To ask if your better off with a smart meter

[shuz1980]

SSE keep pushing me to have a smart meter installed. Im happy paying my set amount of dd each month and not worrying, as even though im using more during winter months, it balances out for the summer months i use less. Is this still the case with smart meters? Or because they are taking more readings and see when your using more want more money that month? Confused as to whats better.

With n power as is my son , when tried to get the best tariff for my son ,as his present deal was at an end was advised he could only have their cheapest tariff if he had a smart meter ( he hasn’t,t)
Has anyone else found this ?

We said no. We don't need one. Our energy usage won't change because of a smart meter. The energy companies are pushing them as they have targets. We just said no

Btw. We are with Octopus energy. They are excellent. PM me for £50 off if you switch . U K call centres. Excellent customer service

I've just blocked a phone number which keeps ringing and texting me. A quick Google on one of the 'who called me' sites showed it was likely to be EDF trying to flog me a smart meter and as I've also had a couple of letters from them too it's bordering on harrassment.

I cannot see any benefit to me. I use what electricity i need - no more no less. I am quite capable of reading them meter twice a year when they send me an e-mail and submitting it on-line and if they want to send their meter reader then the meter is accessible as it is outside the house. And in the current economic climate I don't want the meter reader to be out of a job as well as the rest of the masses.

No, I think it will make DH obsessed and also I want to switch suppliers when our contract finishes.

We have one, it is pointless

I'll never get one. They are insecure, have little to no protection and can easily be hacked. Once in, an attacker could get any information on you, including your banking details. Because its also connected to your WiFi, once a hacker has access onto the smart meter, they then have access to your computers, your phones, anything connected to your home network.

We have one with BG and it's plugged in and we never look at it. I was sick of them banging on so just gave them the go ahead to install it. It has the option to use batteries but eats them

BG a have been asking me for years to have one at no cost to me but I’m happy with the meters I’ve got ,they are easy enough to get to for me to read them quarterly . I can’t see how I’m going to benefit from a smart meter as it won’t affect my energy using habits .

We changed to one a few years ago. I don’t look at the display thing, it’s chucked in a cupboard somewhere and we just carry on as before. It’s removed the hassle of having to take meter readings, but otherwise made no difference to anything much.

You have a legal right to reject one so I suggest you do.

1. It is a hassle to have installed.
2. It might not work - better the devil you know
3. Most people know what power they use already and can look it up on on line if they want without having to have a device cluttering the kitchen showing them
4. Not all houses can have one - our meter is housed in a brick built hut with a roof even (!) about10 feet from the garage and not near the house I do not even want to start thinking about whether they could install one here.
5. Some of the companies have been deceptive -some have told old ladies they had made an appointment when they had not and sent a man out to con them into thinking they have to have one installed.
6. When you change anytihng it often goes wrong so why take the risk?
7. If hacked burglars could work out when you are in and when not.

8., It makes it harder to switch.

1. Later the power companies would have power to charge different rates based on your use at times of day.

10. It relies on signal which might drop out and is riskier than current tried and tested meters. 11. It puts meter reader men out of jobs 12. Sometimes people have had bits of their house damaged by the man installing it. 13. In the US huge numbers of people report adverse health effects. I am not a tin foil hat person but if there is even a 0.00001% chance of risk to health why risk it? 14. They charge me a lot more each year as I will not accept one so only the highest tariff is available which is so nasty of them that I stick with paying the extra money!

@CakeRequired

I'll never get one. They are insecure, have little to no protection and can easily be hacked. Once in, an attacker could get any information on you, including your banking details. Because its also connected to your WiFi, once a hacker has access onto the smart meter, they then have access to your computers, your phones, anything connected to your home network.

Please link to a verified case of this actually happening.

If you want to track how much electricity you use and be able to see which items are responsible for it then buy an electricity monitor from Amazon (about 40 quid). It doesn't connect to your supplier so you still provide regular readings but it can help you understand your usage and make changes e.g. energy saving light bulbs, not leaving tv on standby etc

SSE have applied for permission to allow them to switch off electricity to individual houses, in times of high demand. So, no, a smart meter is not a good idea.

If knowing how much energy you use at certain times will not make you change your usage habits then no a smart meter will be of no benefit and will not save you money.

If you are a high user outside of peak times for example electric car charging then the deals you can get on smart metered bills can allow you to get frankly ludicrously cheap energy during those times.

Energy companies have targets to meet which is why they are plugging them but for the majority there will be little benefit.

