Smart meters or linky

[woolybanana]

These are I suppose the same but how are they supposed to help people save money, particularly as most are located outside or out of easy sight?

Are we supposed to study them to observe and modify our consumption? Hardly practical?

[idun]

Exactly just how does one save money?????

Strangely, and being far from the brightest person around, even I know that IF I bump my heating up, leave the hot tap running, or have lights on that I don't need, that my bills will reflect the amount I use.  And if I turn stuff off or down, my bills are less and then I could save money if I so wished.

IS this 'rocket science'?????

What I do know is that these things in the UK have gone radically wrong, spewing out HUGE bills for some people and not being a very lucky person, would hate it to be me, with a battle on my hands about an erroneous bill.

I will avoid having one for as long as I can, and have so little faith that I would watch what it was saying every single day.

[NormanH]

I thought I was going to be able to read my daily consumption on a web site as I can now with my water, but if that is the case I haven't found it..

[idun]

Well I can, I just read my meter?

I read the meter every month and always have a good idea of usuage during the month.

[alittlebitfrench]

One of those caught fire the other week and burnt the house down.

So you could argue they do work in lowering your electricity consumption. LOL.

[Théière]

I have already sent in a complaint to the advertising standards lot as the smart meter cannot save money!

[Lehaut]

In our flat we have a Linky meter and Direct Energy. They also offered me, for free, an Atome system. This is a "key" which pushes into the Linky box. The app on your smart phone (once you have initialised and connected the system on the wifi) allows you in real time to see your consumption of electricity. It has been my intention in fitting out this flat to be "connected". Several lights, heaters, towel rails, heated floors etc that we have installed are all fitted with smart plugs. They can be either operated on Google Home or on the phone. Not to everyones taste I know, but I have enjoyed mastering it. I can lie in bed at, say 0720, and see the base load on the flat (220 watts) and, at 0730 when our heated bedroom floor comes on, as well as the kitchen heater, I can see the load go up to 2220 watts. Should I monitor the consumption during the day and know that nothing should be on, and see there is higher than expected load, I can take action, thus reducing consumption and saving money.

Works for me, family hate it!!

[YCCMB]

LOL, Lehaut! It's a bloke thing, without doubt. Mr Betty enjoys keeping track of meter readings (he would feel usurped by a smart meter) and all my friends and my kids' friends wax lyrical about the man of the house turning down thermostats and switching off lights whilst the rest of the family play scrabble in the dark, clad in layers of jumpers.....

[EuroTrash]

There's some concern over Linkys being an invasion of privacy, because they can build up a fairly complete picture of your private life from your electricity usage pattern - what time you get up and go to bed, when you're in and when you're out, when you have guests, etc.

Personally I've become pretty immune to privacy issues and resigned to my life being an open book to smart technology, but can't say I like it and I understand that other people may find this a real issue.

http://services.completefrance.com/forums/completefrance-forums/cs/forums/AddPost.aspx?PostID=3662446

[idun]

so why check up all the time????

I did when we got a new gas boiler to see how much it was using, I did this every couple of days for a week.

I have to cook, bake, hoover (well sometimes) and have a decent light to read by. And I like warmth and clean clothes, ironed usually.

What I was always good at was being economic with water when we had a meter. But the rest, well, I daresay I could cut down a little but I don't leave lights on all over the place, or unnecessarily heat rooms we do not use.

However, this checking up thing...... our friends got solar panels and every time we were out with them, he would be checking on how much money they were 'making'....... that wore off as they found that they weren't making anything like promised.............AND WORSE......[:-))]the pidgeons had nested beneath the panels and their droppings had blocked the guttering and they got damp in their house. Sorted now, an expensive fix though.

[EuroTrash]

What worries people is that your electricity supplier can collect information on your behaviour inside your own home, because Linky systematically records your electricity usage. This information can be stored and potentially hacked or sold.

[NormanH]

Lehaut:

In our flat we have a Linky meter and Direct Energy. They also offered

me, for free, an Atome system. This is a "key" which pushes into the

Linky box. The app on your smart phone (once you have initialised and

connected the system on the wifi) allows you in real time to see your

consumption of electricity.

That is exactly what I hoped to be able to do. I too have Direct Energie but they have never offered me that option. I will contact them, so thanks for the tip.

Why check up? Because I have just moved into a new flat with things like reversible air conditioning  and I want to see the power consumption.

Why online?  Because the metres in both my places are quite inaccessible even for someone able-bodied, never mind a cripple like me.

[woolybanana]

Somewhere I read a suggestion that the elec. companies might decide to charge according to when the electricity is used. Thus if you use a lot at peak periods you will pay a supplement but less if you use off peak.

Which poses loadsa problems but may force the elec companies to provide much cheaper access at off peak times to get consumers to change their habits.

This would be more subtle than the present arrangements of peak and off peak electricity.

Though with electric cars probably being charged at night, there may be no off peak any more.

[Gardengirl]

Norman said: <>

Norman, I hope that your energy consumption goes down like ours did when we had reversible aircon installed.

We had assumed that our bills would go up dramatically as our apartment is south-facing and became extremely hot even with the shutters closed and the awning out from early morning. Our aircon made it much more comfortable, but we though it would be at a cost, worth paying fir us.

Plus our apartment becomes extremely cold while we’re back in the UK, especially during the few weeks around Christmas/January, as no neighbours are at one side of us in winter and those underneath us are there only intermittently. So the heating part had a lot of work to do to warm the apartment up and keep it comfortable.

Not only have we been much more comfortable in the apartment in both summer and winter, but the savings compared with previous bills have been considerable.

[NormanH]

Thanks for that [:)]   Might be good news for once...

[Kong]

You can see your daily consumption on a website - you need to set up an espace clientelle on ENEDIS, not your electricity provider. Instructions came with the bumph supplied when the meter was installed. Go to: www.enedis.fr/Linky

[woolybanana]

If you read French there is a lng and very comprehensive article in today’s Le Monde which gives a pretty good picture of Linky and its ‘attributes’.

I assume it is similar to the British system. The bit on differential pricing is most interesting

https://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/article/2018/10/27/linky-en-questions-explorez-toutes-les-reponses-a-vos-interrogations-sur-le-compteur-connecte_5375503_4355770.html

[richard51]

Or load, click right and translate to English or whatever language required.

[NormanH]

Very interesting link WB. Thanks [B]