1st Solar Anniversary

On 19th Nov we passed our first Solar Anniversary and 3762 kWh on our 4kWp system.

That was 9% over the estimate we'd had of 3440 kWh per year (including the 29th Feb) - not a bad result given the pretty rubbish weather in particular in the summer.  I found that March & September were good, May, July and August were passable but May & July were poor.

In the end we got a credit from our electricity companies of more than 7 kWh per day for the 11 months we were generating and being charged for what we sold back to the grid due to the faulty meter.  This was a reasonable sum but given all the pain & frustration of the saga, £200 didn't go a long way, especially as we'd already paid it out and it was simply a refund.

Better though was the lovely figure of £1747 in the bank (well, paying off the first instalments of the loan for the system) and a benefit of around £80 for the year by way of a lower electricity bill (16% lower than previously)

So all in all a return of £1827 GBP on our investment of £11000 - more than 16.5% APR by my rough maths ... not half bad!

The amount we generate and earn in FiT payments is great although there's obviously little we can do to affect that.  What I am trying to work out though is how to get more benefit from what we generate and (until now) have only used a little of.  

Basically I work out that:

• We use around 5700 kWh per year or 15.5 kWh per day.
• This can be from the grid or from the panels (if the sun is shining etc.) but that's what we need.

• We generated 3762 kWh from the Solar PV panels in year 1 - 10.3 kWh per day.
• Of that the majority went back into the grid.

• We used approx. 16% less electricity from the grid - 917 kWh per year, 2.5 kWh per day - from our panels.
• This is a benefit of around £80 per year depending on the power company.

• So if 917 kWh didn't come from the grid it came from the panels (assuming our usage is broadly stable)
• That means that we used less than 25% of what we generated and more than 75% went back to the grid.

Obviously there's no great problem with that - we get our FiT payments whatever happens (at least until Smart Meters are rolled out) however as 84% of our electricity was still from the grid in spite of the panels and 75% of our generated power went back to the grid, it seems crazy to accept that when we could be using up to 100% of our generated power without suffering any FiT disadvantage AND see the benefit of a further reduced electricity bill - by up to another £240 per year theoretically if we could use all that we generate and only go to the grid for the balance of 2000 kWh per year.

There are increasing numbers of clever systems available for making use of more of the generated power, however with some of them costing many hundreds or even thousands of pounds, saving only £20 extra per month means we'd have to be truly convinced & have the money available before such a system would make sense.

There does seem to be an argument though that one of the more intelligent immersion heater systems would be a good idea - not too expensive or complex but a cheap & easy way to store power, as heated water and therefore reducing our gas bill accordingly.

The other relatively simple measure I'll look at is the Wattson electricity monitor - a great system which it seems works well with Solar PV systems to show when the generation outstrips demand in an easily comprehensible way and so it helps everyone to understand when it's "free" to switch something on and when it is not.  Wattson is not cheap as electricity monitors go, but at around £100 is pretty affordable if we can save more of the extra £240 per year!

eBay here we come!  Not only for Wattson but to sell our 2 other electricity monitors which only get confused by the Solar PV system!

average August, sunny September!

After an average Sat & Sun at the start of the month, the first full week of Sept was one of the best weeks of the year for us: 19, 20, 21, 22, 22, 21, 20 - 143 kWh for 7 days, and average of more than 20kWh per day.  Not bad for Sept when the expected average is 10 kWh per day!

3 weeks into Sept we're now 45% above the PVGIS climate figures for Sept so far and we've passed the expected total for the month (310 kWh) yesterday.

The last 2 days have been quite contrasting - Fri 21st was probably the worst day ever, certainly since we've had the generation log running - 2.6 kWh for the 9 hours we were generating in the day - a miserable average of 0.274 kW per hour and a "peak" of 0.572!  Not even enough to run a few bulbs.

Then yesterday, Saturday 22nd was great - sunny, windy, a little cloudy and a total of 20 units for the day - that's more like it!

There's a week of the month to go but we're certainly on course for passing August in terms of generated units (377), and possibly June (426) and July (429) too!

Oh and at the end of August we were 5% up on predicted figures, not bad given the Met Office AnomAct figures are out for the month and showed ~100% of the average sunshine for our area.

