Smart meter lost comms, effect on Charge Anytime credits

Hey ​@TomThumb 

Thanks for coming back with that update. A shame about the gas meter not being changed at the moment but at least they were able to swap the electric meter and you’ll be able to use Charge Anytime again, hopefully those smart readings start coming through to us soon, it can take a few weeks which is pretty normal.

Let us know if you do have any other problems.😊

Back with an update.

After my elec smart meter exchange, things were working well for the first week, with my electric meter sending in 5 readings out of the first 7 days, but nothing recorded for the last 10 days.

  The wan light is flashing green every 1 second this time round, so the comms unit still might reconnect to the network. Otherwise it’s the 32 days without comms until Ovo will look at the issue.

 Meanwhile my Charge Anytime credits are again at risk & so is the A Little Help With Your Heating promo.

Tom…

Hi ​@TomThumb, I hope you’ve had a good festive break.

Sorry to hear that the smart meter doesn’t seem to be communicating. If you haven’t checked already, it’d be worth checking if your smart meter reading schedule is definitely set to half-hourly. If you check online and it says the reading schedule is set to half-hourly, change it to daily, and then back to half-hourly. There’s a chance this may kick it back into life.

You can find out how to do this using this guide:

Cheers for that ​@Ben_OVO never seen that tip listed before.

it was set to ½hr readings, so set to daily then back to 1/2hr with the notification that it could take upto 24hrs for the changes to show.

So will see how it goes.

Tom…

Morning ​@TomThumb,

It’s a trick that can be tried that occasionally works. It works if the meter is in communication but the read schedule isn’t set up properly. Let us know today whether the reads have started coming through or not.

Cheers!

Hello.

Just to let you know ​@Ben_OVO 

My account is once again showing it’s set to 1/2hr readings after the flip then back from daily yesterday.

 
But nothing has changed re meter reads, still no meter readings or usage stats shown on my account since 19th December.

Wan flashing green every 1sec & ihd working working albeit on elec only.

Tom…

Update

Since mid November, my smart meters have been in & out of comms with Ovo.

With a new meter installed in December, that has also been running dumb more often than not.

 Previous to November, no real communication issues.

Now I have somewhat stumbled upon the suspected cause & I clearly have a link between lost comms & maintenance works by Vodafone, who from the info gained are the smart network provider in the southern half of the country.

Although my Vodafone mobile has never lost service, I do get network updates via text messages from Vodafone stating they are experiencing network issues in the local area & are sorry for any disruption.

These network reports coincide exactly with lost comms from my smart meter, but in reverse.

Vodafone report network issues within my postcode area:  my smart meter is sending data.

Vodafone report the network issues in the area have been fixed: my smart meter turns dumb again.

I suspect that the Three - Vodafone merger has played a large part in this,

so much for there 2 networks are better than 1 add campaign.

According to the web, mine is not an isolated case.

The question is:
Is the smart metering network signal likely to improve?

(As far as I’m aware, wan light fast flashing in any state of communication)

How likely are ovo to install a smart meter aerial?

Tom…

I’m a bit confused (that’s nothing unusual). You wrote that a visiting engineer deemed the comms unit on your electricity meter to be U/S, ‘requiring both meters to be replaced.’ That latter bit suggests that the engineer decided that your gas meter was more likely to be able to communicate if it had a dual-band communications hub (DBCH), allowing for transmissions over both the 2.4GHz band and the 850MHz band. This would require a different communications hub (CH) on the electricity meter. It wouldn’t necessarily involve exchanging the electricity meter, but that’s by the way.

Unless the new CH is of the very latest type, which I don’t think is due for mass deployment for a year or two, I’d guess that you will have the DBCH cellular variety, which in your part of the world uses the Telefónica (VirginMedia/02) network. The latest one, made by Toshiba, is clearly labelled 4G DBCH. If you are lucky enough to have got one of those, then yes, the comms provider is Vodafone and your experiences will be of interest to those monitoring the performance of the new devices. It would be really good to see a photo of your new meter if you can be bothered.

​@Firedog  I will drop a pic up when able, but my comms hub is marked as WNC SKU1 cellular.

Apologies if my assumptions of Vodafone being the network carrier for the smart meters network are incorrect, I blame google for that, my understanding was that Vodafone had taken over that role from Telefónica (VirginMedia/02) network in 2024.

                                                                    ***** 

You are correct in thinking my comms unit was previously classed as U/S, so both elec & gas / comms unit were due to be replaced.

The engineer on site deemed my gas meter was not safe to swap out, (limited access to the exposed lead to copper pipe work) so only my electric & comms unit were changed.

The engineer cited that out of the box, the gas meter would only offer a onetime pairing, so it would never run smart from then on,

but the newly fitted electric meter / comms unit were commissioned successfully.

 Currently my ovo account is only showing elec meter readings going back to when my elec meter had been replaced (13th December)
So aside from from the network being Telefónica (VirginMedia/02) or Vodafone,

since the 13th Dec 4 times in all, (aligning to the day)

when Vodafone report network issues affecting my post code, Ovo received my elec smart meter reading.

when Vodafone then report the network issues affecting my area have been fixed, no smart elec meter readings received by Ovo.

My smart meter comms issues are seemingly related to the Vodafone network in this area.

Thats where my understanding of the smart meter closed network ends.

Your recollection of my gas meter needing a (DBCH) is also beyond my understanding lol 🤭

Given the circumstances, what are the chances of my smart meters regaining full comms, with or without intervention from Ovo?

Tom…

​@TomThumb good morning, I hope you’re well.

Firstly - my apologies for the fact you were left without a reply to your post on the 30th of December. This one must have slipped the net over the festive break.

I’m going to reach out to you by Private Message - it’d be great to look at this properly to ascertain what the issue might be.