Schedule of my storage heaters doesn't match the off-peak hours on my plan - Can you help me?

Twice I’ve had smart meters installed, and on both occasions the engineer spent much of the time on the phone to the mother ship while doing things with the meter. The second was an OVO man, but I’m not sure about the first. In any case, how do contracted engineers call up the over-the-air stuff when they need it? I seem to remember something like a BOAT-load of HQ staff who do nothing else. That’s probably not the right acronym, but I’m fairly sure it was ‘back office’ something. It could be that it’s all automated via the installation app now, of course.

The last time I witnessed an install taking place, it was via an SMS engineer who just whipped out a Panasonic Toughbook device and used an app on that to commission the Comms Hub, Meter and IHD without having to call anyone.

IIRC the OVO Engineer I had do my install (hi Ben!) back in 2021 simply used his smartphone to do it.

I know you've understand what the problem this. But OVO customer service is not understanding. I don't know what to do now.

Have you chatted with them since the last engineer visit last week? What did they say?

They asked me for 12 readings load test. And I did that. Than they Said my meter is okay.

Did they say what they were trying to find out? What readings did they ask for? At different times of day? Perhaps you could share the results with us.

From what you’ve told us before, there seemed to be no doubt that the offpeak register is only recording usage during the night, while all other usage - during the daytime - is recorded on the peak register. Did that change at all with these latest tests?

I honestly don’t know how to get you moved on from this silly situation. As ​ 

I think that moment has arrived, ​@Bradley_OVO 

Summery of Guy in the telephone is as the off-peak reading is not changing in peak hour so meter is okay. And there is nothing called ALCS. He never heard them.

Thanks for the flag ​@Firedog 

​@VOU30 Apologies that we’re back here and trying to get to the bottom of this matter. It is concerning that you’re being told all is OK, if things are not aligning. 

I am in no way an expert on any of this (I’m having my own issues with a heating system in my new home) so I’m reaching out to one of our internal contacts to ask them to come and review this thread and try and offer some advice on what next steps you can take with this matter.

I’ll reach out to you as soon as I hear back!

Hey ​@VOU30 & ​@Firedog,

I picked this up at the same time as ​@Bradley_OVO and i’ve also sent you a private message so I can gather a few details from you. If you get a second to reply i’d greatly appreciate it, you’ll find your messages here.

Thanks, for chipping in, ​@Chris_OVO 

This has become a long thread. I’ll summarize the issue as I see it here:

1.  The meter is an Aclara SGM 1416-B S/N 23M0051900 apparently correctly installed.
2. The customer asked to be put on Economy 7, but changed his mind a few days later and asked for Economy 10. It’s not clear whether this change started and got stuck in limbo, or the system was misconfigured from the start. In either case, the customer is prepared to settle for E7 after all, only because E10 was proving too difficult to configure.
3. Repeated load tests have shown only that the tariff is changing according to Economy 7 times (EMEB, GSP group _B, area 11) - offpeak all days 00:00-07:00.
4. Observations of both the storage heaters, their supply indicator lamps and the load control icons on the meter display have shown that the switched circuit is being energized at some times during daytime hours (and thus E7 peak-rate periods). 
5. The conclusion is that the meter’s ALCS is misconfigured and needs to be updated to reflect the E7 timings. It’s not at all clear what timings it’s currently set to, but in any event it should not be energizing the switched circuit during peak hours.
6. The support staff the customer has been in contact with neither understand the problem nor know how to remedy it. Expert intervention is sorely needed.