We've now passed a nice round figure of £ 1500 Feed in Tarrif earnings, although some of that will only be paid once the first 12 months are finished & our next reading goes in on 22nd Nov.  We're also only 100 units short of the predicted total for the year - 3434 kWh - with a reasonable week we could reach that next weekend with all of October and 3 weeks of November still to run.  Not the sunniest of months but certainly a nice bonus of perhaps 5-10%!

simultaneous equations ... such fun!

With the help of sly_dog_jonah from the MSE Solar PV forum, I've worked through some simultaneous equations to solve the question of how much Ovo and E.ON owe us, using a few reasonable assumptions.

The main one is that our total electricity consumption since we installed the solar panels has not changed dramatically, either up or down.

Using that basis, the figures from the Generation Meter and the Import Meter (which actually adds the incoming and exported electricity figures together) I've come up with the average figures for the 9 months we've had the solar panels, as well as the 3 months under E.ON and the 6 months under Ovo.

Basically under E.ON we were overcharged by an average of 3.440 kWh units of electricity usage per day.

Under Ovo we're still being charged for an extra 7.925 kWh units per day.

This is a total of around £200 for the 9 months.  We are still waiting for a 2nd offer from Ovo (they offered 6 units per day for the 6 months they've supplied us).

What is also interesting is that it shows how much benefit we've been getting from the panels in terms of electricity we've generated & used without having to import and pay for it from the grid.

For the 9 months (Winter, Spring & Summer) our electricity import has reduced by more than 25% - a saving of around £125 for the 3 quarters of the year.

So together with the income from the Feed-in-Tarrif payments, the benefit in the first year could reach £2000, and that's without making any major changes to our electricity usage.

3rd quarter payment received & all info updated

We submitted the 3rd quarterly reading by phone to E.ON's FiT team late on Wed 22nd Aug.  The electronic transfer reached our account by the end of Wed 29th Aug - 5 working days later, a great improvement on the 48 days previously!

August finished 5% up on the estimated figures (394 vx. 377 units, 13 kWh/day instead of 12).  Not a bad result but considering we were 30% up on prediction after 10 days, it's clear the better half of August was the earlier half, which of course was good for the Olympics. The first 15 days averaged 15kWh per day, the last 15 averaged 11 units per day.

3rd quarter figures posted & all info updated

So on Wed 22nd Aug we passed 9 months as a registered micro-generator of electricity.

The 3rd quarter figures (22nd May - 22nd Aug) were 1326 kWh - a payment of £623 is on its way to our bank account from E.ON!  This will bring the total for the 9 months to £1354.

This is about 5% above the expected figures from PVGIS of 1255 for the quarter, as you can see from the figures below.

The figures in the grey & white boxes are the predicted ones from PVGIS, those in the green boxes are the ones we've achieved.  We're still 8% above where the PVGIS figures were for 9 months in - I'll take that as a good deal!

Summary & all stats / graphs updated once again

including figures to the end of Fri 17th Aug 2012.

Based upon the data available the following is a snapshot of the consumption and generation for our family / household.  This uses electricity readings from more than 1 year, Solar PV figures for 9 months and gas meter readings since mid-Jan 2012.  Therefore the figures are likely to be slightly optimistic - low on gas usage (full winter costs not included) and perhaps slightly high on Solar PV generation.

average Solar PV generation

• per day - 10 kWh (£ 5 FiT income)
• per week - 72 kWh (£ 34 FiT income)
• per month - 311 kWh (£ 146 FiT income)
• per year - 3736 kWh (£ 1 756 FiT income)

average electricity consumption

• per day - 17 kWh (includes approx. 6 units generated by Solar PV) - approx. £ 2
• per week - 122 kWh (includes approx. 40 units generated by Solar PV) - approx. £ 12.50
• per month - 529 kWh (includes approx. 181 units generated by Solar PV)  - approx. £ 56
• per year - 6346 kWh (includes approx. 2173 units generated by Solar PV) - approx. £ 675

average gas consumption 

(heating, cooking, hot water)

• per day - 7 units - approx. £ 2.50
• per week - 52 units - approx. £ 17
• per month - 227 units - approx. £ 77
• per year - 2721 units - approx. £ 918

New e-mail to Ovo (& their MD)

To: feedback@ovoenergy.com

Cc: OvoEnergy Managing Director (e-mail address from the internet)

Given that it is 5 weeks since I raised this issue and 4 weeks since I complained, I am sending a copy of this message to the MD at Ovo as I think it is ridiculous that the company cannot carry out its duty to bill me regularly and accurately for the electricity I am using.  If it reaches 8 weeks without a satisfactory solution then I will be contacting the Energy Ombudsman to reach a decision on this.  I should also tell you that I have been publicising this problem via my blog, Twitter & Facebook as well as the Moneysavingexpert Forum and I have also been asked to write a guest article about my experiences on a micro-generation blog with wide readership.

