If anyone from OVO is actually listening

  • 27 September 2023
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Please can someone explain why despite the best endeavours of a senior complaints resolution handler, OVO is unable to get my smart meter working correctly. Having been promised a smart meter with E7 functionality to replace my previous dual meter (with E10 rates) and having received a new agreement showing dual rates the smart meter fitted 27 days ago on Aug 31st is still only showing a single rate and the the 5th port is not switching on during the off peak hours. This means I cannot use my storage heaters and have to rely on using conventional heaters at the more expensive standard rate.

In essence OVO have taken away one of my services and failed to replace it. (Not to mention the fact that my circumstances should class me as vulnerable).

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Blastoise186
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This is actually a quick fix. Please ask the Support Team to reconfigure the ECAUL/ALCS Configs on your meter. Fixes around 99% of these cases in a matter of hours.

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way!
Firedog
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… the smart meter fitted 27 days ago on Aug 31st is still only showing a single rate and the the 5th port is not switching on during the off peak hours.


​​​​​​

 

While not identical to your situation, the two or three customers in this thread:
 

are experiencing similar problems. They are ex-SSE E10 customers with Aclara SGM 1416-B meters. You may learn something by wading through the thread.

It peters out because there’s an enforced 6-week wait for the metering people to get things sorted out, but I’m sort of hoping those affected will come back and tell us if and when they are. Meanwhile, stay in touch with your complaints handler to make sure you both know what the metering team are up to. I’d use email (to feedback@ovoenergy.com) so that you have written evidence of what was said just in case.

 

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA
Jeffus
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… the smart meter fitted 27 days ago on Aug 31st is still only showing a single rate and the the 5th port is not switching on during the off peak hours.


​​​​​​

 

While not identical to your situation, the two or three customers in this thread:
 

are experiencing similar problems. They are ex-SSE E10 customers with Aclara SGM 1416-B meters. You may learn something by wading through the thread.

It peters out because there’s an enforced 6-week wait for the metering people to get things sorted out, but I’m sort of hoping those affected will come back and tell us if and when they are. Meanwhile, stay in touch with your complaints handler to make sure you both know what the metering team are up to. I’d use email (to feedback@ovoenergy.com) so that you have written evidence of what was said just in case.

 

Appears no progress or even a useful update on progress from OVO after 6 weeks for at least one of the customers in that thread Painful reading some customers experience of ovo when things don't work. 

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Now I get up this morning and it feels strangely warm! The heating is on! Coincidence?

However the meter (an Aclara SGM 1416-B incidentally) still shows only one unit rate so it’s still being charged wrongly according to the meter. However as the rate shown is just over 13p a unit and the amount accrued since last read seems to confirm this. 

I have never been an SSE customer, over ten years with OVO.

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Having plowed through  (this thread)as recommended. Looked at the JSON for my account and found only:

 

Abby_OVO
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Hey @Ovouser777 

 

I’m really sorry to hear about this.

 

We’d agree with Firedog on this one. It’ll also definitely be a good idea to discuss this directly with your complaints handler. If they have contacted you before hopefully you’ve got their email and contact number. Otherwise they will be reaching out once they’ve investigated your complaint. 

 

We'd recommend ensuring the house is kept warm as it get’s a little colder, and any extra expenses that are through no fault of your own should be considered as part of any resolution.

Location: Electric Avenue
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Thanks Abby, I am in constant communication via email and phone

Emmanuelle_OVO
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Hey @Ovouser777,

 

Sorry for the issues you’re having,

 

I’d imagine if a 5 port meter wasn’t installed or the 5th port wasn’t connected correctly then they should be able to book a meter exchange asap. But you’ve advised this seems to be working now? 

 

If it’s just the tariff that needs amending this should be easier. What are the support team advising? When you attempt to take a meter reading manually does it should two readings or just one? I’m wondering if the meter itself is single rate or just the tariff. 

 

Keep us posted with how you get on.

Renewable Energy? Big Fan.
Firedog
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Having plowed through  (this thread)as recommended. Looked at the JSON for my account and found only:

 

That ‘refresh token’ is the cookie that tells the page that you’re authenticated. That’s why you have to stay in the same browser session as the one where you’re signed in to your OVO account. If the token is absent, it just means you’ve been signed out. Sign in again and then refresh the JSON page.

The cookie expires after an infuriatingly short period of 30 minutes. 

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA
Blastoise186
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The cookie expires after an infuriatingly short period of 30 minutes. 

Umm… Yeah… That’ll be because of me three years ago. Further information is classified.

