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nils_aksnes
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January 10, 2024
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THTC meter - Removal Request

  • January 10, 2024
  • 240 replies
  • 7845 views

Hi folks,

 

I am trying to have a redundant THTC meter removed from my house and OVO seem to be refusing to do this. Can anyone help explain what I should do? Some background info below:

 

We moved to a property in March last year in the west of Scotland. The property has two meters with a THTC setup running storage heaters. We are getting the storage heaters removed in February and an air source heat pump installed. 

 

Once this work has been carried out there will be nothing running from the RadioTelemeter (THTC) meter.

 

I have contacted OVO by phone yesterday to request that this meter be removed once it is no longer in use. The person I spoke with said that OVO would not do this because doing so would stop the other (ordinary) meter working. They weren’t able to explain why this would be the case. After some time on the phone I was told that if I emailed OVO with evidence that the THTC meter would not powering anything then they could arrange for it to be removed. This seemed like a positive outcome although it was not clear why we were initially told in the call that removal wasn’t possible.

 

I sent an email last night attaching the quotes from our electrician and heating engineer for removal of storage heaters and replacement with heat pump etc. I got a positive response this morning:

I am Stephen from account management at OVO energy after reading your email we can go ahead and do that for you but i am going to give you extra information so to proceed with this job there is a charge due to the nature of it I would like to clarify that your okay with that and if you are i can go ahead and get you a price and and book the job for you.

 

Again this seemed positive and I asked Stephen to go ahead and give us a cost. I then had response email from Nahim:

Apologies for the confusion form what Stephan said but as of right now, appointments for removing THTC meters aren't available. We appreciate you gave us confirmation the property's heating system is no longer dependant.

However we are working on a new meter type that'll basically replace the current two meters and you'll get one meter. The meter will reveal at Spring and you'll get an email when your free meter upgrade is ready

 

As far as I understand it the ‘new meter type’ mentioned has been in development for years and has been repeatedly delayed. I have little to no confidence that it will arrive in spring as promised above. It isn’t clear why we should be expected to wait for this.

 

Ontop of that our experience from speaking to neighbours and friends locally is that smart meters are useless in this (rural) area since they are not able to connect to a radio mast for communication. Any smart meters fitted simply operate as ‘dumb’ meters in this area.

 

Can anyone give us some hope that it is possible to get the redundant THTC meter removed as we have requested? Is there any technical reason why this wouldn’t be possible?

 

Failing that at least any good reason why we should have to wait for the new meter to be developed and rolled out? It seems in this instance that whilst waiting we’d have headaches if we wanted to switch supplier etc because we’d have a strange setup with a redundant meter and two MPAN numbers associated with the property. This could go on indefinitely since the new meters are not yet launched.

 

Below is a photograph of our current setup incase this is useful:

 

 

We’d really appreciate any help on this!

 

Thanks

 

 

 

Best answer by Nukecad

They may well ask for consumer feedback later; once those initial proposals have been refined by industry discussions.

However at the moment that isn’t what they want or need.

So it’s best not to clog up their email with unwanted stuff that just takes up their time to deal with.
(There’s a word we all use for unwanted emails - spam).

Wait and see if they do ask for consumer feedback/opinion, but TBH there may not be time.
The clock is counting down and contingency plans need to be in place for when it reaches zero in June.

240 replies

Blastoise186
Super User
Blastoise186Super User
Super User
January 11, 2024

Hi @nils_aksnes ,

I think your best bet is to wait for the free option to be ready, otherwise you’ll have an absolute mess to deal with - and it won’t just be that £160 fee you’d have to pay either.

I’ve seen it make progress recently - the biggest delay was because nobody could agree how to do it, which has been… Resolved...

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way! Remember, I'm just like you - AI Powered Evil Geniuses aren't Staff!
    N
    Rank 1
    nils_aksnesAuthor
    Rank 1
    January 11, 2024

    Hi @Blastoise186 

    Thanks for your response. Could you explain why we would have ‘an absolute mess’? Is this something unique to our setup in the photograph or because we have the misfortune to have a THTC setup?

      Jeffus
      Rank 20
      Jeffus
      Rank 20
      January 11, 2024

      Updated on 04/09/25 by Ben_OVO

       

      Update on RTS shutdown

       

      As you may be aware, the RTS signal that instructs some of our meters when to move to the “Off Peak Period”  is closing down and we need to arrange for all of our RTS customers to have a meter exchange so they don’t lose any of their meter functionality.

       

      The RTS signal began closing on 30 June 2025. The period between 1 July - 30 September 2025 is being used to close-down the RTS signal and allow us to manage any unexpected customers impacted.

       

      After a very successful pilot, from the 17th June 2024 we began writing to our Economy 10 RTS customers to invite them to call us to arrange for their meter exchange. 

       

      We are continuing to work at pace to enable the same solution for the majority of our other RTS customers.

       

      We will continue to update you on our progress.

       

       

      Hi @nils_aksnes 

      The situation is certainly frustrating as the industry has known about the issue for years and the deadline has been moved before. It is an industry wide failure.

      Even though the "reveal" may be in Spring, I suspect it will be a long time before all the meters are actually migrated.

      In the latest annual stats for smart meter installations, OVO received the second highest fine from OFGEM having missed their target. 

      So I think customers have to be realistic about when their actual installations will be changed.

      If you feel really strongly you could put in an official complaint to see if they will remove the meter, particularly given the moving deadlines and conflicting information you have been given via official ovo channels.

      https://www.ovoenergy.com/feedback

      Then after 8 weeks or a deadlock letter if the meter hasn't been swapped you can ask the Energy Ombudsman to help

      https://www.energyombudsman.org/

      Alternatively as @Blastoise186 says wait until OVO issue more information on a widescale migration.

