Smart meters.

[bulleidboy]

Going slightly off the original question, I think many of us "older" folk (over seventy) are getting our homes up to scratch in preparation for the coming years. My neighbour opposite, who had his double-glazing installed a couple of weeks before us, probably thirty years ago, as I type this, is having it all replaced and his conservatory roof is getting a tiled roof. The latest windows are more efficient than those installed many years ago. I'm not sure if we will do ours, but one or two windows are getting condensation between the glazing on some days, so need replacing. Better to do these things now when you are fit and relatively healthy.

[Bandit Mick]

On a serious note (I was in cynical old fa*t mode previously), many people will struggle this winter if it’s very cold. I heard someone I worked with tell the story of visiting some homes as part of her job, only to find that the tenants had actually pulled up some floorboards and burnt them. It was a rough area, but even so ... Still, so long as the shareholders of the energy companies are warm this winter, why worry!

[Walkingthedog]

Quite a few have gone bust and disappeared.

If it gets too cold I’ll set fire to one of the sheds.

[IanS]

We've had a SMART meter for many years, probably a Mark 0.9 version

We got it as at the time we regularly went away on holiday when the meter was due to be read and ended up with estimated bills most of the time. The SMART meter avoids that hassle on the return from Spain in the winter and from caravan holidays in the summer. Sadly we are no longer able to travel to Spain or a touring caravan which makes our stays in a caravan 1 week at a time not 3 weeks at a time.

I remember early on, a friend had a solar panel installed by his social housing company and at that time SMART meters couldn't be installed with them. He got no benefit from the solar panels either!

[RAF96]

I took over the solar panels that came with my house and what a palaver.
I had a letter from the previous owner sating I now owned them. The solicitor ‘forgot’ to list the system in fixtures and fitting, so the feed in tariff remunerator thought they still belonged to the previous owner who could be renting my roof. When I filled in the transfer forms the meter serial on the certificate of installation didn't match the one installed despite never having been changed and the previous owner had been getting payed without question. I had to get the certifying agency to change the installation certificate at cost, submit that to the FIT company and eventually I got paid back to day one. Meter readings are sent in quarterly. Returns are well worth it.
I refused a smart meter as I was also told it wasn’t compatible with solar although it is and if you change suppliers they will say it doesn't work with their system so you need a new one, again at severe cost.meter readings are send in monthly. The incompatible ones are those that turn the normal meter back. Mine is a separate meter not affecting the other one. Pity Avro has gone TU as they have switched me to Octopus. Initial blurb email received but nothing heard since. Doesn't inspire me with confidence.

[teedoubleudee]

I was with Avro too when they went bust last month and like yourself am now being "served" by Octopus. FIT payments on my solar system are over £300 pa on average but my total savings on energy are £5k over the 5 years I've had them installed.