Our meter only shows the total of the different registers, though the info will be kept separate internally. 

If the person whose name I gave you isn't available, perhaps someone else at Siemens UK in Nottingham can help. The number I was given was 0115 906 xxxx but they called me after contact I made with @SiemensUK through Twitter.  I have to say I knew about the manual and the separate meter registers and had explained as much when I raised this issue originally.  

If anyone had searched the internet for the meter (Siemens S2AS) would read the forum 

MoneySavingExpert Forum (my profile is jkpaul)

or my blog and would actually have known this. 

I'm sorry if I seem frustrated but I am ... very!

I have been offered a credit of 6 units per day for the estimated overcharge, however as the accurate figures are available from the meter to anyone with an optical device and readily available software, it is concerning in the extreme that Ovo and your partners seem unable or unwilling to even investigate this. I have submitted all the readings and information necessary for the resolution of this problem accurately based on actual usage and verifiable electricity export.  

I have also said that I would accept a refund based upon a check-meter analysis of the disparity between our current meter and what is actually coming from the grid & therefore chargeable.  I would not be willing to pay for this check meter though - it is surely Ovo's responsibility to ensure accurate billing.

I would be very happy to discuss this with anyone who calls me to try to find a solution - I look forward to hearing from someone very soon.

Kind regards,

Paul

New e-mail from Ovo

Good afternoon Mr Johnston-Knight,
Thank you for your email.

One of my colleagues has tried to contact Siemens on the number provided but has not yet been able to get hold of them. She has since sent an email to Siemens and is currently awaiting a response. From the manual however she has found the following:

“A “total register“ holds the total accumulation of all the rate registers. This is a separate register - not a calculated register. There are, in fact, two separate total registers - one for import energy and one for export energy.

An option in the tariff software allows export energy to be added and displayed to the forward total (or Import) register. In all cases, the export and import registers are physically maintained separately.

The display consists of a number of annunciators and six seven segment displays.

The display cycles round all the displays that are enabled. The rate of cycling of each display item is programmable in 1 second steps up to 16 seconds per display item.”

My colleague has therefore asked if all displays on the meter have been supplied as there should be an import register as well as a total and export. If we can check on what displays are available then we can ensure that going forward only the import dial is read. I apologise if this has already been discussed.

We are chasing the response from Siemens and will provide you with an update once we have heard from them.

Kind regards,

[name removed]
Extra Care Coordinator

Fantasy solar panel performance prediction

OK, so I've been playing with figures over lunch.

It's now 2 weeks tomorrow until our 3rd quarterly generation meter reading will be submitted and I've been calculating / guesstimating what figures we'll have then and at the end of the year:

• Q1 474 units = £213
• Q2 1125 units (1599 total) = £518 (£731 total)
• *Q3 1326 units (2925 total) = £623 (£1354 total) *prediction
• *Q4 725 units (3650 total) = £340 (£1694 total) *prediction

The assumptions I've made are:
* average of 15 units per day from last Saturday until Wed 22nd August;
* average of 8 units per day from 23rd Aug - 22nd Nov (10 units/day in Sep, 8 units/day in Oct, 6 units/day in Nov).

This would take us to a grand total for the year of around 3640 units - around £1700.

Compared to the pre-installation predictions this would be around 7% up on the performance and 10% up on the payment (due to inflation-linked FiT increase).

Not bad for a mediocre summer!

So you can either look at it as 
1 - covering our gas & electricity costs for the year (our over-estimated bill is around £1650 per year) 
OR 
2 - set it against paying back 15% of the cost of the solar PV system 
OR 
3 - against paying back most of the first year cost of the loan for it.

The loan is of course not inflation-linked so will reduce in time relative to the increasing payments for the FiT (although the loan amount will of course grow with interest during the 7 years duration).

