[RedBeard89]

Good afternoon all,

We recently (25th August) moved to a new property where e.on next are the provider.

Around the 25th September I took an eletricity meter reading to ensure our first bill would be accurate, however, to my horror it showed that within a 34 day period, we had clocked up 1660kWh of electricity usage.

A few days later we received the associated bill for over £300 of electricity.

Not quite believing what we were seeing, I started to investigate what might be draining so much power.

First, I experimented by shutting off all appliances and outlets - this resulted in our meter showing a constant LED - presumably denoting 0 usage. I then tried to see what usage individual appliances registered over an hour period - first with just our router (2kWh) then the Fridge (2kWh) then the freezer (2kWh).

Noticing a pattern, I then preceeded to take a meter reading every hour across the period of a day during normal usage:

11923 - 11:30AM 30/9/22
11925 - 12:30PM 30/9/22
11927 - 1:30PM 30/9/22
11928 - 2:30PM 30/9/22
11930 - 3:33PM 30/9/22
11932 - 4:33PM 30/9/22
11934 - 5:33PM 30/9/22
11942 - 9:33PM 30/9/22
11944 - 10:33PM 30/9/22
11966 - 9:33AM 1/10/22
11968 - 10:33AM 1/10/22
11971 - 11:33AM 1/10/22
11974 - 12:33PM 1/10/22

Again - this seemed to confirm my suspicions - a roughly 2kWh per hour consumption being registered via the meter regardless of our usage.

Here is a picture of our meter, it's a Landis+Gyr E470 SMETS1 with a Trilliant SEAP-2001 comms unit attached.

Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated - it's clocking up over £10 a day in usage and e.on said they won't be able to send an engineer out until 11th November at the earliest!

Kind regards,

RedBeard89

[JoeSoap]

@RedBeard89

It would be interesting to see what your meter says you're using if you consume over 2kW in any one hour period. @theunknowntech gives advice on meters but in the meantime did you accept the offer of an engineer visit on 11th November?

[meldrewreborn]

@RedBeard89

The E.On response is ridiculous. Make a formal complaint and demand earlier action.

The consumer advice though is rather weak on this topic. See here:

Check if your energy meter is faulty - Citizens Advice

nothing about reasonable repair times.

see this also.
Electricity meters: independent testing of accuracy - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

[RedBeard89]

@JoeSoap

I did take up their offer of an engineer to investigate the meter from 11th November - despite chasing they insist this is the earliest available date...

[meldrewreborn]

@RedBeard89

Make sure he is bringing a replacement meter - not just checking it.

[RedBeard89]

@JoeSoap I don't recall a single hour period where the consumption has dropped below or spiked above 2kWh. It seems to be very consistent at all hours.

[JoeSoap]

@RedBeard89

In that case, until the issue is resolved, to make up for the hours where you're getting charged in excess of your usage, you could get all the heavy consumption stuff done and get charged less.

[Mailman]

@RedBeard89

Are you absolutely sure that you have'nt got some device (hard wired) that is causing the issue. System Boiler HW tank always switched on?

I'd try turning off the electricity at the fuse box for 30 mins recording the meter reading when you start and when you finish. Should be 0 difference but I think you have done this. Then turn on the mains but turn off all the individual circuit breakers. Try turning them on, one by one to see if one of your circuits is causing such a large usage and see what appliances are running off that circuit.

If you haven't already done this do a meter sanity test by switching everything off at the consumer unit (fuse box) and watching the red LED labelled '1000 Imp/kWh' or similar for at least five minutes and make sure that it never flashes once. Then switch on just one high powered item (a full kettle is ideal) and count the number of flashes (impulses) in one minute. Multiply that number by 60 and divide by 1000 (or the figure next to the LED) and that gives you the power being drawn by the kettle. Check the rating plate on the kettle and they should match up.

It's a rough and ready check because the power drawn depends on the local voltage and the kettle rating may not be exact but it should indicate whether the meter really does need further investigation.

[meldrewreborn]

@Mailman

I think the issue here is that the usage is always 2kWh per hour, irrespective of all the tests. To my non expert mind that means the meter is kaput.

[theunknowntech]

If you have a SMETS1 L+G meter, I'd definitely accept any offer to upgrade to SMETS2 equipment if it were me! :)

To me, it sounds like the current meter has failed. Not surprising given how easy it is to crash L+G meters...