[dobbo99]

Anyone else got them installed?

The Mrs has had a bee in her bonnet about us using too much electric in the new house (to be fair, we are paying alot) and with us only having one salary and 2 kids etc etc she wants to save some money.
So she has had these new meters installed which tell you when you are using what and how much. We are using between £2.50-£3.00 per day for both gas/electric. Reasonable I think.

In under a week she has turned neurotic, and is checking the digital display every time she turns an appliance on..................

Anyway, my question relates to are these things accurate? Has anyone seen their bills come down and the provider change their tariff?
Also why the f&&k are we using more electric at 12pm midnight than at 8am in the morning???

[Mark1966]

Originally Posted by dobbo99

Anyone else got them installed?

The Mrs has had a bee in her bonnet about us using too much electric in the new house (to be fair, we are paying alot) and with us only having one salary and 2 kids etc etc she wants to save some money.
So she has had these new meters installed which tell you when you are using what and how much. We are using between £2.50-£3.00 per day for both gas/electric. Reasonable I think.

In under a week she has turned neurotic, and is checking the digital display every time she turns an appliance on..................

Anyway, my question relates to are these things accurate? Has anyone seen their bills come down and the provider change their tariff?
Also why the f&&k are we using more electric at 12pm midnight than at 8am in the morning???

Tell her to stop worrying about the Electric bill and go out and get a job

[dobbo99]

Hahahaha. We have had that conversation a few times, the one I remember most was just after I spent £25k on another BMW.......

In her defense, she is on Mat leave until September.

[subsy]

https://www.your-loop.com/

Brilliant

[SkyJawa]

Had one, never cared about it!

[Daftasabrush]

Don't like the idea about smart meters, it enables the supplier to turn off your supply remotely. With normal meters they have to come out and do it which is a lot more effort for them.

If you just want to monitor energy usage use a clamp meter on the incomer.

[goodbyalfa]

The biggest pain I see with this is that each bloody supplier has their own, as they have not yet been forced to keep the same protocols on the machines between different suppliers.
We moved into a new build house recently, was with EON, but the prices started to creep up. Went to move to another supplier, was told the smart meters would no longer be smart WTF? i.e. outside you go to read the dam meters again... Rubbish!

[MarkG_M5Comp]

Had a version of them - totally pointless. Looked at it for the first few days then never again.

I think the transmitter is still on the cable but I've binned the receiver.

Just find a better priced supplier!

[x-m4n]

What I do is report my readings regularly - I keep the notes to have a good proxy for when my tariff deal ends and i change to a cheaper supplier...

With a good tariff in place, I this is useful to have sort of smart thermostat, like the Nest, that you can control remotely and turn off when you are out of the house.

[RobUK]

Regards accuracy, yes they are supposed to be reasonably accurate.

As far as I am aware, the UK energy companies have not yet finalised a common standard, thus the likelihood is that any smart meter you have now will end up being orphaned and ultimately need replacing. More worrying is that one thing the energy companies did agree on is a common key to encrypt traffic between the meter and them - that is effectively one master key for every UK household fitted with a smart meter... hmmm, what could possibly go wrong?! Apparently GCHQ had to intervene in that little folly.

British Gas is desperately trying to push it's own smart meter on every customer in the hope that its meter gets accepted as the standard. They started off writing to me, 'inviting' me to have a smart meter. The communications have become more desperate and they're now telling me that I urgently need my meters replaced with a smart meter (which is an out and out LIE).

[subsy]

Loop works with standard (non smart meters).

It will analyse your usage continuously, as well as then - based on your specific usage - advising on better deals for you using independent comparison sites.

After a month of analysis, its able to do so, and Ive just moved us to a tariff that based on our specific usage will saver us ~400 quid a year

[f1swk]

and opens the door to variable pricing,energy companys have been wanting this for ages

[subsy]

Originally Posted by f1swk

and opens the door to variable pricing,energy companys have been wanting this for ages

??

I only ever move to guaranteed fixed tariffs - but I'll use Loop to monitor if I am better off elsewhere.

[Rbrown]

If you are trying to save money, have you thought about changing to LED bulbs. We had about 40 halegen 40W bubs - after I changed them to LED, my electricity costs reduced significantly!!!!

Look after the pennies and all that........

[subsy]

Originally Posted by Rbrown

If you are trying to save money, have you thought about changing to LED bulbs. We had about 40 halegen 40W bubs - after I changed them to LED, my electricity costs reduced significantly!!!!

Look after the pennies and all that........

Yep, our house had tons of spotlights - all now LEDs. Expensive one time hit but will pay off before too long (especially given how often my wife leaves lights on )

[Kal101]

Yes I found LEDs saved a load on Leccy Bill - doesn't help that I've got two decent sized aquariums and a pond to run as well.

Def doesn't help that the 2 fat kids don't appreciate that at great expense I have also installed switches that have two settings on and off !!

[Rbrown]

Originally Posted by Kal001

Yes I found LEDs sacred a load on Leccy Bill - doesn't help that I've got two decent sized aquariums and a pond to run as well.

Def doesn't help that the 2 fat kids don't appreciate that at great expense I have also installed switches that have two settings on and off !!

Taking the light bulbs out of their rooms will save you loads of money!