Should I get a smart meter?

[Puddy_Tat]

I'm not keen on having a bunch of electrical appliances each more intelligent than I am conversing with each other around the house.

i'm also concerned about the prospect of my toaster getting hacked by the russians

 

[fishfinger]

i'm also concerned about the prospect of my toaster getting hacked by the russians

In Russia, bread toast you:

 

[NoXion]

Fuck smart meters. Intrusive and unnecessary bullshit. All my electricity supplier needs to know is how much electricity I am using, so that they can bill me appropriately. Actually they don't even need to know that, because I used a pre-paid meter. But of course they're jacking up all the non-smart tariffs in a scummy attempt at getting people to trade their privacy for cheaper bills. Absolute fucking cunts.

Nothing I've heard about smart meters provides any benefit to me. They're being pushed by the government because the climate crisis is apparently the perfect excuse to spy on peoples' electricity usage. Fuck off.

 

[pogofish]

I'm simply not convinced the technology is fully sorted-out yet - even with SMETS-2 meters.

Everyone I know with one seems to have had no-end of problems, from the person who was being awoken at all hours of the night by the "beep-beep-beep" noises when it tried to connect to the one who got a twenty-thousand pound bill off the company because it wasn't reading properly - Her normal for the same period would usually be less than a hundred! They got sorted of course but not without a lot of faffing about with crap customer services.

Then there is also the matter that if the worst does happen, it seems to be a lot easier to cut-off someone on a smart meter compared to conventual. So that's a negative too.

And past experiences with "credit accounts" building-up unfeasible balances/monthly bills and taking forever and sometimes the intervention of a solicitor to get any money back out of them means I'm now submitting my own readings regularly and paying just what I've used at the beginning of every month. Which is working very well now.

If you have physical problems reading your meter, what a friend does is to take a digital snap of her meters from a comfortable position and enter the reading off her computer/phone screen.

 

[Guineveretoo]

No use me getting a smart meter because there's no mobile coverage in the valley. I've heard stories about it being difficult to transfer supplier. That's true of the first-generation meters (SMETS 1) but second generation (SMETS 2) apparently don't have that problem. I think some suppliers are still installing first generation meters though.

I find the ads somewhat annoying with the little kiddies pleading with us to save the planet by installing the things. Suppliers mainly (as I understand it) want them so that they don't need to employ meter readers any more. Mind you readings are pretty well all estimated now anyway.

They supposedly help balance out electricity usage because you can see the meter reading and so switch off stuff at expensive times. Not sure that's too useful because withouth them you can just not switch stuff on at expensive times. In future suppliers will want to switch your equipment off remotely again to balance out electricity usage. Not sure I'd want them to do that either though.

Would be interested to hear of any actual environmental benefits.

They need mobile coverage? I thought they just used the internet.

I only just realised that the meter reader might be biased and trying to save his job!

I thought their installation was being funded by the government?

am I getting everything wrong?

 

[Guineveretoo]

Ours is just a box that npower sent us to plug in so no installation needed.
We also don’t have to read our meters now which is a bonus.
We’re about to switch supplier so I don’t know what happens there, maybe the new supplier gives you a new smart device and we return the old one? I really don’t think that’s a barrier to switching, I thought it would make it much easier.

I have to book to get one installed.

 

[two sheds]

Neighbour had a smart meter fitted but it didn't work because there's no mobile coverage so I'm assuming yes you need it.

((((meter readers))))

Not sure about funding, either government or utilities themselves.

The government websites talk about putting consumers 'in control of their energy supply' and stress how much people can save from their energy bill. Seems bollocks to me but I may be wrong.

 

[Guineveretoo]

These days, most people don’t have meter readers coming round but have to read the meters themselves. I had great difficulty persuading Bulb that I needed someone to come and read them because I’m disabled.

my father, who is 91 and lives alone, has to crawl to read one meter monthly and climb a step ladder to read the other one. Every fucking month! I’ve told his supplier that he’s not going to do it anymore.

I think a smart meter will help him. Although they’re not yet being fitted where he is.

 

[l'Otters]

IME if you don’t send a meter reading in to Bulb they eventually send a human round to do that.

 

[pogofish]

IME if you don’t send a meter reading in to Bulb they eventually send a human round to do that.

However, that could be as infrequently as once every two years, which I think is the minimum legal requirement that still persists even if you have a smart meter.

