Prices of the electricity we use to charge

[soundwave]

i just had some nob head telling me i have to have a smart pre payment meter fitted as required buy law, said no thanks.

well you have no choice hmmm puts phone down and rings edf.

been put on hold for 6 months and i dont have to have a pre payment one and i can have it det to dumb mode oh no

 

[soundwave]

i have a quote of 250-450 to remove the edf meter and fit my own one

so if edf does supply me with with power then they wont have any problem turning my cable off in the road will they

whats the worst that can happen the meter service life is over this year so has to get replaced one way or the other.

 

[lenny]

 

[guerney]

i just had some nob head telling me i have to have a smart pre payment meter fitted as required buy law, said no thanks.

well you have no choice hmmm puts phone down and rings edf.

been put on hold for 6 months and i dont have to have a pre payment one and i can have it det to dumb mode oh no

AFAIK nobody can force you to have a smart meter. Consult Citizen's Advice?

You should switch to Octopus via Ebico, they're easier to push around - I've got them to agree to cancel my direct debits and paying extra above what I'm actually using, so they can build up a surplus on my account to line their own pockets with, which I can apply to get back at some later stage, if unused, and if they agree to pay me. Why do I need to build up a surplus for winter? It's winter! Octopus say they've cancelled the direct debits from my bank account, and claim they've enabled the barcode on my emailed statements, so I can pay monthly over the counter at a Paypoint using card or cash instead - why the hell isn't this enabled by default? Every previous energy provider has accepted cash or card payments. Whether or not they continue to demand that I pay towards building up an Octopus account surplus remains to be seen. I'll only pay for what I atually use otherwise I'll consider switching to an energy provider which issues old fashioned quarterly bills, after I've used it.

It's all taken rather a lot of enraged sounding emails and emailed threats (I refuse to speak to them over the phone, because it's best to collect evidence), including threatening to complain to Ofgem and Ebico about Octopus, and threatening to complain to Ofgem about Ebico... and while jumping through hoops to get to this point, I discovered that the email address for complaints listed on the Octopus website for Ebico customers, doesn't even exist! Octopus really, really want people paying too much every month by direct debit, and make things as hard as possible switching to paying by card or cash.

Imagine if your restaurant charged you extra before you ate anything, to build a surplus for what you might eat at some point in the future... then pocketing that extra money to earn interest in their bank account, or to invest in other businesses with you not being paid a penny for any return on those investments, or to make their business more attractive to investors by showing a higher cash flow than they would have otherwise. It's outrageous!

And what's with the minimum threshold before you can get any Octopus account surplus paid back? It's my money! It's the principle of the thing. I don't care if my Octopus account shows just 1p surplus - if I want my money back, I should be able to get my money back at any point! If I wanted another bank account, I'd open one!

I don't know what Octopus customer service is like when they aren't providing energy and customer service on Ebico's behalf, to charge my ebike with.

 

[esuark]

(I refuse to speak to them over the phone, because it's best to collect evidence)

I did this once on a completely different negotiation because I didn't trust who I was negotiating with and wanted everything like you in black and white correspondence.

 

[guerney]

I did this once on a completely different negotiation because I didn't trust who I was negotiating with and wanted everything like you in black and white correspondence.

Very wise. They know hardly any people record phone calls - I do, my wonderful OnePlus 5 automatically records every phone call including my SIP VOIP line (my phone has two numbers: one SIM, one VOIP as the second "SIM", which looks like a regional landline but isn't), but emails are easier to print out and send. My OnePlus 5 still gets security updates, even though it was manufactured in 2017. OnePlus support their phones far longer than any other phone manufacturer I know of, and what's more their boot loader is unlucked, so when they eventually do cease support, you can install free open source Lineage OS. With Samsung and others, you buy a phone which is going have an out of date OS and be insecure shortly.

 

[nigelbb]

Very wise. They know hardly any people record phone calls - I do, my wonderful OnePlus 5 automatically records every phone call, but emails are easier to print out and send. My OnePlus 5 still gets security updates, even though it was manufactured in 2017. OnePlus support their phones far longer than any other phone manufacturer I know of, and what's more their boot loader is unlucked, so when they eventually do cease support, you can install free open source Lineage OS. With Samsung and others, you buy a phone which is going to be insecure shortly.