The loan will be paid off after 7 years and we'll then have a further 18 guaranteed years of the FiT income before it becomes a case of simply "don't turn anything on until the sunshines"!

And what's more, our electricity bill since we installed Solar PV has not reduced due to the incompatibility of our incoming electricity meter.  This will be resolved (hopefully sooner rather than later) and will mean a credit for this current year and with accurate billing in future, hopefully our electricity bills will be around £250 - 350 lower per year.

The Journey (part 3) ... getting somewhere?!

So having spoken to Siemens, MeterPlus (npower), E.ON and Ovo again, it felt like I was making some progress, slow, but in the right direction, albeit by a bit of a roundabout route!


Being totally confused by MAPs (Meter Asset Provider) / MAMs (Meter Asset Manager), as well as MOPs (Meter Operator Provider) / MOAs (Meter Operator Agent) I don't know who really to speak to but at least Ovo have now called me back (Thu afternoon) following a voicemail message I left the Feedback (complaints) team last weekend AND an e-mail chasing up a response on Tuesday.


Rachel who called with the Return to E.ON suggestion asked what my response was, so I explained that I didn't think it was very helpful or sensible to suggest estimating our usage and export figures for the last 6-9 months when the accurate data was available and accessible, safely stored within the meter itself, simply because they are not used to doing it.  I compared it to any normal consumer offering to estimate their usage on every reading for the next 6-9 months without any accurate historical usage to compare it to and without hope of an exact reckoning with a detailed reading later.


I pointed out that MeterPlus were amazed and keen to help and that Siemens had understood the issue and offered their assistance via a specific telephone number which Ovo or their engineer could call.


Rachel took down the details, agreed to call Siemens with their Industry Manager and to involve their meter partners, Lowri Beck and to let me know when they have spoken to them.  I insisted that she let me know specifically so that no-one would come and change the meter without informing me in advance.


And then this morning, as I left the house, I saw a MeterPlus car/van arrive. They'd come to read next door's meter (coincidence) so I asked if they'd have a look at the meter for me.  The guy was reluctant but prepared (while waiting for next door to unlock their gate) to cast his eye over the meter all of 5 yards from where he'd been standing anyway.


Unfortunately though when I pointed out the optical communication port on it and asked whether he had a reader which could access it, he glazed over blankly and said, "Er, no, I just read the number & put it into this" pointing has his handheld device much like a DHL "Sign here" machine.

It was worth a try!


Perhaps I'll have a search with Google's help for the optical readers and software necessary to read the data from the meter's internal registers myself ... I'll have to do something while waiting for Ovo to come back to me again.  Or I could use the e-mail address I found online for the Managing Director of Ovo ... possibly sending a copy of my next "Feedback" e-mail would be interesting, or maybe he'd like to read my blog!


Whatever happens, there's certainly more to come ... !

The Journey (part 2) ... the plot thickens

So having had a surprising response from Ovo, I was open to suggestions of whom I might contact to get some, as Mick Jagger would say, satisfaction.


A helpful person on the MSE board (utility_csa) offered to put our meter serial number into his database at work to try and get the name of a company to speak to to get the meter read in detail.  I was a little sceptical but having few promising options meant I was getting desperate so I provided the serial number.  They came back to say that npower were the firm to speak to as they were the Meter Asset Provider and offered a contact number.  When I called them it turned out to be MeterPlus, the meter servicing arm of npower.


The automated call-direction system on the phone gave several warnings that the number was not for consumers, that general public should contact their own energy provider and that this line was only for utility companies.  Nevertheless I persevered and when the phone was answered explained very quickly that I had heard & understood the warnings ("public should not proceed any further, to do so will be dangerous" etc.) but that I had done so, as although I'm a consumer, I have a serious and unusual issue with my meter which was causing desperation and wanted some advice!


The helpful woman at the end of the phone relented (she was obviously well-trained to get rid of consumers usually) and agreed to listen.  I briefly explained the situation: that our meter was apparently fine until we had the Solar PV installed and the problem had since arisen that the incoming meter was programmed to add up and display imported and exported units and we had been charged for them.


I explained it was an unusual situation but a known issue with this meter and that although the data was all contained in the meter's internal memory and accessible by a technical engineer with the right meter reading hardware and software, our electricity supply company (and the previous one, E.ON) had maintained that estimation was the only way to remedy the historical over-charge and that they would then exchange the meter.


