Why is there a rush about having a smart meter? By 2014 every commercial property in the UK should have a smart meter installed, but to what purpose?
Let’s look at what a smart meter can do.
- It lets your supplier know what you’re using and when you’re using it.
- No more estimated bills to deal with.
However, a smart meter is also more expensive for those on quarterly accounts, which the vast amount of small businesses are and dependent on where you are in the country, it may not be able to transmit a signal to the supplier.
A smart meter allows you to review your usage, but as there is very little choice in the range of business tariffs (7 at best), its function appears to be aimed at the customer being proactive in reducing usage at peak times.
It’s currently the case that the smart meter which you have installed is dependent on which supplier you have. To have full viewing access to the meters data you either have to be with the supplier who installed it, or one with a compatible system.
If you decide to change suppliers, you may not have access to this data and what is more, it’s quite possible your new supplier won’t either. So you could well be back to estimations.
This post may appear to be anti smart meters but it isn’t. Smart meters are a must if we wish to be serious about reducing costs. By imposing a deadline without making sure that everyone and everything is working together is not making life easy for the customer. It’s not going to be a smooth ride by any stretch of the imagination.