Apple still provide security updates for the iPhone 7 released in 2016. Most recent update iOS 15.8.2 released March 5th 2024 i.e. four days ago.

 

[guerney]

Apple still provide security updates for the iPhone 7 released in 2016. Most recent update iOS 15.8.2 released March 5th 2024 i.e. four days ago.

I don't like Apple's habit of making their new OSs so huge, they fill up phone memory so much it necessitates the purchase of a new phone because there's little room left for anything else, or their other trick of underclocking the CPU when they do so because they're "concerned about overheating" while running the new OS. And it's not just Apple. There's plenty of room on my OnePlus 5, despite not having a memory card slot and only 64gb internal storage, even with OxygenOS 10.0.1, their own Android build. In the not too distant future, I'll be selling it and buying another one of their network unlocked newer models which also automatically records every phone call, VOIP and cellular network.

 

[nigelbb]

I don't like Apple's habit of making their new OSs so huge, they fill up phone memory so much it necessitates the purchase of a new phone because there's little room left for anything else, or their other trick of underclocking the CPU when they do so because they're "concerned about overheating" while running the new OS. And it's not just Apple. There's plenty of room on my OnePlus 5, despite not having a memory card slot and only 64gb internal storage, even with OxygenOS 10.0.1, their own Android build. In the not too distant future, I'll be selling it and buying another one of their network unlocked newer models which also automatically records every phone call, VOIP and cellular network.

The update for iOS 15.8.2 was 2.7GB which might be tight on the base 32GB model but is insignificant on a 64GB iPhone even more so if you had the 128GB model.

BTW I didn't see you issue a correction to "OnePlus support their phones far longer than any other phone manufacturer I know of". You now know that Apple support their iPhones longer than OnePlus do.

 

[guerney]

The update for iOS 15.8.2 was 2.7GB which might be tight on the base 32GB model but is insignificant on a 64GB iPhone even more so if you had the 128GB model.

Can your iPhone automatically record all calls to use as evidence, to use if necessary after negotiating with energy companies, without using an app to do the recording? Does your iPhone have a built in SIP client, and does your phone record all calls using SIP VOIP without needing to use an app to record? Automatic call recording is a feature built into OnePlus's OxygenOS, no app needed.

My phone's better than yours.

 

[soundwave]

it was a 3rd party company trying to push smart meters on old customers to bad i answered the phone and our meters life runs out end of 2025.

they can only make you have one if ur meters life is at its end or it has a fault and needs to be replaced.

you can also ask for them to be put in to dumb mode but this wont work for pay as u go but if you are on a priority list then can pay monthley and give them meter readings.

 

[guerney]

it was a 3rd party company trying to push smart meters on old customers to bad i answered the phone and our meters life runs out end of 2025.

they can only make you have one if ur meters life is at its end or it has a fault and needs to be replaced.

you can also ask for them to be put in to dumb mode but this wont work for pay as u go but if you are on a priority list then can pay monthley and give them meter readings.

Are you certain about the legality of this? If so, why? What did Citizen's Advice say?

I would have hung up and waited for a letter or email, and responded in kind. Always collect a paper or virtual paper trail as evidence.

 

[soundwave]

i rang edf and got it halted for 6 months and can keep doing that until the meters life is over in 2025.

and then ill fit my meter and they can have there one back and see what happens lol.

 

[guerney]

i rang edf and got it halted for 6 months and can keep doing that until the meters life is over in 2025.

and then ill fit my meter and they can have there one back and see what happens lol.

I certainly hope your wrong about being legally required to have a smart meter, even if you're on PAYG. You really should thoroughly investigate where you stand legally. They might charge you for removing a smart meter, if turns out later that you've been illegally forced to have one installed.

Treatment of PAYG customers by energy companies is shocking - they make more profit from them than from any other private citizen.

 

[soundwave]

smart meters have to be installed if the meter is faulty or at the end of its service life.

 

[guerney]

smart meters have to be installed if the meter is faulty or at the end of its service life.

Mine won't be, I doubt yours is legally required to be either.

 

[soundwave]

my meter is 40 years old next year so will need replacing but for 250 might just fit my own meter and stop paying edf lol.

 

[guerney]

my meter is 40 years old next year so will need replacing but for 250 might just fit my own meter and stop paying edf lol.

Mandy Tory

 

[lenny]

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[lenny]

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