My eyes would roll when I used to read about problems with early smart meters and I refused to have one.
Now the electric company is billing monthly using estimates and home readings which can be messy.
Have the wrinkles been ironed out with the meters and is it worth getting one now?
I think the main wrinkles are to do with:
- installation and setup problems
- weak signal issues
Installation is things like your installer not setting things up right, which can take some chasing to get the supplier to sort out.
Signal issues include the meters not being able to phone home due to lack of signal, or the gas and electric meters not talking to each other because of wall construction. If you're in the southern half of England they use O2's
2G network for the uplink, so if you have good O2 signal you should be OK.For ours, the installer put in an isolator and upgraded the meter tails for free, which was nice. However they didn't set up the IHD correctly (because COVID) and it took several emails to Octopus to get them to sort it out, which they eventually did. It all works fine, and I set up half hourly readings which come through on their website.
Wouldn't go back to an old meter now. In particular at the moment it's very handy to know actual consumption day to day, rather than getting a bill for a gazillion pounds at the end of the billing period.
Theo
Haven't there been incompatibility problems with smartmeters when switching suppliers? Something to do with an early version smartmeter.
Can you insist only the latest generation meter gets installed?
There's also something to do with the smartmeter losing connection with your display device and not being able to reset.
Has all this been sorted out now?
That was the old SMETS1 meters, which I think were previously communicating directly with the supplier. SMETS1 meters are now gradually being enrolled on the same middleman network as the current SMETS2 ones - that network serves all the suppliers so switching should work in the same way.
There was additionally a thing where some minnow suppliers weren't registered on the smart meter network so if you switched to them they didn't get readings - I suspect most of the laggards have now gone bust.
Only SMETS2 meters will be installed unless there's a really really good reason why they can't.
Can't say I've experienced that, but they should be able to push profiles from their end. My device wasn't communicating and now it is, so it can be done. If there is a more fundamental problem (your meter is in a lead lined cupboard underground) there's not much that will help.
Theo
Though not all SMETS1 meters (mine included) can be "adopted" by DCC.
Depends what you call wrinkles. For me as a blind person, I had to get one since it is impossible for me to read a conventional meter. The first one I had last august failed at Christmas, when it decided that it was not going to turn on the economy 7 part at night. The user display seems to have no way to look at the night and day units, except at day and night, IE it will show a change in how much kwh price wise it is, but seemingly only when its in the time that the system is actually on. So its very difficult to really do a budget. I mean at that tariff, if I lived my life between the E7 hours my bills would be much lower!
It does at least talk to me though. Lets see how long the new meter lasts before it goes wrong. Things are just not made as robustly as they used to be, as the previous meter was electronic with an lcd display, but lasted for many years. I do not know what happens if you change supplier. the bumph suggests that any company can set it up to let them know the readings, but in reality, many seem to not be able to get that to work. At the moment I'm on a fixed tariff till 2024, but the industry seems to be looking toward dynamic pricing, in other words meters can be told to charge variable amounts during the day to reflect costs and demand. That would be anarchy, since nobody could possibly budget for their energy usage at all. Brian
Well the display is Bluetooth, and mine works fine. I was very surprised, however that the internal battery in the audio visual display only lasts for about an hour or so. Seems a bit weedy these days. I had to get a new power supply cable as the original one went intermittent near the display end. Its not a robust USB C its some naff connector seemingly made out of a bit of bent tin with a pcb poking out of it.
Brian
The installer told me that there are connections inside meters for external aerials now, but they are only needed when the signal is too low. He said he had never had one that could not be resisted to get a signal, but then he would say that! Like you I needed a second visit to reconfigure the meter as they were not getting readings, and as I said another visit to replace the faulty meter after some months. Brian
I am currently using an old BG 'minim' monitor (it's a clamp device on the meter tails with a battery-powered sender to the desk display).
It tells me I've used 1.44kWh 0000 - 0900; that I used 11.14kWh yesterday; 74.66 in the last 7 days; 328.98 in the last 30 days.
It doesn't communicate with a middleman, there are no signal issues, I didn't need a change of meter, and my meter isn't vulnerable to being monitored, controlled, or hacked by Non-State Actor.
I send my readings once a month to my supplier, and get an up-to-date readout of my account status in less than 24 hours.
I have no plans to have an EV and therefore don't need a 'smart charger' to go with my 'smart meter'. or to have the EV used to supply peak demand when the renewables give out yet again.
Right now, there are no advantages whatsoever to my having a 'smart meter', and I suspect I'm not alone in this.
I somehow doubt it. They seem to become dumb meters again about three months after installation round here. Non existent mobile signal.
I'm due to have mine replaced since the antediluvian counter rotating dials one is "over 15 years old" (actually >27 years old to my certain knowledge) and has recently wrapped around to zero.
It should be fun! Electricity comes in at roof height and the existing meter and mains supply is 9' off the ground in a really awkward corner. I have warned them. Guy reads it with a phone on a selfie stick.
Smart meters once they have gone wrong you have to press various buttons to see the reading which isn't so easy that high up! When it goes wrong I have no intention of reading it for them - too dangerous!
Remote readings worked fine before the collapse of my last supplier (Igloo) and the transfer to Eon. Now, only the gas works remotely, so I have to send manual readings. I'd assume this'll be sorted soon.
The IHD is a bit primitive, needing a lot of scrolling to get any info. And has a very short range - mine will only work reliably within a few feet of the meter. Which defeats the point more than a little.
However, the info on apps posted by Theo (thanks!) makes accessing the data far easier, although I haven't been able to get the raw data out just yet - complicated IMHO.
Brian Gaff (Sofa) used his keyboard to write :
Yes, but they are a lot more complex than the were, more complex more to go wrong. More chances of yet to be found bugs in the firmware.
What is supposed to happen now, is that all meters report to an intermediary, then the intermediary reports on to the supplier.
Brian Gaff (Sofa) explained :
The system tried by octopus (??) was one where the consumer would be emailed the cost per unit + times, the day before, giving them advance warning and the choice of when to consume. Sometimes there was negative costing - they paid you to consume. Might work well if none time crucial items could be automated in their consumption.
Since april 2021 their "agile" prices have ramped upwards, spending far more time pegged at the maximum 35p rate than at or below zero.
e.g.
It seems to me that the theory is great, but the appliance market has not even begun to scratch the surface of building this into equipment that non-geeks can easily just plug and play.
Chris
Even if all appliances were smarter, there?s only so much power consumption you can time shift. Dishwashers and washing washing machines come to mind but beyond that, that?s about it for most people.
I did rather like the idea of frequency sensing fridge & freezers that could delay kicking in during peaks of demand on the grid. Maybe kettles could have a lower power mode to spread the peak demand load too?
Of course if we all get into battery storage then a lot more possibilities open up. It?s just the the cost per kWHr is still a bit eye watering.
Tim
Washing machines don't timeshift well. Yes you can run them in the middle of the night, but then, when you get up, you have a machine full of damp clothes!
It'll be a long time until most people can afford any significant sized batteries.
And a heap of annoyed neighbours that you have kept awake all night.
But no big deal if that is just before you get up and deal with them.
Not if you consider the battery as part of the house price.
I cant hear mine washing at all, and the neighbours certainly can't.
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.