4 electricity meters

[Sharpkat]

I know, I know. The most boring thread ever.

Does anyone have a 4 electricity meter read set up? Rather than the standard 2? I have had nothing but issues since I moved into my property last December. The first provider claimed I spent £600 in 6 weeks despite living alone in the world's smallest house and not even here all of the time. I changed supplier but they have not activated my account so I have no idea if I am paying enough.

They cannot tell me what tariff I am on as they are not sure....... also my storage heater meter reading keeps going up despite the fact that they have been fully turned off since February.

I am in desperate need of a supplier who can cope with this ridiculous system.

The house is only 10 years old so it is not antiquated!

TIA

Do you only have electricity? Can you take pictures of the meters?

Hello @dementedpixie I do only have electricity. I have never had gas!

It is one meter that I press a button and it gives me 4 readings. Hoping this attaches.

So I see Rate 1 and Rate 2. What do the other readings say?

Have you checked that your bills are based on actual Meter reads, rather than estimates? Do you mean your storage heaters are off at the plug, but the meter read for the heaters still moves - have you read it at bedtime and again in the morning? Have you called your supplier to ask why it is not activated? Sorry for all the questions!!

Are you on an Economy 7 tariff?

Sorry - could not upload all photos at once.

There should be 3 readings as one is always 0000.

The storage heaters are off at the mains and have been since Feb. I only have 3 and they are in pointless places. Who wants to heat the front door or the patio doors!

I have been trying to submit meter readings for months but they have always said it is a computer issue. Finally this week they admitted it was because they have not activated my account. They apparently need a week to "work on it as it is very complicated" before they can tell me what tariff I am on (I have 4 emails telling me different things), if I have economy 7 (apparently I have economy 10 but they do not know the hours it applies to), and what my balance is. They keep saying I am £400 in credit. Well of course I am as they have never deducted a penny for electricity used.

Online it says I need to increase my direct debit to £300 a month.

I really do appreciate any advice. This has been nothing but stressful since the start. I still think the meters are faulty.

Rink

I don't know what Rink is - me and my clumsy thumbs

They said I am on a standard tariff as that is all that is available to 4 meter properties. They said I have economy 10 but could not tell me the hours.

We only have electricity and are on Economy 10. Low rate 2-5pm, 9-11pm and 1-6am. That is fairly standard I believe. When our meter was put in no one at the electricity company could tell me what each of the 5 number readings were but one is date, one time, one total units, one low rate and one high rate.

Do you have a previous supplier bill you can post if you scrub out name and address? It could be that the day and night units are being accounted for the wrong way round.

Thanks @TheTeenageYears

I know that of the 4 meter readings, 1 is day (rate 1), one is night (rate 2), one is 0000 permanently and the rht one is storage heaters.

I changed supplier as soon as I could as the previous tenants had astronomical bills (which they have still not paid) and I disputed the £600 for 6 weeks as I was at my mum's a lot or did not have anything unpacked so could not be using any electricity.

I will take more meter readings in the morning.

Thanks everyone. I thought no one would respond 😀

Which readings come up in which order? You should be on an economy 7 tariff with storage heaters as they would charge up overnight when electricity is cheaper. Can you check which reading increases during the day as that should be your day rate. The one that increases overnight is your night rate

Xpost. Which supplier for economy 10?

Eon at the moment. Though I do not trust the economy 10 advice as they cannot tell me the tariff I am on.

Was Npower previously. Will take more photos in the cupboard in the morning and note the proper order. Thank you!

Should get you all only Royal Mail redirection issue too 😂

I am on that setup with NPower. The hot water is on the heat circuit with the storage heaters. If yours is the same then that could be why the heat circuit reading is still going up with the heaters off.

I aired on the side of caution when they couldn't tell me which reading was high and which low but after realising that in 4 month period over summer with water heated only during low rate hours (power to the switch is on a timer so is only live during low rate hours), 90% of washing and dishwasher being done during low rate hours and no heating on that my 'high' rate units were twice as many as 'low' rate which to me didn't sound right. I took a photo of all readings at the start of a low rate period and again at the end and the rate which changed was the one we had presumed was high rate but must be low. It's going to be fun getting that sorted out and will have been massively over paying for more than 4 years - high rate is between 4 and 5 times low rate price so we must be owed at least £1500 I think.

You could try looking up what the Economy 7 and Economy 10 hours are for your supplier and then take photos at the beginning and end of what should be either a high or low rate to see what numbers change and know what you had running. Do you have a programmer for the hot water or know when it's heating. That can be a huge drain on electricity.

I'm inclined to think the company only has 1 M pan number for your meter instead of two different ones. Ask your supplier for a copy of for your M pans. If they don't have it or tell you you only need one, they cannot bill you correctly and will result in abnormally large bills.

Contact the ombudsman to get it sorted ASAP. Customer service advisors and some engineers will tell you you don't need two or may not know that you need two but you do because you're white meter heating. You need to escalate it to a different department from customer service. I can't remember what department we spoke to but we were £204 a month for a 2 bed flat. Argued with the company, engineers, customer service until I contacted the ombudsman. The company couldn't bill us accurately because they only had 1 M Pan number for us.

The company we were with was investigated and were fined £10M several years ago. We got thousands back after 7 years of eye wateringly high bills and them saying we still owed them more. Turned out they were in the wrong.

Thank you all for so much information.

I have just taken the readings again and they have all gone up. They have told me that the rht is just the storage heaters but it may be hot water.

They are supposed to call me back on Tuesday once they have activated the account so I shall be armed with questions and not taking no for an answer.

So maybe its day rate, night rate and heating/hot water rate?
Googling suggests economy 10 times differ depending where you live. A moneysavingexpert forum user gives times for their area - don't know if they'd differ too much
They says theirs is;
12midnight - 5am
1pm - 4pm
8pm-10pm

Maybe check the meters at these times to see if any are changing.

E10 is a massive pita, the companies don’t have a clue how to bill you.

It’s day, night, heating, boost. Unless you press boost you aren’t using boost 🤦🏻‍♀️ Which heats the rads up in the afternoon. It’s a comfort tariff 🤨.

Email the ceo office. It’s the only way you’ll get a resolution.

Thank you everyone. I will see what they say when they have activated the account. He was not sure about E10 so I need to go through that with them again.

I had a similar issue with N power as they tried to charge me high rate during the night as they didn’t understand economy 7. I’d ask for someone to come out.