Only 4% of houses with smart meters are on smart plans

Obviously not but the less appliances that you have running in the middle of the night the less risk of them becoming problematic.

I had to do my research before signing off on a new contract. None of the main providers made it easy to find the actual October rates on their websites. Here’s what I found…

Based on October increases and incl. VAT

Bord Gais 48.33 less 10% 43.50

Electric Ireland 43.27 less 5.5% 40.89

Energia based on website 44.44 less 10% 40.00 but when talking to them via WhatsApp they quoted 43.60 inc discount and VAT 🫤

One Big Switch - above Bord Gais price but 33% discount 32.38.

@DC999 you did well getting that rate from energia.

Good point does any provider list your rate when you sign in to online account? I moved to energia from ei and I can't see anywhere on either providers webpage when i sign in where it displays current rate and discount. I can see old bills and other info but rate/discount should be mandatory.

Agreed - recently there was another thread with this exact same conversation. Ultimately though it's about peace of mind. If someone doesn't feel comfortable leaving stuff on, that's fair enough - although I would at least ask them to challenge their assumptions, as the fridge is more likely to catch fire than a dish washer (statistically) - but yet, they are fine with the fridge on and won't use the dish washer. it's odd to me, but each to their own. Peace of mind is important too.

Sure putting the oven or a chip fryer on a timer, you'd want to be bonkers, but generally most modern well cared for devices are safe. Night rate also it 9 hrs, so for many they can put the timer on at 8am and have it run for an hour until 9am in summer using night rate. most of the energy usage on these things is at the start of the cycle where it's heating up things.

For clarity.... It depends on when you look that fridge verses dish washer statistics :-) Most recent statistics I saw has fridges more.

fire-statistics-data-tables-fire0605-290922.xlsx (live.com)

The point is, is that they are roughly the same. You may have more one year in a box than another, but the same rough probability is there, and that is low. Very low. Same with washing machine. It's in about the same ball park as a fridge. If you have a well maintained machine, it should never catch fire. What happens is that people "notice a funny smell" and yet they will continue to use appliances. Nuts.

To go back on topic, about smart meters and and shifting load - people need to feel comfortable in their mind about moving stuff to night time. If they are not, then look at the edge hours (11pm - 12pm in winter) and (8am - 9am in summer) as times to do stuff like washing. You can set the timer the night before and have it come on as your eating breakfast. There is usually a good compromise/solution when you think about it and can keep peace of mind while taking advantage of lower rates

ELM327 who is this with & is this deal still available, thanks

That was a fixed term deal for 12 months and the post you replied to is so old that the tariff is not available, and my 12 month contract expired and I moved to Flogas for 30c day 13c night, which is also not available to new signups right now either.