She laughed and was incredulous, unable to believe the stupidity that I'd been   faced with, not to mention the unhelpful response from the utility company and their insistence that I do all the chasing of wild-geese in this scenario.  She said that they could help but that they were unable to do it at my suggestion - it would have to be a request from Ovo - and once they'd been asked by the energy supplier to get involved they could do so and quite quickly and easily.  She recommended that I speak again to Ovo and insist that they request help from MeterPlus to interrogate our incoming meter for the relevant data.

I've also spoken to a very helpful person at Siemens who manufacture the meters in question.  She said they couldn't do it or help me to, but were very keen to advise the meter provider or utility company on how to get at the right bit of the meter memory to get the right info out! All I need to do is get someone to call them!

So now I'm confused ... but again utility_csa was able to advise:

• Ovo - current supplier
• E.ON - former supplier
• Utility Warehouse - supplier when meter was installed (buy their electricity from npower)
• npower - meter asset provider or meter operator as the person on the phone said?
• Meter Plus - npower metering arm
• Yorkshire Electricity - meter is "property of YE", part of npower?
• Lowri Beck - Ovo's metering partner

So it feels as though I'm getting somewhere, in the same way as someone trying to swim through syrup is getting somewhere!

More updates very soon ...

The journey (part 1)

Where was I?

Oh yes, I've outlined the problem, then the next part is the journey towards finding a solution.

Having read through all the posts on the MSE thread I mentioned which alerted me to the problem at the beginning of July, I quickly became quite knowledgable about the Siemens S2AS-100 meter ... isn't the internet wonderful?


I learnt that the meter doesn't just add the outgoing electricity readings onto the incoming ones, it counts them in an internal register separate from the imported readings, but then ours (as many others) is programmed to display the sum of both registers on the meter!  


This data is kept in non-volatile internal memory in the meter and should be readable to a technical engineer (or a savvy meter-reader) if they have the correct optical reader device.  Basically they can get a USB-connected gizmo which reads infra-red communication and can translate that with the correct software into data on a computer.


Unfortunately our search for a solution was made more difficult because the company supplying our gas & electricity when we installed solar PV was E.ON (they are still our FiT company) but 3 months later we moved to Ovo for lower bills, their green credentials and their (supposedly) better customer service.

Anyway, undaunted, I decided the best place to start would be Ovo - our current dual-fuel supplier and the company who would need to refund us the overcharge for the units we had paid for but not used since at least when they took over our account in mid-Feb.  

Additionally I decided that as the Nov - Feb period (with Solar PV & under E.ON) was not a particularly long or fruitful one for generation, I wouldn't go back to E.ON to claim back what I'd been overcharged. Therefore I started by speaking to Ovo.


Sadly of course, the person I spoke to at Ovo had not heard of the problem (they knew some meters could go backwards with solar ... a bad thing of course) but promised to discuss it with the siteworks team and come back to me.  


While waiting for that response I decided to call Eclipse to see whether they'd heard of the problem before.  They were again very helpful, hadn't come across the issue in the past but agreed it was serious & undertook to assist in ensuring we would not be left out of pocket.  They agreed that yes they surveyed & passed everything pre-installation and post, that they cannot legally touch the import meter and it was E.ON's responsibility to ensure it is fit for purpose and functioning properly.


When I was called back by Ovo's more technical people, they acknowledged the issue, said they knew nothing about it previously or in our case and agreed to work to find a solution on 2 fronts:

1. to change the faulty meter for one which is appropriate for a micro-generation location (for a £ 30 charge due to us!)
2. to find a solution for the overcharging issue

I was obviously glad they were keen to find a solution but said they'd got things the wrong way around - that the financial solution must come first and they could look at changing the meter once that was agreed.  I pointed out that the meter contained all the data they'd need to re-bill me correctly from day 1 and that I was concerned removing it would lead to the loss of that information (either through electrical issues or incompetence).  They said that they couldn't have this data read until the meter was sent to a lab, but that they'd work on arranging that so we could agree to it.  


