Smart meter

I have one but haven't changed to the smart meter tariff. The ESB don't ask for your permission to install one, they just let you know it will be upgraded, your only choice is whether you change the tariff. As they're planning to charge more for peak times it's a no from me.

You're perfectly entitled to refuse one, it's been discussed many times on here.

Refused mine being replaced also.

Can't see how I'd save from a smart tariff. Energy companies don't tend to try to save you money. Already do as much as we can off peak.

Plus house is about 5 years old with a digital meter already. Why replace that before it's useful life is up? Seems like an awful waste to me

ESB removed it?

I had no problem with getting one installed. Quite happy not to have a meter reader coming out or having to submit my own readings.

I haven't moved to a smart tariff, though and won't until I can see for myself the savings or lifestyle adjustments I'd have to make to make it worth my while. At the moment, you can't utilise the smart part of the meter unless you're on a smart tariff, which is really stupid. Seemingly there's going to be a "data hub" website launched next month that will allow you to log in and analyse (minus one day) your electricity usage, even if you're not on a smart tariff. That will at least make the meter more useful.

But lets face facts: there's going to come a point that those not on smart tariffs are going to be penalised. They won't make people get them, they'll just make it uneconomical not to.

If one buys a house with a smart meter installed & where the previous owner had a smart plan, can the new owner revert to a 24 hour plan?

The smart tariffs are crap. The more smart meters that are installed the more they'll be tempted to start grandfathering the dumb plans. Smart meters are also unfavourable to those with solar panels

There are also some privacy concerns. For example if they see that your usage kicks off at 11 or so in the morning they might be inclined to think you're on the dole and start sending your bill every month. There is lots of other information that can be garnered about you using AI overlords which no doubt they are rubbing their hands together at the prospect of doing

The following is an interesting post from elsewhere on boards:

"Electric Ireland told me the other day that ordinary day rates will not be available from 2024 if you have a smart meter."

Meter reader called here twice in about a month and a half after being absent for about 6 months or more. Those fcuking power companies have put them into over drive to make sure they collect every penny of their massive price increases after absolutely years of trying to automate meter readers out of existence so they could pocket their wages in order to fuel/upgrade their superyachts.

I'm sick of smart technology, it won't be installed in my house.

Don’t.

Those new metres have known problems of pulsing when no gas is being used.

I doubt they going to be able to tell the difference between a laptop being used to work vs a laptop being used to relax.

They're cheaper off-peak compared to 24-hour or flat rate tariffs if you can shift your usage into the 2300-0800 timeframe.

However you could always have done this using a day/night or nightsaver tariff on the older digital meters for decades.

And that's where the rip-off is happening now.

Compare the traditional, decades old day/night plans against these shiny new smart time of use plans and the smart plans work out more expensive in every case, unless you're a particularly low energy user, since the standing charge is a bit less on the smart plans.

For example, Energia is 43.6c per unit and €236.62 per year on 24-hour plan versus:

"Old" Day/Night... Smart Meter

€296.41.............. €236.62................. Standing Charge per year

47.77c................ 52.52c................... Day Rate 8AM-5PM

47.77c................ 57.53c................... Peak Rate 5PM-7PM

47.77c................ 52.52c................... Day Rate 7PM-11PM

13.75c................ 28.17c................... Night Rate 11PM-2AM

13.75c................ 12.64c................... Night Rate 2AM-6AM

13.75c................ 28.17c................... Night Rate 6AM-8AM

SSE Airtricity is 43.41c per unit and €240.97 per year on 24-hour plan versus:

"Old" Day/Night... Smart Meter

€309.56............. €240.97.................. Standing Charge per year

44.34c............... 45.32c.................... Day Rate 8AM-5PM

44.34c............... 57.27c.................... Peak Rate 5PM-7PM

44.34c............... 45.32c.................... Day Rate 7PM-11PM

27.52c............... 29.4c..................... Night Rate 11PM-8AM

Once you've had a smart meter installed, you can't get the old day/night tariff, even if you haven't activated the smart meter - ESBN won't allow it and this is fully sanctioned by the CRU.

Once you go onto any smart meter plan, then you can't go back onto a 24-hour plan either.

It's a captive market and the providers are making sure they're building a price uplift in as people are gradually being forced into these smart tariffs with no way back.

Nope. It happened to me with a brand new build. The builders put the house on a smart plan and now I'm stuck with that. Electric Ireland gave me a 24 hour tariff but it's still split into day/peak/night so they'll probably up the peak rate.

So what are they going to do with that data? This is tinfoil hat territory.

Use it themselves by limiting your credit, sell it to advertisers. This is not tinfoil hat this is happening with other data every day of the week and has become fairly normal unfortunately. Obviously they won't sell it straight away but eventually there will be a plan that gives you a few % discount in return for Google or someone else getting your data, then the discount will slowly disappear and the data collection becomes normalised. Companies will always do all they can get away with or slightly more to make a few bob.

Data won't be sold on yet.... these things take time to bed in and be accepted... or forgotten. As the other poster said, there could be an incentive discount applied to convince you to offer up your data - just like we all do every day when we click terms and conditions on the web, that prevent us from doing anything, unless we agree to join the club.

I am old enough to remember when bank ATM cards first were introduced and they were promoted as transaction fee free and that they were going to drive the move to much cheaper banking, because the processing costs and associated labour costs were going to be much lower for the banks. In time... it all changed and we now get charged more for less services .... no one around at the time remembers that it was supposed to be cheaper banking for all , and the younger folk think that this present model of operation is way it always worked. I am even old enough to remember getting paid interest on my savings, because it was a fundamental commercial principle that the banks paid you for the use of the money that you left on deposit with them.

Companies that are working to rip you off more effectively, play a very long game. Be it banks, insurance, broadband, or energy companies .... they are not operating for the benefit of the consumer and fanfare announced operational 'advances' that they introduce, are purely for their benefit but usually dressed up as a temporary gain for the customer, to ensure initial buy in. It doesn't last .....

So data being sold by electric companies is purely hypothetical.

Gotcha.

That is correct.

Does the tinfoil scratch your head ?