Monday we finally got our smart meter installed, should have been Friday bu t despite Scottish Power reminding me with texts every day for a week to be in for the install they never told the installers they were due on Friday. After getting onto Amey their installer I managed to get an appointment fo r the following Monday after initially being offered 31st December as the n ext available appointment!
This morning had to phone Scottish Power because the In Home Display (IHD) appears faulty despite being on constant charge the battery shows no sign o f charging and the display only stays on for a few minutes before the scree n shuts down so instead of getting a constant readout you have to switch on every time wait for it to communicate with the smart meter before download ing any data. As with many things these days it does it does not come with any instructions you are directed to go online for them only problem is the only instructions are those for a previous model! So I asked the Customer Services Advisor to replace the IHD, first he suggests change the batterie s, I point out they are rechargeables and the unit is a sealed affair with no access panel for the batteries and there are only two screws hidden behi nd the stand one of which is painted with anti-tamper paint both seem part of the case fixings. I ask him to send out a replacement, they cannot do th at as they have run out of IHDs and even new customers are not getting one with their install! I ask when will more become available the reply is not till next year and they do not have a date for when new stock will be avail able! So much for being able get an instant picture of my power usage, he s uggested you can always go online and get the usage data but I could do tha t before without a smart meter!
Mind you Scottish Power are not the only utility supplier I have had proble ms with, Northern Gas Networks was the next. We are currently in the proces s of installing a new kitchen and as you may have gathered from previous th reads this has involved demolishing a pantry moving and replacing a CU a to tal kitchen rewire as well as moving meters about. So I am trying to get al l these things put right whilst there is still easy access to everything. S o the next issue is the gas stop c*ck whose operating lever is tight agains t the wall and has been awkward to use even with reasonable access and will be much more awkward once access is through a smaller base unit. The solut ion is quite simple, rotate the valve through 180 deg. Except that the supp ly pipe to the boiler from the meter will prevent the valve opening the ful l 90deg. I ask Scottish Power will the smart meter installers do any altera tions to the pipe work? The answer is all they do is replace the gas meter and reconnect as before get onto your NDO for anything to do with the suppl y pipe.
Along comes the Northern Gas Networks inspector. The valve needs rotating a nd he can see the problem with the supply pipe. The first suggestion is we will move the valve and meter outside into a wall hung box and reconnect th rough the existing hole in the wall to the internal supply pipe. Great thin ks I except it is not that simple it is going to require a hole digging bec ause they have to run plastic pipe up to the meter now. SWAMBO went ballist ic understandably since we had only forked out £2000 the year before f or a new drive and his proposal meant disturbing the top end at least and p ossibly a trench down the full length. What amazed me was that he had no re cord if the underground part of the supply pipe was already plastic. He cou ld tell by the the type of metal pipe emerging at neighbouring properties t hat the underground pipe work was plastic and suspected ours was too but co uld not be definite. So back inside can you simply rotate the valve leaving the meter where it is and divert the internal supply pipe to allow full mo vement of the lever. The answer is the valve can be moved but I will have t o arrange my own Gas Safe plumber with permissions to do meter work to rero ute the pipe! What I do not understand is if they moved the meter out they would reconnect the internal supply pipe but making it easy to access the v alve lever is no. I am sure when I filled in the online job request it ment ioned they would reconnect any internal supply pipe up to 60cm as a result of any meter movement and depending on how neat they did the job that is th e maximum required. In the end he went back to his office to raise a job or der to have the valve rotated and I would be left with organising a plumber to do the rest.
As you can gather I am not a happy bunny but at least I got it off my t*ts for now and it is rant over! I just cannot believe what is patently a simpl e job can be made so complicated it seems like a throwback to the 60/70s wh en we used to have those ?who turned the tap? disputes.
Richard