The £ 30 charge was not something I was keen to agree to - I'd had no idea they'd want to charge me to replace the meter (naive!) but realised that if that would the case then I'd have to chase E.ON as they were aware when we bought the Solar PV system & had it installed. They were informed and all the necessary paperwork was approved. At no point did they raise the potential issue with the Siemens S2AS (though I'm sure someone there would have known by our installation date in late 2011) and they then proceeded to overcharge me as have Ovo ever since.


In addition, Ovo said that if we couldn't agree a way for them to re-bill the overcharged months, they could fit a check meter (or an accuracy test) to log the differences in future days, but that those would cost us around £80 just to get fitted.  I offered to pay that if they agreed to levy the charge on an "I win / no fee basis" - if there was no problem, I'd pay the £80, but if there was an issue, they wouldn't charge it.  Sadly they wouldn't go with this.


I called to try and ask Ofgem for advice and their phoneline was interesting ... no way at all to leave a message or ask a question directly as a consumer, so I ended up leaving one for the Renewables Team and when they called me back they couldn't help me at all but recommended calling the general advice line. Ofgem's general line just says "contact your supplier and then the Citizen's Advice Bureau" .... not what I expected from the energy watchdog, supposed to be protecting consumers.

So I had left it in Ovo's hands, and here's their response by e-mail:

Good Afternoon Mr Johnston-Knight,
Thank you for your call regarding the query on the current metering issues. 


As we discussed I have been in touch with a senior technician at Lowri Beck our metering agents, I had posed them the question relating to your research on the meter type and the potential for accessing the memory to try and establish an accurate record of usage. 
After an in depth discussion we have unfortunately found that although they are aware of the meter type and the capabilities of the internal memory it would not be possible for them to access this themselves without involving the manufacturer with whom we unfortunately hold no contract. 
As we mentioned earlier I have looked into other possibilities so that this may be worked out as fairly and as accurately as possible, looking into this with my manager we would be willing to look at the generation readings you have from your personal generation meter and compare this to your estimated consumption to work out a plausible final bill for the old meter. 


I appreciate your time and patience with this matter and hope we can resolve this for you, if you could please contact us so we may discuss this further and of course arrange the exchange of the meter so that the issue is not delayed for your bills going forward. Many Kind Regards


[name removed]
Industry Interaction Specialist




Following this message I had a discussion with them, airing my frustration that something as functional and mundane as their lack of a contact with a particular company could be the barrier to getting the information we all want off the meter. For goodness sake, the device they need is little more than a fancy TV remote control.


Anyway, they offered to propose a re-billing solution after exchanging the meter - I said they must offer the solution beforehand. 


So they asked for the readings I'd been taking since before we installed the solar panels (electricity in, solar PV generation) which I was happy to provide.


Their proposal came back relatively soon:




Good Afternoon Mr Johnston-Knight, 
Thank you for the spread sheet containing the meter reading history. 


I have looked at this with one of my colleagues in our billing department to try to give you an example of how your daily usage would be billed based on the generation readings provided. 


Using the figures provided I have calculated the data based on the readings provided from 19/02/2012 to 07/07/2012, we have used the 19/02/2012 as a starting point as this record has reads taken from both the generation and supplier meter and of course is making sure we only include the period of time since you joined Ovo. 
This period covers a total of 161 days, if we look at your total generation for the period it equates to 1775 units, over the 139 day period this comes out at an average of 12.7 units of generation per day. From the other side the total usage before we take your generation into account equates to 2520 units over the 139 day period, this comes to an average of 18.1 units per day.  


Using the data collated from your generation we would calculate that the usage after generation is taken into account would come to 5.4 units a day for this period. I must advise this is only based on the data to date and that as I am sure you aware the meter would have only “overclocked” when the generation was more than your consumption, I must also advise that when it does come to re-bill we will only be able to use the readings from when we became your supplier .  


Going over this with my manager we would like to propose that we would re-bill you for the total consumption used to the date of the meter exchange, minus 6 units per day, so for example using the data above if we re-billed you now you would be billed for 1554 units. 
I hope this has provided you with some clarification on what the re-billing process would entail, if you have any further questions or queries please do not hesitate to contact me.  


Many Kind Regards 


Industry Interaction Specialist




So basically, ignoring the errors in the message (inaccurate dates, figures & calculations) they were offering me a credit for 6 units per day for the time I was with Ovo.


I didn't feel this was sensible or realistic, so as well as pointing out the confusion in their e-mail, I told them my view:




Hello and thank you for your swift response.