No you are not tied into a provider although as a PP said not al meters can be transferred to a different provider making them non-smart meters again. No, a hacker can not get your bank details from your smart meter . In theory your provider can cut you off but it would be incredibly unlikely!

A smart meter costs the consumer money as it has to be plugged in to enable the consumer to see how much power they are using

It would cost on average a whole shiny pound a year to run an in home displace @Lookjaz we just use an app.

Because its also connected to your WiFi, once a hacker has access onto the smart meter, they then have access to your computers, your phones, anything connected to your home network.

I don't think they need to be connected to your wifi to do their primary job of sending your usage information to the company. They use the mobile phone network to do that.

The wifi connection is only if you want to use the little energy displays they provide. I would rather look at my data on a proper computer with a much bigger screen, so will probably look at it via the supplier web-site after it's been uploaded. (I say "will" because my meter install was recent, and I switched supplier shortly after, and I've yet to see any sign of my data appearing, even though the new supplier says my meters will work with them. I'm not worried about hackers, so I am using the small wifi connected display in the meantime.)

If knowing how much energy you use at certain times will not make you change your usage habits then no a smart meter will be of no benefit and will not save you money

It saves you have to read the meters four times a year and send the data in. I'm in a flat and don't actually have physical access to my meters, I have to ask the building manager to give me the readings each time.

Not having to read meters any more, or report readings to the supplier, is enough of a convenience to justify having meters, for me.

Random, they send a man to read my traditional meter however so I don't have to read it (or only very rarely).

As for hacking www.nickhunn.com/how-to-hack-a-smart-meter-and-kill-the-grid/

www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/dec/29/smart-electricity-meters-dangerously-insecure-hackers

I see no reason to have one - reading the meter isn't hard, and neither is putting the reading into the website. My currnt meter is OK for another 4 years, by which time HMG may have decided this is a waste of time and effort. I can't get a mobile signal at the back of the house where the meter is, and I have very thick walls, so the chances of it actually being able to send a reading is not very good.

You have a legal right to reject one so I suggest you do.

Unless your new cheap tariff includes a compulsory upgrade to a smart meter in the t&cs.

‘When taking out this tariff you agree for us to CONTACT you re. Installing a smart meter’
This means you do not have to have one and can have the cheap tariff whether you agree to one or not.

‘When taking out this tariff you agree for us to install a smart meter’
Means you only get the cheap tariff if you have one fitted. They can’t force you to have one but can withdraw the tariff deal if you don’t.

There are a lot of reasons why it could a bad or just not a worthwhile idea for an individual, but some conspiracy theories on here are getting a bit silly.

The concerns about smart meters and health are the exact same ones as mobile phones of all kinds and wi-fi - that the radio frequency radiation that they give off is an issue. The levels are too low to cause an issue to human health.

Unlike most "smart devices", smart meters don’t connect to the internet and most don't connect to home Wi-Fi network, but to the same networks as 2g mobile data. Smart meters don't contain people's personal details, they're not linked to bank accounts. The main concerns about hacking comes from when there are other smart devices in the house connected to it (like smartphones, not required) and from malicious coders in tech companies using them to attack the grid. Malicious coding can happen with any smart device - when step 1 of hacking is 'get a job at the development company', as it is in that nickhubb article, might want to see the risk in perspective. It's a risk, but out of all the smart devices, smart meters are probably the lowest risk at this point. Some want to avoid them entirely, I can see the reasoning there, but a smart phone is far more of a security risk than a smart meter. They can be used to track when you're home or not and their security isn't really that much better most of the time.

In the multiple reports about the 'off switch', it's stated that the current gen 1 and gen 2 ones out there don't have this feature and it would require a legislation change for one to be put into the next generation - which is what is happening, SSE wants the ability and others are calling into question. If the signal drops out, the information is still stored and just passes along when the signal comes back - many of them aren't tracking at all times of day anyways and when it doesn't work, they turn into standard meters.

Yes, some companies have done shitty things around it. Some utilities companies have done a lot of shitty things when persuading people to switch or put them on terrible tariffs and some companies already have tariffs that are different depending on time of day. Whether the device could be useful to someone - like if their current meter is hard for them to use - doesn't really depend on whether some utilities companies are ethical. It depends on their personal situation and risk tolerance.

When you change anytihng it often goes wrong so why take the risk? - seriously? Yes, all changes have risks, but are we really basing our choices on this kind of fear that change so often goes wrong so 'why take the risk'? That seems weird to me.