Smart Meters
- Thread starter Raymond Lin
- Start date
Soldato
It's not that they can't, they just don't want to.
Soldato
- Joined
- 19 Oct 2008
- Posts
- 5,951
We have anti-competitive laws yet rubbish like this has been allowed to happen.
I've said no quite a few times and they've given up calling me about it now. Also changed to Bulb so maybe EDF (previous supplier) were encouraging it too back when I was with them.
Waste of time IMO. Just like people should be able to work out for themselves that leaving things on costs them money, it's not difficult to work out that someone foots the bill for the installation/upgrading/possibly removal of the units. The software/infrastructure side has cost a fortune too.
Bulb bills me monthly and if I give them a meter reading, it's accurate
. A few mins to do too.All my meters are outside the property too so don't have the hassle of having to let someone in to check them periodically.
Associate
Not long ago I heard a news snippet where they said that the major energy suppliers would remove the meters for health reasons if you wanted them to do so.
Unfortunately after a quick google search nothing comes up, apart from something from edf who would remove them but it looks like the terms have changed already.
Funny thing you say that they are staying unless they catch fire, I've read plenty of stories from people who have lost their home due to their smart meter catching fire.
I would like to take you up on your offer and I'll PM you to take it out of this thread.
Unfortunately after a quick google search nothing comes up, apart from something from edf who would remove them but it looks like the terms have changed already.
Funny thing you say that they are staying unless they catch fire, I've read plenty of stories from people who have lost their home due to their smart meter catching fire.
I would like to take you up on your offer and I'll PM you to take it out of this thread.
They probably sacked all their meter readers as a "benefit" of going to smart meters.
Meter readers for most companies have actually really skilled as installers....
Lots of companies now use Morrison Data services to read meters. Just because meters are smart does not mean they won't be read by a third party. Under regulation the meter should be read every 12months by a representative of your supplier, that does not change with smart metering.
The chance of a meter catching fire is so remote it's mental, the ones that have caught fire are usually from poor installation (terminals not tightened enough, exposed copper and high moisture content in the air causing arking and so on) over 80% of smart meter fires are from tampering...
Soldato
This right here is what puts me off. Hourly tariffs will be weighted to extract the most out of the consumer, regardless of situation, under a guise of smart energy use.
Every household will eventually have them, until then I'll defer for as long as possible.
I just had a letter with red writing telling me that my mandatory safety inspection is overdue and to call them for an appointment ASAP.
Thinking maybe I’ll just get a smart meter installed as per their other letters rather than bother getting the ancient one inspected.
Bizarre though, they’ve never made contact before and now send this warning letter. They could have inspected this meter at any time during the 8 years I’ve owned the house but have never made contact before!
Thinking maybe I’ll just get a smart meter installed as per their other letters rather than bother getting the ancient one inspected.
Bizarre though, they’ve never made contact before and now send this warning letter. They could have inspected this meter at any time during the 8 years I’ve owned the house but have never made contact before!
It's one of the misleading letters they write. All of a sudden, your meter that's never needed a safety inspection needs to be changed for a new, smart meter. Because the companies stand to get hit hard with fines for not reaching the ill-thought out government targets for smart meter installation, they are resorting to some pretty dodgy tactics to get you to comply.
Hmm good perspective, do you think just ignore them and see if they write again? It does seem bizarre that they suddenly want to inspect it after 8 years which coincides with the recent bombardment of letters about smart meters from them.
There's been many reports of companies saying this sort of thing, making appointments without telling the customer, saying you must change your meter for legal reasons, etc. If you phone them to make an appointment for your "safety inspection", I guarantee they will use that call to upsell you to a smart meter installation.
We had an old style dial meter that was probably here for 30 years, and was never inspected. We changed it about 8 years ago to a modern meter (not smart) when we changed from Economy 7 dual tarrif, and that's never been inspected once beyond meter readings.
Associate
There is another option to all this, generate your own electricity and only use what you need, rather than wasting it, and I think we are all guilty of wasting electricity.
Tricky part of that is maintaining a generator large enough for your peak demand which would go unused a lot of the time
Who is your provider? Letters like that are only applicable if your meter is 30 years or older!
They cannot currently force you to change your meter unless there is a fault, but they have to prove there is a fault beyond reasonable doubt.
Meter could very easily be over 30 years old, 30 years is only 1989? It looks older than that to me but who knows! I think that it has a small silver date sticker on it mentioning 00 (2000?) but clearly that wasn’t the install date, I’m guessing that this was an inspection or calibration.
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the meter should have a ''cert date" to show its last certificated test date, most meters are installed within 3 years of that date. If you have a picture of it (by all means block out serial numbers and such) I can tell you how old it is.
Soldato
I'm with EDF at the moment, is there any argument I can give them for swapping my smart meters back to non-smart ones?
It's SMETS1 so doesn't work anyway, I don't really care much for having a smart one at all when I can just take meter readings myself.
It's SMETS1 so doesn't work anyway, I don't really care much for having a smart one at all when I can just take meter readings myself.
Unfortunately no, my employer will not remove smart for legacy, is it an EDF meter or other suppliers? You can have a smets2 meter installed but no point removing smets1 until they have to, i.e. when it needs to be replaced. If it's not working as smart then it is already working as a legacy meter as the 'mobile phone' section will turn off after 10 days of inactivity, and turn on for one day a month to check signal and connection.
Soldato
I have taken a pic of mine, the WAN and PWR lights are solid green, the HAN light blinks on & off and is a red/orange colour.
Perhaps I can wrap it in loads of foil so it can't call out?
It's in my cupboard. Morons attached the door so the hinge is on the right hand side. Looks like I could move it to the other side but I'd have to rotate the door 90 degrees, and it has what I presume is an earthing cable connected to the bottom hinge area.