Securing energy by zapping security bugs... For that is The Blastoise Way!
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Unfortunately

Having plowed through  (this thread)as recommended. Looked at the JSON for my account and found only:

 

That ‘refresh token’ is the cookie that tells the page that you’re authenticated. That’s why you have to stay in the same browser session as the one where you’re signed in to your OVO account. If the token is absent, it just means you’ve been signed out. Sign in again and then refresh the JSON page.

The cookie expires after an infuriatingly short period of 30 minutes. 

:Unfortunately I’m one of those users from the old Apollo system and am in process of being migrated to new system so have no online access currently so that explains the JSON issue.

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Hey @Ovouser777,

 

Sorry for the issues you’re having,

 

I’d imagine if a 5 port meter wasn’t installed or the 5th port wasn’t connected correctly then they should be able to book a meter exchange asap. But you’ve advised this seems to be working now? 

 

If it’s just the tariff that needs amending this should be easier. What are the support team advising? When you attempt to take a meter reading manually does it should two readings or just one? I’m wondering if the meter itself is single rate or just the tariff. 

 

Keep us posted with how you get on.

It is a 5 port meter that was installed (correctly as it now works), see below:

5 port meter correctly installed.

Port 5 (the timed switched one) started working overnight today. My resolution handler says it’s possibly because she finally got the meter team to finally understand that the fact that  port 5 was not switching was a problem as well as the rate set wrongly.

The meter shows it can display usage for more than one rate but only one is showing any usage. Because I come from the old system that had 2 separate meters (and mpans) it appears to be causing all sorts of billing headaches. Once the rate problem is sorted they have promised to refund the overcharging and compensation for the (so far) 9 months of hassle. I have nothing but praise for the resoution handler they put on my case. Once it was in their hands things at least started moving. Now I just need to check it works again tonight.

Firedog
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I had a meter like yours (Aclara SGM 1416-B) installed yesterday. I too have storage heaters and an E7 tariff, although I’ve recently been paying single-rate because it’s just too expensive to use the heaters. 

I noticed during the night that:

(a)  The ToU Rate 2 register wasn’t recording anything, and there is no Rate 2 recorded on the meter (it should be the same as Rate 1);
(b)  The second contact indicator was Open, even though we were well into the off-peak period when it should have been Closed. Unsurprisingly, nothing happened when I switched a storage heater on;
(c)  The IHD (Chameleon IHD3) only shows one ‘Meter reading.’
(d)  There are no usage data on my account page since Monday. The latest meter readings are the ones I submitted manually yesterday, the closing readings of the old meter. There are none for today, and the readings page still bears the old MSN.

So it sounds as if I’m in the same situation as you were, with the meter just not configured for peak/offpeak switching and registering. I’m a bit reluctant to involve Support with only 24 hours’ experience, but I’m also anxious to get this sorted out quickly - before Sunday’s tariff change - and to make sure I don’t miss out on this month’s Power Move reward because of the missing usage data. I’ve established that those data are indeed available from DCC; the only gap in them is the couple of hours I was off-supply while the engineer did his stuff. 

We’ll see. Since this was an Ombudsman-mandated meter exchange, I’m hoping they’ll get it right quickly.

 

[Sorry you didn’t manage to get your ‘backend’ account data. You can look forward to the upgrade that the Orion system brings.]

 

 

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA
Emmanuelle_OVO
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Hey @Firedog,

 

I’d advise contacting the support team as soon as possible, really hope this gets sorted! 

 

Keep us posted!

Renewable Energy? Big Fan.
Firedog
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I’d advise contacting the support team as soon as possible,
 

That’s what I thought, so I’m currently chatting to them over the new Messenger channel. I was rather hoping for a result like Ovouser777 got (“she finally got the meter team to finally understand that the fact that  port 5 was not switching was a problem as well as the rate set wrongly” - this is my situation, too).

The one is AFAICS a question of sending a new tariff configuration to the meter, the other needs an ECAUL command (thanks, Blastoise 🙂). We’ll see what happens - the chat has been going for an hour now, so I hope the agent is talking to somebody over at Metering.

Wait out, as they say in the army.

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA
Firedog
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… or, as they also say in the army, “hurry up and wait.” It’s now over an hour since I last heard from the agent I’m chatting with. She’s either (a)  waiting for someone from Metering to spark, (b) gone to lunch or (c) abandoned me.  Shall we open a book on which of these is the right one?

