[pm002]

Hi,

i had a new smart meter installed back in may 2023 and at that time the switching mode changed, it used to be active from 2230-0030 and 0230-0730 (GMT) but since smart meter install it has been 0030-0730

i didnt realise at the time but following a horrible bill i turned on the IHD and have monitored it incessantly since jan 2024

i have raised this with E.On, and also via the Ombudsman, but both refuse to accept the supply is not switchng at the correct times, and that i am being over billed (of note my bill went up by 50% with no change in usage)

i think the ALCS is incorrect somehow from my research, but the meter programming keeps being checked out ok and i doubt a normal field technician will understand my issue

E.On refused to send a technician out to investigate/swop meter and redo the installation so i had to spend 2 nights taking videos of the mart meter IHD and my economy 7 supply activation to prove it, but because it is only 2 hours out that is within their tolerances

surely the activation of billinng and supply at the same time, for an Economy 7 service is a fundamental prerequisite?

[retrotecchie]

@pm002

You are, or were, one of the fairly rare E7 customers in a particular supply area where the 7 hours of Economy 7 time is split. Smart meters, although in theory capable of being programmed to these legacy E7 split timings are no longer set up as such for the simple reason that the necessity of needing a non contiguous 7 hours in a particular area no longer exists. All new E7 meters and installs use the straight seven hours as is now the case with your new meter. Split E7 hasn't been in use since before the electricity industry was privatised and opened up for competition.

Unfortunately, your original meter was probably installed by an old electricity board, no longer in existence, and records of which meters in which regions had split timings for whatever reason no longer exist.

The problem here is that you were not advised of this fact by the new meter installers as it likely wouldn't have been flagged up on their systems.

The thing is, your supply number clearly shows what time pattern you would have been on, and even though your new meter is now on a different schedule, I'll bet any money your supply number hasn't changed...which it should have. Has we still had regional electricity boards, it would have been so the time pattern digits correlated to the meter.

And this is what happens when private companies take over a market from nationalised utilities. The market opens up to competition, and anyone who gets a licence can sell you the electricity...but prior knowledge of the technicalities and nuances of non standard systems gets lost in the translation.

You can appeal to E.On Next and provide them with a set of calculations (show your working!) to compare what you think you would have been charged on the old time pattern against what you might have been charged under the new straight seven hours. In theory, they should be able to pull 13 months worth of half hourly readings from the meter to validate your usage patterns. If you cannot arrive at a mutually satisfactory outcome, you can take it to the ombudsman after 8 weeks.

[pm002]

thanks for that, very much explains the issue at hand.
will having a non smart meter put back in place solve the issue , or will it now suffer the same incompatibility issue

[meldrewreborn]

@pm002

if your smart meter is functioning correctly you can use the Bright app to get the half hourly readings mentioned by @retrotecchie.

then you would be able to properly calculate your extra costs. Then complain again, through to ombudsman if necessary. Should the latter fail you, using the money claim online to sue will probably succeed as you were not informed of the supply hours changing upon installation of your new meter.

[retrotecchie]

Originally Posted by pm002

thanks for that, very much explains the issue at hand.
will having a non smart meter put back in place solve the issue , or will it now suffer the same incompatibility issue

You can't have a non-smart meter and even if there were any available, it's not going to be configured under your old time pattern. As I say, split E7 timings are from the days of the original electricity boards and there isn't any real reason for them anymore.

It's not an issue of 'compatibility' unless you compare your situation to having an old 405 line VHF black and white telly and the world has moved on not only to full colour 625 line UHF, but left that behind and gone digital.

Now, you will be able to tweak your usage patterns to fit the new schedule, I'm sure. You still get 7 hours cheap rate electricity. I'm struggling to understand how the difference between a split and a contiguous pattern accounts for a 50% difference in the bill, but without knowing your exact figures it's impossible to know,

The issue is not 'compatibility' or the number of hours of off peak. The issue is your timing pattern changed and you were not explicitly informed that this was the case so you didn't know to tweak your usage pattern accordingly.

You can base a complaint on that, but you can't have the old meter pattern back. Even if the new meter is capable of a Time Of Use pattern, the split pattern isn't a thing anymore. The old electricity boards who had a specific reason for splits in particular supply regions are as obsolete as analogue TV.

[pm002]

thanks retrotecchie

the increase in bill is from the first 2 hours of my activation period being charged at day rate, for example over winter with 2 radiators on and water heater active i draw @8kW/h for the first hour then as water gets to temp it drops to 5kW/h for the second hour, all of which is being billed at 37p per unit, not 16p per unit a £2.60 a day over bill

obviously it reduces as the radiators get switched off, but currentlyy in summer, all my E7 usage for water heater is at peak rate

[retrotecchie]

@pm002

So hang on a second? Are you saying your 'activation' or switching periods are still using the old hours but the meter is changing rates at a different time pattern?

How is your heating and hot water controlled? Do you have a fifth terminal on the meter to power your Economy 7 circuits (heating and water) or is the system controlled by a time clock or an RTS switching system?

A 5 terminal E7 meter can only switch the heating and hot water on when the meter is on off-peak rate. If you have a time clock,ratechanger or RTS control for the heating then that is the problem, not the meter itself.

It seems to me as the problem isn't the metering, per se, but rather having an obsolete time control system for the E7 that wasn't swapped or modified at the same time as the meter was upgraded.

Photos will help but I think I see what the issue is now!

[pm002]

[QUOTE=retrotecchie;51483]@pm002

So hang on a second? Are you saying your 'activation' or switching periods are still using the old hours but the meter is changing rates at a different time pattern?

so it is the other way round, the meter is charging on the old timings, but the activation changed times

from what i have seen it is a 5 terminal meter

i have also been looking at meter time switch code, but it shows me as 16 but E.On Next have me down as 0093
hopefully added images to show this

[pm002]

forgot to add i have no switches for time in my flat it soley rely on the off peak feed being live

[retrotecchie]

@pm002

OK, if it's a five terminal meter, then the switching times should be the same as your billing times. If not, then the meter has been incorrectly set up.

That time code first digit 2 states you have a 2 rate meter. Ok so far. But the rest of the S Number doesn't look right.
The second box (time pattern) should have 3 digits as should the third box.