In the meantime they will still be estimating, based on an "average" family who seem to be mainlining electricity, so it won't be helping your bank balance. I had this with my mother, who as she got more frail and her eyesight faded, became less able to read her meters and was being billed ever-increasing "estimated" readings. By the time I got her sorted out, she got a four-figure sum refunded. Then I was punctilious about summitting readings for her but her credit-plan amounts still rose to about double what she was actually using, except for a few months when they reduced her payments and brought it down a little.

 

[pogofish]

I thought their installation was being funded by the government?

IIRC there was some funding in the first stage but it was more to cover the suppliers costs in training new generations of installers and setting-up/integrating the new reading network/technologies.

Since then, it has been more of a carrot and stick approach with suppliers facing serious-level penalties and stricter limits on other investment incentives for not meeting the government's somewhat high target levels and tight timescales for installations. Although I see that COVID has made them extend the current period timescale that was due to be-up this year to 2024.

And any incentives passed-on to the customers for switching seem to be pretty limited. A discount is fine but I'd rather be paying a tariff that I know I can still be able to afford on an ongoing basis, long-term than one which will rise significantly in two years or so when any incentive period ends.

 

[moose]

Do smart meters need to be plugged into the mains? I have a dearth of plug sockets.

 

[gentlegreen]

Do smart meters need to be plugged into the mains? I have a dearth of plug sockets.

They replace your existing meter - hardwired between the supplier fuse and your fusebox ...

 

[gentlegreen]

My 10 day rolling average daily electricity consumption is currently 8.7 units per day - total cost approx £1.82 - subtract my baseline 8 units that's been the same for years, it's costing me approx 52p per day to use the fan heater.
Peak usage was around 8th Jan when it was 23.8 units per day or £4,27 - so heating was £2.97...

 

[magneze]

I trust energy companies to automatically read energy consumption about as much as I trust insurance companies not to jack up auto-renewal premiums unnecessarily.

"You don't need to worry about it, let us take care of it"

They will take a mile.

 

[Guineveretoo]

IME if you don’t send a meter reading in to Bulb they eventually send a human round to do that.

My father is not with Bulb, he is with EON.Next. They have a duty to provide a meter reader for vulnerable/disabled people, but they just keep sending him letters and emails telling him he needs to read the meter, so he dutifully does. I have forbidden him to do so. Although he will forget and do it again once he gets another email.

 

[farmerbarleymow]

I've not been hassled about this for years now - not sure why. They badgered me at the last place which I ignored.

 

[farmerbarleymow]

My father is not with Bulb, he is with EON.Next. They have a duty to provide a meter reader for vulnerable/disabled people, but they just keep sending him letters and emails telling him he needs to read the meter, so he dutifully does. I have forbidden him to do so. Although he will forget and do it again once he gets another email.

I'd complain as that seems to be a direct breach of their obligations to vulnerable customers.

 

[Guineveretoo]

I'd complain as that seems to be a direct breach of their obligations to vulnerable customers.

I am in the process of doing so. Not just about that, but about the whole thing. They have been awful. But not for this thread.

 

[two sheds]

I am in the process of doing so. Not just about that, but about the whole thing. They have been awful. But not for this thread.

Taking a photograph of the meter reading as someone suggested sounds excellent idea. Can he do this (sorry I missed if you said he couldn't). I occasionally need to check my house gutters aren't blocked and I'm not hugely happy up the top of tall ladders so I duck tape my phone to a long pole, set the phone to record a movie and raise it to a useful position. Works nicely

 

[Guineveretoo]

Taking a photograph of the meter reading as someone suggested sounds excellent idea. Can he do this (sorry I missed if you said he couldn't). I occasionally need to check my house gutters aren't blocked and I'm not hugely happy up the top of tall ladders so I duck tape my phone to a long pole, set the phone to record a movie and raise it to a useful position. Works nicely

My father doesn't have a smart phone, or even a digital camera, and he lives alone, and the electricity meter is above his front door and requires a stepladder to access. So no, taking a photo is not feasible/relevant, since my concern is to stop him climbing the stepladder at all!

 

[cybershot]

The whole smart meter thing is somewhat more confusing than I first thought.

I thought a smart meter was just some thing you plugged it and it monotored your energy usage and let you see your meter readings, however does the whole meter itself need changing too?

When I moved in here in Dec I've got some main digital type main meter with lots of buttons (I had to google just how to get to the meter readings) and it's this that is 'smart' and the energy company can read it remotly. When I moved in here it was with OVO and I switched to E.ON. While with OVO it displayed the tariff name also, but doesn't with E.on, but they are still able to read it remotly.

