leave running. American style fridge freezers waste huge amounts of energy, for example.

CAF80ST

Reed_Richards said:

You could try visiting this site: https://homebrew.n3rgy.com/
If you put in your MPAN (which should be on your bills) it should tell you the equipment associated with that MPAN and you can check that that equipment is yours.  This might be worth a try, to give yourself some reassurance on that aspect of the issue.

Thank you, this is helpful.  Equipment associated is:
Communications Device
Electricity Meter (Reads 'No Export MPAN configured, Import MPAN configured' followed by MPAN number)
Gas Proxy Function
Gas Meter
In-Home Display Chameleon
In-Home Display Geo

We only have 1 In Home Display (that doesn't work), I'm not sure which it is. 
No warnings or errors that I can see on the report. 

QrizB

In your first post you gave the annual breakdown of your electricity meter readings.

If you look at the Octopus app or website, you should be able to get a monthly breakdown. Is there a particular month where your recorded use surged? Probably in 2023 or 2024?

CAF80ST

Netexporter said:

Why don't you switch off at the main switch, when going away? Seems to suggest that there something you need to leave running. American style fridge freezers waste huge amounts of energy, for example.

Our house alarm is on the mains, we like to keep this on just in case. We don't have an American style fridge freezer. 

victor2

Your reported electricity usage is somewhat excessive considering you have gas heating. That does suggest, as you have suspected, that your meter is over reporting. It is odd that an engineer sent out to check your meter failed to do so. I'd chase them (again) to send someone to check it.

CAF80ST

QrizB said:

In your first post you gave the annual breakdown of your electricity meter readings.

If you look at the Octopus app or website, you should be able to get a monthly breakdown. Is there a particular month where your recorded use surged? Probably in 2023 or 2024?

In 2023, the highest month was December at 2,299.418kWh, however November wasn't far off at 2,268.546kWh.
In 2024, the highest month was January at 2,359.441kWh. I guess what you would expect in the darker colder months, but not quite to this extent. No notable surge. The rest of 2024 monthly breakdown:
Feb 1,831.694kWh
Mar 1,943.933kWH
Apr 1,713.04kWh
May 1,509.924kWh
Jun 1,400.535kWh
Jul 1,446.052kWh
Aug 1,098.108kWh
Sep 1,550.592kWh
Oct 1,825.199kWh
Nov 1,979.835kWh
Dec 2,035.516kWh

MikeJXE

WOW 

August 1,098 is twice as much as I use in a year 

brianposter

CAF80ST said:

We took a meter reading before going away and another on returning then compared that to what was recorded on the Octopus 'My Energy used' interface and it matched.   

So why do you say " 21.231kWh - 23.978kWh." ?

bagand96

OP how much detail have you gone into when investigating the meter?

- Take a meter reading 
- Isolate everything with the main switch on the Consumer Unit, as well as turning off each circuit
- Monitor the meter to see if readings are increasing (or the red light is flashing)
- Turn on each circuit one by one, again monitor the meter for a period

This should show if there is something drawing a large load (and which circuit it's on) or whether the meter is incrementing on it's own.

Forum user @Gerry1 has devised a Meter Sanity Test that goes into a bit more depth: https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/78850409#Comment_78850409

(try as I might I just cannot make that link display nicely!)

CAF80ST

brianposter said:

CAF80ST said:

We took a meter reading before going away and another on returning then compared that to what was recorded on the Octopus 'My Energy used' interface and it matched.   

So why do you say " 21.231kWh - 23.978kWh." ?

Meter reading taken 27 Jul 2025 03321
Meter reading taken 10 Aug 2025 03647

Compared to Octopus 'My Energy used' 
w/c 28 Jul 2025 160.662kWh
w/c 4 Aug 2025 165.709kWh

Daily usage break down over the above 2 weeks as appears on Octopus 'My Energy used' ranges between 21.231kWh lowest to 23.978kWh highest.