Being hounded to get a smart meter

[Yorkshire Andy]

I had the ‘old,dangerous’ sales pitch too! On that phone call, I said if it was that dangerous I’d better inform my neighbours they must evacuate,then I had a huff and puff and told them I was having a panic attack. Their phone was put down!

That's brilliant they haven't bugged me with a phone call yet, but I might use this one when they do

"Can't be anymore dangerous than the 1960's pitch insulated cable supplying the dno head love"

"What "

"So your telling me something is dangerous when you have no idea about what your attempting to say ? Last Ecir had no issues listed . How dangerous is the issue on the ecir coding list?


Click ..... Bzzzzzzzzz

[Arzosah]

I had the ‘old,dangerous’ sales pitch too! On that phone call, I said if it was that dangerous I’d better inform my neighbours they must evacuate,then I had a huff and puff and told them I was having a panic attack. Their phone was put down!
"Can't be anymore dangerous than the 1960's pitch insulated cable supplying the dno head love"

"What "

"So your telling me something is dangerous when you have no idea about what your attempting to say ? Last Ecir had no issues listed . How dangerous is the issue on the ecir coding list?


Click ..... Bzzzzzzzzz

Tee hee this forum is full of creativity

[Ara]

We changed electricity suppliers at our last house and the new one insisted that they needed a smart meter installing. Okay, we said. Meter man came and changed it. Oh, he said, it's not connecting to the internet, oh yes it is, oh no it's not. After 2 hours he gave up and said he'd be back in 3 months. Someone else arrived and had exactly the same problem. This had been going on for a year when we moved and they still hadn't managed to get the "smart" meter to work. The new house already had one fitted so we had no choice.

[Frnc]

I'm glad I gave smart meters. No nasty surprises when the bill comes, I keep track of how much gas and electricity I'm using compared to this time last year. I think it helps me to cut down. I got a new boiler, and this was the first time I've had a thermostat. I got a few days of high gas use (relative to same time last year) in November and made some adjustments to the settings on the boiler, thermostat temperature and timings. My monthly use has been down apart from this month's gas, but we did have a cold spell.
I also have a digital thermometer in the living room where the thermostat it. It sends a readout to my phone and plots a graph. It's quite useful.
For instance using the graph and the hourly readings from EDF I was able to set the heating to go off a bit earlier in the evenings.
I have 2 lodgers so things are a bit more complicated than if I was on my own.

[jansman]

We got another phone call yesterday from Eon. “It’s a legal requirement “ my wife was told. She asked what would happen if the matter was refused ( on loud speaker) I burst out laughing! The caller asked if I was making fun? She said , “ be glad you haven’t called my husband “. The caller suggestion was that they have legal entry if we refuse!

My wife said,unless the police ( with good reason) knocked the door,anyone else attempting entry would be looking down the barrel of a shotgun! What a woman!

Weird how the phone call ended…

[Frnc]

I just remembered why I went onto a smart meter. For years, with previous companies, there was always a bit of a problem as my day and night were wired up the wrong way round. The day one was switched permanently off. Usually it just meant I had to give my reading by phone. Then EDF took over my account, and they were charging all my electricity at the cheaper night rate! I tried to get this corrected so I didn't suddenly owe them loads, but in the end they said I'd need a new meter. I never did have to pay the extra I owed them. I think the under charging started just before they took it over.

[grenfell]

I am being hounded by EDF to get a smart meter fitted. Phone calls, texts and emails. I do not want one. How long before energy suppliers start penalising us for not having one? Perhaps when there are alternatives to the variable rate tariff again?

Be aware the smart meters have the ability to cut off supply remotely (over the phone network)
This video may help to understand......
https://youtu.be/G32NYQpvy8Q

Interesting the comment about having the ability to cut off supply. It's one I've heard before on a number of occasions. Has this actually happened to anyone or is it just scaremongering that it could happen ? I've a number of friends , customers and so on that have a smart meter and haven't heard a scare story from any of them . And frankly if people don't pay their bill without good reason what's wrong with cutting them off?
We haven't got a smart meter , we did have a look at one but when they came to look they reckoned there was a problem and they couldn't fit it and we never chased it up. To be honest I'm only really weary of the claims that it can save energy usage , the adverts do say "consumer action required" but it's never really prominent. I suppose it works the same way as using cash over card. Using cash doesn't give you any more money but the visual impact of seeing it disappearing can make some thrifty.

[korolev]

We got another phone call yesterday from Eon. “It’s a legal requirement “ my wife was told. She asked what would happen if the matter was refused ( on loud speaker) I burst out laughing! The caller asked if I was making fun? She said , “ be glad you haven’t called my husband “. The caller suggestion was that they have legal entry if we refuse!

My wife said,unless the police ( with good reason) knocked the door,anyone else attempting entry would be looking down the barrel of a shotgun! What a woman!

Weird how the phone call ended…

I had a running dispute with the electric co (forget which one) in the 80s; they wanted to read the meter so I rang them and told them they could come between 6 & 8pm weekdays or saturday/sunday mornings. The woman said "we only work 9-5 mon-fri. If you don't let us in then we'll get a warrant". I told her I would put my access times in writing and that they would have to disclose this when applying for a warrant which would be unlikely to be granted.
She went off for a minute, came back and said "Ok, we'll be round saturday morning"

It's not uncommon for utility companies to try and bully people with threats of warrants for quite trivial matters like mine.

It's an absolute disgrace, though, that due to covid magistrates have been doing bulk entry warrants for fitting prepayment meters; when I was a magistrate every warrant had to be applied for in person and under oath, and they would be asked if there were children or vulnerable people there; I have refused to sign warrants when the applicant didn't know.

[Ahastyatom]

I am being hounded by EDF to get a smart meter fitted. Phone calls, texts and emails. I do not want one. How long before energy suppliers start penalising us for not having one? Perhaps when there are alternatives to the variable rate tariff again?

Sorry for the late post, but if you have an EDF online account you can go into the Smart meter settings and say "Do not contact me". I was having the same problem and this seemed to sort it.

[jennyjj01]

To be honest I'm only really weary of the claims that it can save energy usage , the adverts do say "consumer action required" but it's never really prominent. I suppose it works the same way as using cash over card. Using cash doesn't give you any more money but the visual impact of seeing it disappearing can make some thrifty.

Along with FRNC, I can confirm that these smart meters can be massively useful in cutting energy usage and expenditure. IF YOU USE THEM. I did and saved about 50% on my usage.
By noting the hourly stats provided by EDF, I was able to recognise massive wastage from devices left on unintentionally (embarrassing wastage). And after that, I tweaked central heating settings to fine tune gas usage. You can do things like isolate circuit by circuit to see what's using electricity, and how much. Silly things like a loft light or old VCR, or PC left on 24/7. Also makes obvious the cost of running certain appliances. It led me to replace a tumble dryer with one MUCH more efficient.
Granted, you can do this without the smart meter, but it doesn't half focus your mind.
Granted also, it's a risk that the company may cut off supply by mistake or on a whim. But that could happen regionally anyway.
As to getting warrants to forcably fit them. I'm with Jansman on that.