The little smart meter that sits in the kitchen also still works but that obviously just communicates with the big meter. it still displays OVO logo when it's powered on, but still gets all the right e.on tariff costs, fancy graphs and when Economy 7 flips in and all that jazz. It hasn't been as annoying as I expected it to be.

 

[Sasaferrato]

I have been thinking of getting a smart meter for my gas and electricity because it is such a pain (literally, in my case) reading the meter and I understood that smart meters automatically tell the company how much you have used.

But a chap came to read my meters yesterday and, without prompting from me, said I should not get one. He said that you can't transfer to another company if you have got one, he said that they often break, he said that I would still need to read the meters, and he said that they would be in exactly the same place as they are now.

I have only been holding off booking the installation of one because of covid, since I am vulnerable, but I think I am now ready. Today, I got an email reminder that I can get a smart meter fitted for free.

But I am confused now.

Should I get one?

Do any of you guys already have one?

A Latin phrase has been my guide for a lot of years, if you cannot understand why something is, then apply 'cui bono' who benefits.

The adverts feed you crap about 'controlling usage' 'saving you money' etc.

Well, for most of us heat and light have been a major part of our household expenditure for ever, and we are careful not to waste energy.

So how does a smart meter benefit you? The simple answer is that it doesn't. Incidentally, whether you have one or not, you are paying for it in the form of a tariff on your bill.

Smart meters benefit only the power companies. It does this in two ways, firstly, they don't need to employ so many meter readers, secondly, and this is the real bonus to the power companies, it enables variable pricing. When demand is high, they raise the price you are paying, thereby maximising their profit.

 

[moose]

They replace your existing meter - hardwired between the supplier fuse and your fusebox ...

Oh god - there's a lot of Bakelite and Heath Robinson-esque contraptions in my meter cupboard

 

[Sasaferrato]

The only conceivable benefit to me would be stopping the constant emails telling me to get one fitted

I got one E-mail from Scottish Power re smart meters. I rang them, told them if they bothered me again, they would lose my custom. Nothing further heard.

 

[andysays]

However, that could be as infrequently as once every two years, which I think is the minimum legal requirement that still persists even if you have a smart meter.

In the meantime they will still be estimating, based on an "average" family who seem to be mainlining electricity, so it won't be helping your bank balance. I had this with my mother, who as she got more frail and her eyesight faded, became less able to read her meters and was being billed ever-increasing "estimated" readings. By the time I got her sorted out, she got a four-figure sum refunded. Then I was punctilious about summitting readings for her but her credit-plan amounts still rose to about double what she was actually using, except for a few months when they reduced her payments and brought it down a little.

In my experience, which I realise may not be typical, once you've had an account for a while the estimates are based on your previous consumption, so hopefully your friend isn't typical, not that that's any consolation to her.

I've been contacted recently about having a smart meter, and I don't have any objection in principle (unless the stuff about them being able to interfere with the supply remotely is true), but I can also see that some people might have good reasons (or even not particularly good reasons) for not getting one, and I don't think it's right that they should be obliged to have one installed if they don't want it.

 

[andysays]

My father doesn't have a smart phone, or even a digital camera, and he lives alone, and the electricity meter is above his front door and requires a stepladder to access. So no, taking a photo is not feasible/relevant, since my concern is to stop him climbing the stepladder at all!

I realise it's never as simple as this, but if the meter is somewhere inaccessible for the customer, surely the company should be moving it to somewhere more accessible?

 

[two sheds]

My father doesn't have a smart phone, or even a digital camera, and he lives alone, and the electricity meter is above his front door and requires a stepladder to access. So no, taking a photo is not feasible/relevant, since my concern is to stop him climbing the stepladder at all!

worth buying a cheap phone that takes films? Then as I say he only has to lift the phone on a pole and pause it in front of the meter to show the reading, doesn't need to go near the ladder.

 

[philosophical]

It is a con, and because of the money spaffed on this crap already the authorities are desperate to get you to accept them.
Some months ago I was reading about antipathy towards smart meters in France, and seem to remember that one feature of how intrusive they can be is that it is possible to learn quite a lot about your lifestyle and habits from them.

 

[WouldBe]

I realise it's never as simple as this, but if the meter is somewhere inaccessible for the customer, surely the company should be moving it to somewhere more accessible?

They can for a price. I enquired about having my meter moved from inside to the outside when I moved in here 20+ years ago. The meter had to move literally one foot. They wanted £400. I didn't bother.