 

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA
juliamc
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My money’s on (b)

Firedog
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Well, I think you lost. It’s looking like (c), but I’ll wait till COP before declaring the winner. 

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA
juliamc
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Maybe a v long Friday style lunch ? 

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I had a meter like yours (Aclara SGM 1416-B) installed yesterday. I too have storage heaters and an E7 tariff, although I’ve recently been paying single-rate because it’s just too expensive to use the heaters. 

I noticed during the night that:

(a)  The ToU Rate 2 register wasn’t recording anything, and there is no Rate 2 recorded on the meter (it should be the same as Rate 1);
(b)  The second contact indicator was Open, even though we were well into the off-peak period when it should have been Closed. Unsurprisingly, nothing happened when I switched a storage heater on;
(c)  The IHD (Chameleon IHD3) only shows one ‘Meter reading.’
(d)  There are no usage data on my account page since Monday. The latest meter readings are the ones I submitted manually yesterday, the closing readings of the old meter. There are none for today, and the readings page still bears the old MSN.

So it sounds as if I’m in the same situation as you were, with the meter just not configured for peak/offpeak switching and registering. I’m a bit reluctant to involve Support with only 24 hours’ experience, but I’m also anxious to get this sorted out quickly - before Sunday’s tariff change - and to make sure I don’t miss out on this month’s Power Move reward because of the missing usage data. I’ve established that those data are indeed available from DCC; the only gap in them is the couple of hours I was off-supply while the engineer did his stuff. 

We’ll see. Since this was an Ombudsman-mandated meter exchange, I’m hoping they’ll get it right quickly.

 

[Sorry you didn’t manage to get your ‘backend’ account data. You can look forward to the upgrade that the Orion system brings.]

 

 

Good luck with a speedy resolution Firedog! Even after getting a resolution handler appointed to my case it’s still taken months and the billing is an absolute mess. The new agreement they sent still contained the MPAN for the old off peak meter that was removed as well as the MPAN that was retained with the new smart meter. They also quoted a figure of expected energy cost for the year to be over £12K from £2K last year. I know prices have gone up but…!

Firedog
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Thanks for your not-so-encouraging words. I was told  by the agent that ‘it can take up to 6wks for this all to be in communication with us’. I’m not particularly concerned about the data communication, because I know that that shouldn’t have any lasting effect. However, I am very concerned that my storage heaters are effectively shut down. My last - unanswered - question to the agent was “…  are you suggesting that I may be without heating until the middle of November?”

This isn’t acceptable for anyone (especially not anyone on the Priority Services Register for age or health reasons), and I don’t understand why this can’t be dealt with remotely and quickly as Blastoise suggests:
  

 

I wasn’t at home last night during offpeak hours, so I couldn’t check the relay. I’ll have a look tonight; what do you think I’ll find?

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA
O
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Thanks for your not-so-encouraging words. I was told  by the agent that ‘it can take up to 6wks for this all to be in communication with us’. I’m not particularly concerned about the data communication, because I know that that shouldn’t have any lasting effect. However, I am very concerned that my storage heaters are effectively shut down. My last - unanswered - question to the agent was “…  are you suggesting that I may be without heating until the middle of November?”

This isn’t acceptable for anyone (especially not anyone on the Priority Services Register for age or health reasons), and I don’t understand why this can’t be dealt with remotely and quickly as Blastoise suggests:
  

 

I wasn’t at home last night during offpeak hours, so I couldn’t check the relay. I’ll have a look tonight; what do you think I’ll find?

One thing I can tell you is that it appears that they are using a timer that is not adjusting for BST so it will be GMT which means you should check between 1am and 8am. That was my experience 2 nights ago.

Firedog
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… they are using a timer that is not adjusting for BST so it will be GMT which means you should check between 1am and 8am.

 

Yep, I’m aware of that. The whole industry always works on GMT all year round. I was once told that some meters compensate for this. 

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA
Firedog
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I was wrong.

Sorry, everybody, but 
        “(a)  The ToU Rate 2 register wasn’t recording anything ...”

isn’t true. It was, but the meter only shows whole kWh and ignores any decimals. It took three nights for the offpeak register to reach 1kWh and display it. 

 

Noel | I have no official status; I'm just a volunteer who comes here to help other customers. My gear: Aclara SGM 1416-B Electricity-only E7 meter; Chameleon IHD3-PPMID-AAA
Emmanuelle_OVO
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Hey @Firedog,

 

Did an agent every get back to you? I can get Forum_Support to reach out if that will be helpful? 

Renewable Energy? Big Fan.

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