We’ve just received an email from Bulb offering us a 2nd generation Smart Meter. I’ve read some reviews on the SMETS1 meter which basically warned users off them. It seems the new version is better according to a few reviews I have been able to find. Any v2 users on here could support or refute the online opinions, or direct me to a good resource? R-
My advice being if you don’t already have a 1st generation, then accept the 2nd generation offer as more often than not the benefits of upgrading as such will outweigh the negatives.
However if you have a 1st generation already, I’d be reluctant to upgrade to the 2nd generation until its tried and tested. You often find reviews will be written based on the history of previous models, so as someone who is looking from the outside, the review can be a bit out of tone.
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Bulb installed my SMETS two meter nearly a year ago. I did wait until I was sure that it wouldn’t be a first gen meter.
Not sure what there is to say except it works fine and not having the first world problem of having to submit monthly meter readings is a nice quality of life improvement.
I would say that the IHD is a POS. it does provide data but ideally i’d want this on my phone and exportable. Bulb does have a SmartThings integration which is quite nice but after moving to Igloo this eventually stopped working.
Have just moved again to Octopus and quite excited about the Octopus Watch app and it’s potentialy to properly track my usage.
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to be fair SMETS2 meters aren’t that new, I’ve had mine for over a year and they were available before then
I’ve had two issues
- the gas meter is too far from electric meter (one at front of house the other at back) so gas meter isn’t smart
- octopus can read the electric meter fine, but seem to struggle with the billing side (used to get monthly electric bills, now it can go many months between bills)
You usually find they send “offers” of installing kit out when they are trying to shift the entire customer based to a better supported model, you usually find they are about to introduce a 3rd generation model and 1st generation will no longer be supported or will have support to it be reduced.
Virgin Media are known for doing this, even recently they upgraded everyone to a newer version of their trash Superhub, to only bring out a newer model shortly after (shortly meaning just a few weeks).
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I much prefer the new Usage screen in the app. Although they’ve done some weird stuff, like include the gas standing charge, but not the electricity standing charge. It would surely be very easy to allow the data to be exported. Feature request?
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The things linked in this article should allow you to export data, regardless of your supplier (as long as you have a SMETS2 meter)
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SMETS1 meters have been/will be getting a software update which eliminates the problem of them going ‘dumb’ if you change supplier, anyway.
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Ha-ha, after all that I signed up but cannot have a Smart meter as we have an immersion heater. Not sure why. Thanks for the input. R-
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I got a smart meter off bulb 18 months ago. The guy didn’t have a revived bit said in my flat on the 3rd floor it wouldn’t reach anyway. And then the meter has never phoned home and told bulb anything so I now just have a slightly different looking dumb meter and still have to do my readings manually. Never really chased them up though. Although I did get a vague email a while ago about some issues with smart meter setup that they would get round to in due course…!
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What does this mean?
Best guess is he meant the guy didn’t have a reason for his response… maybe?
Are you on Economy 7 that could be why or if not maybe they’ve incorrectly assumed you are due to having an immersion heater
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Yes, on E7. Not sure what is on that circuit [just moved in]. R-
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Some funny autocorrect there, it was meant to say:
The guy didn’t have a receiver device so I could monitor it but said that the signal probably wouldn’t reach my flat on the 3rd floor anyway.
That’s why then it’s more just standard setups at the moment which are getting focused on.
You’ll probably find that the immersion heater is maybe setup on that one too draw the power over that cheaper period and usually you’d find storage heaters on the same meter if the property has then
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Ah, thanks @DaveJ I didn’t make that connection as we have oil fired central heating not E7 overnight heaters. Thanks, I can live with how things are until technology catches up. R-
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Bulb support have been in touch and asked for a photo of the meter, in particular how many wires come out of it 4 or 5. Now that is customer service. More later. R-
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I asked bulb for a smart meter over 2 years ago, no answer. Then I asked again a year ago - still nothing…