Doh! Octopus & meter replacement

Well, good luck with that.

Here, Octopus has made five appointments, two of which they never turned up for - and the smart meter is still not working as intended.

What is more, the entire system is crap. The historic data Octopus offer as a download is neither accurate nor fixed.

A complete shambles.

to be fair, the data they provide comes from the DCC ...

Dave

I know they gt their wrists slapped during covid for too much rubber-stamping of the process to swap people onto pre-pay meters, but I though the block on that had been lifted now?

I think it's "don't communicate the readings" rather than "read inaccurately"

And long before smart meters they had a legal obligation to change meters for calibration/certification reason, usually solely based on the amount of time since previously changed/fitted. Often these target were not met.

If your gas supplier wants you to have a smart meter, saying that you don't have a smart electric meter shuts them up as smart gas meters have to communicate with a smart electric meter for the same premises.

I get the occasional month, where DCC haven't sent Octopus my readings in time for my bill to be published. Octopus estimate the readings. To be fair they have never been outrageously inaccurate, and sometimes lower than actual. However, regardless, I send them the new readings via the app, and a revised bill is published within an hour or two.

And how many are first generation? Many meters claimed not working still works as a dumb meter.

There was also the false advertising that a smart meter was going to save you hundreds of pounds. Later the industry had to admit that the savings were insignificant and in reality possibly more to do with households changing to low energy light bulbs and replacing a gas boiler with a modern condensing boiler.

It is surely Octopus who change the data offered via the Octopus web-site?

But that is what they based your bill on!

If you have elected Octopus to have half hour data wouldn't the bill be a day out, at most? You have the option on their web site (your account) to store smart meter data half hourly, daily or monthly. I wonder if this has been set to monthly?

Log into your account Then "my energy" Scroll down to Quick Links and "my smart data preferences"

This link doesn't seem to be on the app.

The data still comes from a third party (DCC) but it seems that what they save (or maybe how often it is requested) can be set by the customer to every 30 minutes, daily or monthly.

When set to every 30 minutes you can download a .cvs file for a spread sheet where the usage is for a 30 minute resolution. Note: when asking for this download on their web page it may take 5+ minutes or more before the download starts if you select a period of a month or more.

You can request an Octopus mini for free where they are experimenting with getting meter reading directly via your wi-fi and then over the Internet. The app reposts in near real time your consumption for electricity (the gas meter only reports every 30 minutes)

They need more than their wrists being slapped:

OK.

I can see instantaneous electric use, and gas use delayed by 30 mins (because the Gas meter only sends data to the comms unit at the end of each 30 min session) thanks to the Octopus Mini dongle

However, I'm only ever billed monthly, where I receive a pdf statement, and 30/31 pages of half hourly data histograms for each day (I'm on the Smart EV charging tariff)

My SMETS1 gas meter died after 13(?) years due to battery, they came out and replaced both meters, so can't be that many old ones around, when did they start SMETS2?

Yes, but the DCC harvested data, is still subject to a 36 hr delay. The Octopus Mini does indeed 'front load' that missing rolling 36 hr gap, but because the Mini is not an accredited billing device, Octopus can only really tag its data as 'estimates'

If you are observant, you'll often see a kWh figure obtained from the Mini, be 'overwritten' once the DCC data arrives. It's a tiny difference, less than a 100 watt/Hour (<0.1 kWh) figure (out of 9 or 10 kWh for a day)

Oh no they don't (but the gas supplier may not have a gas only comms hub).

They are perfectly able to install a modern smart meter, but install it without the 'smart' enabled, basically in dumb mode.

One in five, with major faults, sounds a bit extreme - more likely, one in five do not work fully, such thing as occasional glitches in communicating readings back to base, and problem with the In Home Display, such as it failing to connect.

I've had smarts now for maybe ten years, with now real issues at all.

Many STEMS 1, could be upgraded to 2.