6 weeks since smart meter install- Do I send in a manual reading or wait ?

Hi ​@shetland ,

You can send one now if you wish - a Smart Reading will override it later if one comes in.

Now I just have to figure out which reading is off peak and which is peak !
 

Common sense says Rate 1 is peak, Rate 2 is offpeak. That’s what DCC likes, and you would expect a dual-rate household to be consuming more offpeak - otherwise there’s no advantage to the dual rate. 

I reckon with the same common sense, but it would be nice if there was some documentation anywhere to say which is which for sure.

Hasn’t anyone asked this same question before here ?

I see this mentions for a different meter, but the same logic should apply:

 

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The easiest way to know which one is the day rate is to take a reading from both of them at say, 10am and then come back an hour later and take another reading. Whichever one has increased is the day rate and the other is the night rate.
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328 has changed to 329, whilst 883 has not moved, so Rate 2 is thus Off Peak as our common sense said. :-)

My common sense says as its still not warm enough to turn the heating off yet ( 9c yesterday.. ) and heating previously occupied 2/3 of our electricity usage, its fair to say that we should be using more electricity via heating since the new meter was installed, than on peak times, especially now off peak can include everything else plugged into the house as well, and not just heating like on the system E7 tariff.

Now we get an extra hour being E8 !

I hope its the right way around when it comes to being billed !

Is there a way to check the smart meter is calling home, other than wait 6 months and see ?

I guess in the meantime, just do a manual meter reading once a month.


Oh wait, tried to send a meter reading and get:

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Oops, there’s a problem…

Check your details and try again or contact us (opens in new window) 

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Looks like I’ll have to chat to someone, I wonder how that will go !

Start off with AI bot, it asks for account number, then we get:

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After a while I get a human:
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I can see that your smart meter has stopped communicating with us therefore I will need to send out a smart meter health check via email. If you could respond to the email as soon as you can and then someone will be in touch with the next steps within 2 working days.

I can see that the last reading we had was back in May, this will just be an issue with the meter. Once we have your response to the health check we can send that off to our smart team to investigate:)
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Do you have the same problem if you use the OVO Energy app on a mobile device? 

Have you not seen any usage data or meter readings on your online account?  I can’t remember whether you were asked to check that you’re set up for a half-hourly reading schedule. You should find that option here: Edit meter reads frequency - OVO Energy.

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Have you not seen any usage data or meter readings on your online account? 
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No I haven’t, they aren’t available.

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check that you’re set up for a half-hourly reading schedule
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I did ask for that.

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Edit meter reads frequency - OVO Energy.
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Thanks, I wasn’t aware of that !

Checking it, it is set to half an hour already on one MPAN, but not the other.

The 2 MPAN’s listed are the same numbers as on previous bills with the old RTS meter setup, should there just be one that is different to either of those ?

Checking another page, it does list the serial number correctly to the new meter.

But could it mean no fault with the smart meter, it just hasn’t been plumbed into the databases yet ?

Not tried the mobile app !

Not keen to break something at the moment.

If it is the meter ( Can I tell if the meter has a connection myself ? ) not connecting, I wonder if ever did ?

If it did connect, and now isn’t, I haven’t changed anything in the house to block the signal.

Maybe so many new customers in the area getting connected, that there isn’t enough signal to reach me !

I may well have to try the passive signal booster solution and see if that helps, after I check there is actually a signal being broadcast with that handy Ebay radio receiver like I did before the meter was fitted. ( Which showed a signal, but I’ve no idea its strength, since I’m not an expert user of the software. )

As a matter of interest, here is Support’s reply to another recent Scottish RTS > Smart migrant who isn’t getting half-hourly data yet: “It looks like we're still waiting for the Industry database to recognize your meter setup as changed. So right now your MPAN, the number that is used to address your meter, is still thought to be the old meter type by the National database … It really should sort itself this week as it's their time frame, I'd give it until Friday or Monday and if not sorted by then, then we have authority to have it chased up.”

The national database mills grind small, but they grind exceeding slowly. Six weeks is probably optimistic just now when meters are being exchanged at the rate of 1000 a day; much of the updating has to be done manually, with three and perhaps four actors involved (SSEN, OVO, OVO’s data processor and Elexon). 

The customer aforementioned is happily getting his half-hourly data via Bright, so you might try that or a similar avenue.

Hey ​@shetland,

I’m sorry to hear of the issues you’ve been having,

I can see our community members have provided some helpful advice here, I just wanted to add the following topics you may find helpful:
 

Please keep us posted following the submission of your smart meter health check. 

Hey ​@shetland,

That's fantastic news! I'm so glad to hear that everything is now working as expected for you! 😃 I really appreciate you taking the time to come back and update the thread. I've also tagged ​@Firedog, as he was helping you with this issue previously.