I want one that speaks or can be downloaded in real time to a bog standard
textual file I can read on my computer. I also want it not to be able to be
remotely cut off by my or any supplier when the rationing comes. IE if some
nice person cocks up my payments and accidentally cuts me off. This sort of
thing happens on phones but phones can be lived without till you teach them
to be more attentive.
I see smart meters as double edged swords. Fine you can assuming the above
for us blind, would be very handy in making decisions on usage, but if it
allows the supplier to also snoop and start selling the data, or worse
cutting people off by mistake, then no thanks. According to a gov web site I
visited, this conversion to smart meters is supposed to be done by all
suppliers by 2016, so they will need a big push to achieve that. Lets hope
they don't charge us to do it, of course they will who am I kidding? grin

Brian

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From the Sofa of Brian Gaff Reply address is active
"Michael Chare" mUNDERSCOREnews@chareDOTorgDOTuk wrote in message
o.uk...
I am probably going to change my electricity supplier (i.e. the people I
pay for the supply) to make a small saving.

This has lead me to wonder about smart meters. I would quite like one if
it would provide the data for me to end up with an MS excel graph showing
how much power I use in each hour of the day. Is this likely to be
possible? I don't want to read the meter every hour, I could do that now.

From what I have learnt so far, not all meters are the same, and if you
have one and then change supplier, the new supplier may say that the meter
is incompatible with their systems.

I should say that as a way of life supplying meter readings once a year
and then sorting out the bill is quite good enough for me.


--
Michael Chare