Rts switchover

​@Smiller I’m sorry to hear this is happening since the appointment. Please could you post some clear photos of the meter setup, which will help us to gauge what the issue might be.

Hopefully this is one that’s easily fixable 🤞. We have seen similar instances to this before, and there’s a few different scenarios that could be the issue here, such as the meter not being configured correctly, something being incorrectly wired, or the contract being incorrect. I’ll link some similar Forum threads below, and I don’t doubt that some of our community would be happy to lend a hand here as well ​@Firedog ​@BPLightlog.

If you haven’t already, please raise the issue as a complaint with our Support Team. You can find the complaints process here.

We look forward to hearing back from you with the photos.

As Ben mentions, photos would help to see what might be happening. A clear look at the wiring around and connected to the meter is important if possible.
Also you mention a timer - is this still connected or was it taken out at the same time as the meter change? The newer meters have their own timing built in.

This is what controls my heating. As you can its ignighted on, but no heating. 

I appreciate yous both responding. I'm unsure if the pictures I've uploaded will be of any use. 

This is the smart meter

This has also been added

Hello ​@Smiller 
If we’re to be able to see what’s going on and perhaps make suggestions about possible remedies, we’ll have to have a lot more information. As well as photos of the meter itself (we’re assuming it’s a new smart meter), we’ll need to know what sort of heating equipment you have. For example, night-storage heaters work quite differently from modern panel heaters and need different sorts of control. The more you can tell us about your heating arrangements (including for water), the more likely it is that we’ll be able to help.

A few things here ​@Smiller , your first photo seems to show a room thermostat. It might well be what switches your boiler? on or off. The controller gives 10:13pm as the time, yet your photo shows 21:07 (9:07pm).

The second photo is not the smart meter but what is called the in home display (IHD) - this is designed to give a simple indication of your energy usage.

The third photo is the smart meter. It is difficult to see the wiring but it looks like a 5 terminal device which gives a timed switch for off-peak circuits. Whatever needs to be energised during those off-peak times should be connected to that circuit.

Thanks for the photos ​@Smiller and for your help ​@Firedog and ​@BPLightlog.

​@Smiller have you spoken to OVO about this at all? If so it’d be good to know what you’ve been advised by Customer Services.

As Firedog has said, some photos of your heaters would be really helpful here. We’ll help you get to the bottom of this one way or the other!

Good start!  This might have resulted from having the power off for some time while the RTS stuff was being removed and the new meter installed, probably on top of other earlier power cuts adding up to 10 hours altogether. Funny, since it looks like the unit has battery power …

I found this:

It’s not clear how this central heating controller will interact with ​@Smiller’s electricity supply, but we’ll get to that once the time’s set properly.  

The photo of the meter shows an L&G SMETS2 meter with a bolt-on ALCS (the excrescence with the blue light) and an ultra-modern 4G Communications Hub on top, so a typical 5-wire set-up for managing Economy n heating. It’s a bit surprising if there is indeed oil- or gas-fired central heating, but that will hopefully come clear once we see the (electrical) heating equipment. 

The blue light indicates that power was on to the auxiliary (heating) circuit when the photo was taken - Economy 9 or 10, perhaps? 

I have electric only in property. So radiators. When I called ovo today I was put on hold, then cut off 🤦🏻‍♀️ was at work so will have to try again tomorrow. Will update here once I get through and what I am advised

I have updated time on Horstmann thermostat. 

Right. It sounds as if the radiators used to run at an all-time Heating rate when RTS was in charge*. That changes now, because you’ll only have power to them at a cheaper rate for 9 or 10 hours a day, depending on what you opted for (I hope you didn’t go for Economy 7!). The Horstmann thermostat will still switch them on and off according to the temperature, but I suspect it won’t have as much to do now with the reduced heating hours. The cheap rate will be significantly lower than the old Heating rate, but the problem could be that you need more hours to stay warm, and any use outside of the scheduled offpeak ones will be expensive. 

What tariff are you now on? You should have had an email with details of it when the meter was exchanged. It might be difficult to work out how best to balance the competition between both the meter and the thermostat to control the heating, and this time of year is of course not the best to be experimenting with that when you don’t need so much as in winter. With any luck, you’ll be able to work it out before the (really) cold weather returns. 

Remember, though, that all usage during offpeak hours will be at the lower rate, so make full use of that to minimize the cost of cooking, washing, drying, hoovering, hair-drying and anything else that uses a lot of power. 

We haven’t mentioned hot water. That should also be governed by the meter, but it might not be necessary to have an immersion heater running for all the offpeak hours. Is your shower fed from the hot water tank, or do you have an electric one? An electric shower is very likely the single most power-hungry appliance in the household (it is in mine!), so using it should definitely be confined to offpeak hours.

I’m not sure just how much help you’ll get from OVO support, but it’s worth trying.  

* An afterthought: you only mentioned ‘radiators’ - is this a ‘wet’ system where hot water from a boiler runs through them? If so, you can ignore much of what I’ve written about controlling the heaters. The more you can tell us about the heating arrangements, the better!

Thanks as always for your help ​@Firedog. I agree, it’s most likely this is a contract issue. Perhaps the meter has been installed as single rate when it should have been installed as multi-rate. 

I’ve seen this be the case on a few accounts, where there was a separate ‘heating’ supply. When the heating supply is de-energised, this leaves a single supply with the meter that’s replaced, and this can end up with the smart meter being put in as single rate, as the old meter would have been providing one reading only. 

​@Smiller as ​@Firedog suggests, we’ll need to know which contract you’re on. This guide will show you how to find this info:

If you don’t have online / app access, our Support Team will be able to check this for you.

I managed to get through to ovo today. 1 hour and 9 minutes I was on the call. After many of those minutes on hold they believe that the issue is the meter. They had arranged for an emergency engineer to come within 4 hours. I stayed at home and no one arrived. Not even a call. I will call again tomorrow and hopefully manage to get an engineer tomorrow. 

Morning ​@Smiller,

I’m really sorry you’ve had this experience. To be honest, it sounds as if you must have been speaking to someone who didn’t fully understand the issue, as we only book emergency appointments for customers who are off supply completely. From what you’ve said, you have electricity, but the heating isn’t coming on? We wouldn’t book an emergency appointment for this, and I’m sorry that this incorrect process was followed. If, however, you’ve lost electricity to your whole property, then please do contact again to make another emergency appointment.

This needs proper investigation by our Support Team, before they decide where the problem lies, and what needs to be done. I don’t have access to your account on the Forum, however I worked in Complaints for a number of years, and I know that there may be issues causing this problem that aren’t related to your meter. That said, this could of course be a meter issue, but our advisors shouldn’t be booking you appointments without checking first where the fault lies.

My advice here is to raise a complaint with OVO. In your complaint, write up everything that’s gone wrong, including this missed appointment and (if you haven’t been off supply) the fact that an emergency appointment was booked incorrectly. By all means reference this Forum post in your complaint. 

You can find our complaints process here.

Oh really. This is a nightmare. I will have to call again and go through all this. I have already made a complaint to ovo before the emergency appointment was booked. Do I send a separate complaint?