[bobcdp]

I have a smart meter which was fitted by EON in June 22. From that time until the end of the contract period in August 24, each month I received bills, sometimes for gas and electric, sometimes for just gas and sometimes for just electric. I complained after a few months but despite email tennis with customer services, they never managed to sort the issue.

In August 24 I changed my energy supplier and took out a new contract with EDF.
They took over the existing smart meter and I received a single bill for gas and electric each month from August 24 to July 25 which is as it should be.

I went back to EON with a new contract in July 25 and the whole saga of multiple bills has started again. There is a definite pattern. Combined gas and electric bill on 3rd of each month, gas only bill around 8th of the month and electric only bill around 22nd of each month. Again I complained in August and had emails and phone calls explaining that there is a known issue which the Smart Metering Team were addressing and I would be advised when the issue was fixed.

It's now the end of October and the same issue still persists. Another complaint to customer services and this time another explanation.
"The team confirmed that this issue stems from a manufacturer fault with the way your particular smart meter communicates the gas and electricity readings to our billing system. The issue is not with our internal billing system but with the data being received from the meter itself. The Smart team is aware of this being a known technical glitch affecting a small number of customers with this meter type.
I am sorry to report that, at this time, the manufacturer has not provided us with a timeframe for when a fix will be implemented. This means I cannot promise you an exact date when the separate bills will stop."

I have no issues with the content of the bills which appear to be correct, neither do I have a problem with direct debit payments which are taken once a month.

I would be interested to know if other members of the forum are experiencing the same problems.

Many thanks

[HelenaP_EONNext]

@bobcdp I have looked into this as it is currently a known issue, but unfortunately a fix has still not yet been found but the team continues to be actively looking into this fault. I'm sorry you are affected by this issue and I hope we are able to provide you with further updates as soon as possible!

[HelenaP_EONNext]

@bobcdp Welcome to the community! I’m very sorry to hear the issue was not resolved previously when you raised this with customer service 😞

If your billing calendar is set to a certain date, a smart meter reading should pull automatically and then bill to that reading to receive a bill for the same period on both fuels, however I do believe that there is an issue for some where a smart reading is being updated automatically a second time in a month on different dates, which causes the separate bills.

I'm going to have a look into this further to see what I can find out and will let you know of any updates!

[geoffers]

Originally Posted by bobcdp

... The issue is not with our internal billing system but with the data being received from the meter itself...I would be interested to know if other members of the forum are experiencing the same problems...

@bobcdp : could you share the make/model of the Comms Hub (on top of the elec. meter) and the make/model of both the elec. and gas meters to see if others with the same combination are getting the same issue.

Could this be the same reason for @BruceM problems here https://community.eonnext.com/thread...ll=1#post60327

[BruceM]

@geoffers

Apparently they now know why....not holding my breath its resolved. Shame its taken almost 8 months to get to this stage.

Nice shift of blame tho, not our fault

I can now confirm that following our escalation to the senior technical architects, they have pinpointed the root cause:
The issue is with a historic billing calendar setting within a core industry-level system. This system is not directly accessible by E.ON Next and requires a correction to be implemented by the wider industry.
I have formally escalated this to our Smart Managers who are working directly with the industry to have this setting updated.

• Your feedback has been crucial. As a relatively new company, the issue you raised acted as an early warning. Since you first flagged this, we have received a number of similar complaints, confirming this is a new and wider issue. Your diligence has been essential in helping us identify, document, and now address this deep-seated system anomaly for all affected customers.
• The Smart Specialists are certain this industry-level correction will resolve all your billing issues and prevent the re-occurrence of incorrect charges.

This resolution will take effect on your next two scheduled statements:

• The fix is expected to be in place and reflected on your 01/11/25 statement.
• We will continue to monitor your account to ensure it is also correctly reflected on your 01/12/25 statement.

[geoffers]

@BruceM -👍 cool : I don't know how similar your issue was to the @bobcdp problem, but his billing seemed to be

• random with EOn,
• then fine when he moved to EDF
• Then random again when he moved back to EOn

So it doesn't actually sound to be that industry-wide 😵‍💫

[BruceM]

Originally Posted by HelenaP_EONNext

@bobcdp I have looked into this as it is currently a known issue, but unfortunately a fix has still not yet been found but the team continues to be actively looking into this fault. I'm sorry you are affected by this issue and I hope we are able to provide you with further updates as soon as possible!

