British Gas Smart Meter Distance Communication Issue

McKnze21

Hi All,

Looking for some advice on the following, if anyone has a similar issue please?

My current Energy supplier is British Gas and has been for quite some time. I currently live in a detached bungalow and my electric meter is on external of one gable end wall and the gas meter is on the external of the opposite gable end wall. These are approx. 14.6M / 48ft apart in distance, separated by the house itself.

My electric meter submits readings automatically, however although my gas meter is also a smart meter, gas meter readings are not submitted automatically as I believe this is due to a communication issue from the distance between the meters. My hope is to have the gas meter submit readings automatically and also have an IHD (In Home Display).

I have a SMETS2 Electrical & Gas Meter. 

I have had countless conversations with BG and I have also had engineers out but I seem to be going round in circles and getting nowhere. Each and every time I need to explain myself from the start and nearly every time, the person on the end of the phone never understands my issue/request! 

Has anyone on here had a similar issue? If so, did they ever get a fix/solution?

I was thinking that surely by now, 2025, there must be something out there to help with communication? A signal booster? Newer technology? 

Thanks in advance for any advice or help!

MWT

There are a few options out there, some are down to your supplier to arrange, like a separate comms hub adjacent to your gads meter (requires a local power source) or boosting the range of the existing comms hub with a better antenna.

Alternatively there are devices like this or example: https://www.in-home-displays.co.uk/product/smartxtend/

Can't comment on how well it works, but something like this is able to join your existing HAN and boost the signal, but it does depend on the gas meter having been properly commissioned in the first place which may not have happened due to the distance... 

I doubt you'll get much help from BG though, probably better with a different supplier like Octopus perhaps...

Ildhund

McKnze21 said:

... a communication issue from the distance between the meters. 

This is as you can imagine a common scenario. It's not at all unusual to have the electricity meter a long way from the gas meter, and there are several different remedies. Here are a couple:

• Dual-Band Communications Hubs (DBCH) can use a lower frequency (868MHz) than ordinary ones (2.4GHz) to improve connectivity; 
• AltHAN is a system designed primarily for use in blocks of flats where meters are typically in a central location, perhaps in a basement, and thus a long way from rooms where an IHD would be used. It passes signals over power lines rather than through the air, and can thus solve problems like the one you're facing. BG are allegedly suppliers of AltHAN solutions where required. 

Good luck with getting BG's customer service to listen!

armith

Just to add my experience. We had exactly the same - new smart meters installed by SSE, at opposite corners of the house. Electric fine, gas - no readings. We were told by SSE that they would contact us with a solution - but they never did. We were moved to OhNO (OVO) who we had lots of issues with, so we  switched to Octopus (for the £50 plus friend gets £50). We rang Octopus to say we'd like the gas meter to be properly smart. A couple of weeks later an engineer "came and did something" and it's all worked perfectly ever since. No idea what he did - nothing as obvious as a wire linking the two meters or anything, maybe there is some new bit of gubbins in the meter boxes - but I don't really know.

I don't know if Octopus has some secret knowledge that SSE and OhNO didn't have - but it might be worth you just asking British Gas what your options are? If you've got no other problems with British Gas I suppose you could switch to Octopus, get the gas meter "smartened up", then move back to British Gas - but that sounds like a bit of a faff!

Bigphil1474

We had a problem with our gas meter too in our old house. The gas meter was outside on the rear wall, the electricity meter was in the cellar. The gas meter never sent any readings. We were with Sainsburys when it was installed (via Eon I think), and I used to email a lovely lady who was dealing with it every month for near on 2 years to find out if they could fix it. In the end we moved out and I stopped emailing her. She always promised to get it sorted to be fair, just never did. The main problem was the gas meter was so low down I had to lay down to read it. Can you get the electric meter moved?

Our newer house has the 2 meters about 2 meters apart. They work fine.