Can i swap my traditional economy 10 meter to a smart meter?

Hi ​@maridor ,

That is incorrect - Economy 10 doesn’t rely on how many phases you’ve got. It can be done on Single-Phase and Polyphase equally. Smart Meters exist which can do a bewildering array of Polyphase stuff too.

I will summon ​@Lukepeniket_OVO to dig deeper. Please bear with me - this may take some time as Luke gets busy.

I think there’s a mix up between phases and switching periods. E10 uses a number of time intervals to provide off-peak energy and as Blastoise mentions does not rely on a 3 phase supply

It sounds like someone has got hold of the wrong end of a couple of sticks here.

‘Phase’ has a specific meaning when talking about electricity. If it’s used in a different sense, misunderstandings arise. It’s true that for some time, many smart meters could only manage to record two distinct periods each day during which the rate charged for the electricity used was different. There is a peak period during the day, and an offpeak period during the night. This is commonly referred to as Economy 7, mirroring the 7 offpeak hours of cheaper electricity between, say, midnight and 7 AM. It was designed for storage heaters, which can store heat overnight to be discharged during the day. Did the engineer actually use the word ‘phase’ to describe these offpeak periods?

Economy 10 takes account of the fact that these heaters had often grown cold by the afternoon, making for a less comfortable evening when people would most like to have a warm atmosphere to relax in. The heaters are still charged overnight, but only for four or five hours. They then get a boost - again at cheap rate - during the early afternoon and the late evening. The offpeak isn’t as low as for Economy 7, because there are 10 hours of it rather than 7, but it’s still cheaper than the peak rate. Modern smart meters are capable of changing the tariff rate for the three periods, and also to seeing that the storage heaters (and usually the water heater as well) only charge up during offpeak periods. 

What you have heard in the news is about electricity supplies that are controlled by a radio signal, used by the distributor (the company responsible for bringing electricity to your home) to spread the load where the power network would otherwise not be able to cope, e.g. if everyone was running their heaters at the same time. It’s the radio signal that is being switched off this summer. If you have a supply like this (called RTS), your supplier should have been in contact to explain that you’ll need to have a new meter installed before the switch-off happens.

Thanks. I'm glad to hear that Smart meters which can cope with Economy 10 now do exist. It begs the question why has OVO not seen fit to inform its Economy 10 customers that this is the case?

Given what Forum members have been good enough to explain, and the fact that I have not been contacted by OVO I am reasonably confident that my meter is not one which will be affected by the "switch off" at the end of June.

I wouldn’t be so sure ​@maridor . Please post photos of your Meter first as we’ll need to check what you’ve got.

OVO has been notifying E10 customers who are eligible, but IIRC they’ve been doing it at a controlled pace. You’ll be notified when the time is right

Sorry to be a pain, but it looks like your image didn’t post properly.

Could you try again for me? Alternatively, feel free to fling it over to forum@ovoenergy.com and you can ask the Forum Moderators to upload it to the Forum on your behalf.

I'm not very techy. I thought I had uploaded a photo but it doesn't seem to have worked. the meter is a light grey box approx 6 ins x 5.5 with a window showing the reading near the top and a green button to press in order to see the peak and off peak readings.

​@maridor ​@Blastoise186 Added your image to your blank comment above ^

Hope that helps :)

Adding to Luke’s helpful comments, I’d point out that your meter still has a couple of useful years of life left, so there’s no immediate rush to exchange it. If you’re particularly keen to get a smart meter, though, I’d suggest you just make a booking; you can then ask Support to explain and challenge any problem the booking may throw up.

Up until 12/18 months ago the information on the OVO website was that Smart meters were not compatible with Economy 10. If this information is no longer the case then I would be more than willing to have a Smart meter fitted.

Thanks to all the people who have responded to this query, I am confident that I am not in any danger of being without electricity in the near future.

Thank you

Then we have a magic trick for ya.

Luke happens to be one of OVO’s most experienced Engineers. Fling this thread at OVO Support and tell them Luke Peniket has already made his assessment and they should do the rest. :D