@HelenaP_EONNext

What is the known issue? Please share as the ombudsman would also be interested

[meldrewreborn]

Apparently the billing system at EDF copes with the industry wide problem better than Eon Next does. One solution for Eon Next would be to replace the smart meter combination that is causing the problem- simple if it’s “a small number of customers affected”.

this is obviously an issue beyond the ability of forum members to have diagnosed, but hopefully the support here has been beneficial.

[bobcdp]

Good Morning

First off, I would like to thank you all for your interest and replies.

Not sure exactly how this forum works and how to answer the points raised but here goes:

Helena_P_EONNext Many thanks for your welcome and for looking into this issue.

meldrewreborn Replacing the meter or meters is as you point out, the obvious solution and I am about to wite to EON again and ask them to do exactly that but will hang on a few days and see if BruceM (see below) is correct and I don't get a gas statement shortly.

geoffers Not quite correct. I did say that the billing was fine with EDF and then when I switched back to EON the readings were not random. They conformed to a definite pattern as far as dates were concerned and that was checked over a number of months.

BruceM Thank you. That sounds hopeful. I have already received a correct statement this month dated 03/11/25 with readings up to 01/11/25 which is correct. I will wait with baited breath to see if you are correct and I don't get any more before December. If the previous pattern continues. I will get a gas statement in a few days time. I will update and let you know.

geoffers Re your question on meters etc. The electric meter is Landis & Gyr E470 Type 5424 and the comms hub is Toshiba SKU1 Cellular. As to the gas meter, I'm afraid it's deep in the bowels of my kitchen cupboard and I'm far too ancient to go grovelling in there looking for numbers.

[geoffers]

Originally Posted by bobcdp

@geoffers Re your question on meters etc. The electric meter is Landis & Gyr E470 Type 5424 and the comms hub is Toshiba SKU1 Cellular.

@bobcdp - that is exactly the same comms-hub/meter combination which I have with no billing issues, (though I am on a ½ hourly ToU tariff) so it's doubtful whether there is any issue with your actual meter.

Looking further into @BruceM 's description of billing calendar complications I've come up with the following, which may or may not be relevant...

My assumption was that (for simple billing) at the end of the billing period the supplier would just take a meter reading (maybe using SRV 4.1.1 ReadInstantaneousImportRegisters) in the same way as using a customer's reading to manually produce a bill

However delving deeper, there appears to be a "billing data log" maintained by the meter itself which can be called on demand, or queued for future action by the DCC

SRV 4.4.3 RetrieveBillingCalendarTriggeredBillingDataLog with the following inputs

• ExecutionDateTime - [supplier] require the Service Request to be executed at a future date and time
• ReadLogPeriod - The Start and End Date-Times for which the data is required

With the SMETS2 spec stating..

5.6.4.9 Billing Data Log
A log for storing the following UTC date and time stamped entries:
i. twelve entries comprising Tariff TOU Register Matrix(5.6.4.34), Tariff TOU Block Register Matrix(5.6.4.35), the Active Import Register(5.6.4.3) and the Active Export Register(5.6.4.2);
ii. five entries comprising prepayment credits;
iii. ten entries comprising time-based debt payments;
iv. ten entries comprising payment-based debt payments; and
v. twelve entries comprising Meter Balance(5.6.4.24), Emergency Credit Balance(5.6.4.15), Accumulated Debt Register(5.6.4.1), Payment Debt Register(5.6.4.25) and Time Debt Registers [1 … 2](5.6.4.36),

So possibly this could be the issue, if suppliers are using this to control their billing.

The L&G E470 manual says this


I also found another meter spec which states the contents of the billing log



So with all these added complications, there clearly is plenty of opportunity for inconsistencies in billing timings: with future dated SVR calls to the DCC, billing dates set on the meter's own log etc.

<edit> also for general interest, found this document where it was potentially going to cost £2.2million to implement changes relating to Billing Logs & Smets1 meters 😯
https://smartenergycodecompany.co.uk...ry-march-2022/ </edit>