      It is certainly true that some households have switched from storage heaters in to Heat pumps in Scotland and had THTC meters removed and the Ombudsman has ordered the supplier to pay compensation due to issues with the meter switch process. This is just one of many examples.

      https://www.homeenergyscotland.org/switching-restricted-thtc-single-meter-electric/

      There are lots of customers in Scotland that have had THTC meters swapped in the past.

      In the example above the wiring was done by the suppliers meter engineer and the meter replaced for free, but obviously every case can be slightly different. The example mentions compensation. Goodwill compensation payments awarded by the Ombudsman are typically up to a few hundred pounds, in addition to any loss in not being able to switch to an appropriate tariff in a timely manner as highlighted in the example. 

      Obviously this is just one example and there may be complications in your setup or area of the country.

      You could try speaking to Home Energy Scotland for advice as the example was published on their website.

      You can also post a review on Trustpilot if you like

      https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/www.ovoenergy.com

      Out of curiosity have you found anyone locally that have had their THTC meters removed in the past?

       

        Blastoise186
        Super User
        Blastoise186Super User
        Super User
        January 11, 2024

        Mostly down to the wiring really - you’d have to get a private electrician in to rewire anything that’s on the THTC meter, and that probably won’t come cheap.

        If you were to do the free option, the meter could simply be reconfigured remotely later to turn THTC mode off and otherwise leave everything as-is.

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          N
          Rank 1
          nils_aksnesAuthor
          Rank 1
          January 22, 2024

          @Jeffus Thank you for your response.

          Unfortunately I’ve had no further response from OVO for over a week now to my request to remove our redundant radio meter and switch us to a single meter/single MPAN number setup. So I will now make an official complaint. 

          Emmanuelle_OVO
          Retired Moderator
          Emmanuelle_OVO
          Retired Moderator
          January 23, 2024

          Hey @nils_aksnes,

           

          I can understand your frustration, not many suppliers deal with THTC set ups. OVO are working on a smart meter for THTC but there is no set date in which this will become widely accessible. 

           

          There is a team that deal with complex meter set ups. I’d advise contacting the support team and seeing if your situation can be investigated more thoroughly by someone on the metering team.

           

          If they’re unable to resolve this issue, there is the option of raising a complaint. You can find out more about our complaint procedure online. 

          Renewable Energy? Big Fan.
          J
          Newcomer
          JeanneL
          Newcomer
          February 2, 2024

          We had a THTC meter and a regular meter removed in October. They were replaced with one single, perfectly normal smart meter. The entire process took less than an hour.

           

          As we’re also in rural Scotland, we were told it was unlikely the new meter would work as a smart meter and that it would therefore need to work in “dumb mode”. Lo and behold, when the whole shebang was installed, it connected and worked in smart mode. Haven’t had any trouble with it.

           

          Didn’t pay a penny for the installation, either, in case that’s helpful information for you.

           

           Best of luck…

            Emmanuelle_OVO
            Retired Moderator
            Emmanuelle_OVO
            Retired Moderator
            February 5, 2024

            That’s really helpful advice @JeanneL, I’m glad you had a positive experience. 

             

            Did you have to prove with an engineer report that one of the supplies was no longer powering anything in the home? Did you have to pay for the removal? 

            Renewable Energy? Big Fan.
            M
            Newcomer
            monster9
            Newcomer
            February 6, 2024

            We had a THTC meter and a regular meter removed in October. They were replaced with one single, perfectly normal smart meter. The entire process took less than an hour.

             

            As we’re also in rural Scotland, we were told it was unlikely the new meter would work as a smart meter and that it would therefore need to work in “dumb mode”. Lo and behold, when the whole shebang was installed, it connected and worked in smart mode. Haven’t had any trouble with it.

             

            Didn’t pay a penny for the installation, either, in case that’s helpful information for you.

             

             Best of luck…

            That’s encouraging news @JeanneL 

            Can you advise how you went about this,as I’m just off the phone to customer support who tell me I can’t replace my THTC meter with a smart meter and if it were possible, my electricity supply might stop!!!

              M
              Newcomer
              monster9
              Newcomer
              February 8, 2024

              About 16 months ago, I asked OVO/SSE what it would take to get a Smart Meter installed. They advised then that a smart Meter was “imminent”.

              Yesterday, after chasing, I received the following reply...

              “We are currently working on our systems to recognise a Smart Meter exchange with your current THTC setup. We also want to make sure that when the smart meters are installed this does not affect our customers heating and hot water systems, be they wet central heating (gas, oil, etc.) or electric central heating (air source heat pump, storage heaters etc.)

              The second difficulty, regarding hardware issues are unfortunately a bit more complex. As I explained there are currently no Smart Meters in production that will be able to function the same as your current THTC metering setup, meaning that we would be required to support the range of heating options described above as well as retain the flexibility of the amount of time you have to store heat and hot water”.

              From the above, it doesn’t look like a Smart Meter that works with THTC is coming any time soon. The gentleman I spoke to was very helpful and suggested it may “take some time”.

              I’ve followed up today asking whether an alternative option of …

              1. replacing all my overnight storage heaters with regular electric radiators
              2. consolidating the connections currently wired into the 2 consumer units into a single consumer unit and
              3. moving to a different (non-THTC) tariff

              … would allow for a Smart Meter to be installed.

              I presume the answer is “Yes”? It seems that some on this forum may have gone down that route.
               

              It’s a hugely unnecessary and convoluted route.

              I’ve also written to the Scottish Government’s “Cabinet Minister for Net Zero”               Màiri McAllan CabSecTNZJT@gov.scot to alert them to the higher costs OVO/SSE consumers are having to bear due to being prevented from moving to smarter time-of-day tariffs and being locked out from incorporating Home Batteries, Solar PV into their energy mix.

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