I'm afraid that I don't feel this is a realistic offer given that it means we're judged to have used half of the generated electricity (6 units per day out of an average 12 units) and still imported just as much as we've generated (an average of 12 units per day).  


I believe we're unlikely to have used even 1 third of the generated electricity, certainly during the week, as we all go out to work and do not leave power hungry appliances to run during our absence due to fear of fire and the practical difficulty of organising this with a young family.


I believe that our usage of electricity has changed since installing PV to be less overall due to our awareness of what the power costs and how much we are using.  


I really do think that an interrogation of the current meter's internal register or a check-meter would be the fairest / most accurate way to resolve this!  
Additionally of course I have to get some resolution for the period before switching to Ovo and of course will have to deal with that separately whereas if we can get the info off the meter there will be no fuss & negotiation needed.


Please let me know your response. 
Thanks,
Paul

Sadly Ovo rejected my suggestion of a 9 unit per day credit and wrote the following:

Good Morning Mr Johnston-Knight, 
Thank you for your response to my mail. 


As mentioned in previous discussions a check meter would be possible however I have already discussed this with my manager and we could not offer this free of charge additionally the check meter will only tell us the current consumption at this particular moment in time, it would still mean estimation would be required to create a bill. 
Unfortunately when proposing recalculation to the billing we would only look to use the actual consumption figures as they’re provided, I appreciate that since your PV installation you may have becoming for consumption savvy, it’s an unknown quantity and very difficult for us to anticipate the effect this will have. 


With regards to extracting the information for the internal log within the meter, this is not something we’re able to do. As a smart supplier we do not have all the available technology that may be present elsewhere in the Industry, however we are happy to meet expectations where we can. 
In this instance we’re not able to access the information and we’ll not be able to take this into consideration when looking at the re-calculation of your bill. 


If you would like us to continue with the revised billing as proposed in my previous correspondence please do let us know. Once this is confirmed we’ll be able to arrange with you a suitable time to have the meter exchange carried out to have the functionality of your meter updated to be able to correctly clock your consumption. 
I apologise for any inconvenience this may cause, if you’re unhappy with my response and wish to have this escalated please contact our feedback team at feedback@ovoenergy.com who will look into this for you. This will begin our complaints process, which, should the need arise for this to be escalated further, will need to be followed. 


Many Kind regards, 
Industry Interaction Specialist

So as I was unwilling to accept their guesswork & meter swapping, I "escalated the issue to a complaint" to use their jargon.

Here's my message, trying to make it simple:




Hello,
I'm afraid that I'm dissatisfied with the way my request has been handled, so as directed I would like to escalate this to a complaint.  
I'd like to underline that my complaint is not with anyone in particular – everyone I've spoken to has been courteous and helpful – rather with your procedures and systems.  
I feel that my concerns are not being taken as reasonable or acted upon fairly.


As things stand we don't have any accurate info at all regarding our true usage of power since Nov 2011 (Solar PV installation) and for the whole duration of our Ovo account (since Feb 2012):
1         The incoming electricity meter (Siemens S2AS-100) has been recording not only theincoming feed but also what we generate (with our Solar PV panels) but do not use ourselves and therefore export to the grid.
2         This has only recently come to light (when I started logging our readings) but is a known issue with the meter we have had for years.
3         The estimated usage figures based upon (our) previous years' readings do not take account of the recently installed Solar PV system which allows us free & unrecorded use of a 4kWp array, at times up to a nominal 4kWh level.
4         Replacing the incoming meter now would, yes, give us our true incoming electricity level in future, but would not go any significant way to documenting what our historical incoming orgenerated & exported levels of electricity were.
5         In my view there is 1 ideal way of getting the accurate information regarding the level ofovercharge: to interrogate the only place where the relevant figures are stored - our currently installed meter - to analyse the historical incoming & outgoing levels of power on a daily basis.
6         The incoming meter analysis solution would also give us the data we need to pursue E.ON who were our supplier at the time of PV installation, who should have picked up on the incompatibility of our meter with that system and should have changed it.
7         E.ON supplied us before we switched to Ovo (a change I'm now regretting!) and therefore were also overcharging us for 3 months.  If we are prevented from getting the accurate data then we will have the same merry-go-round of negotiation and counter-argument with them, something which I'd really rather avoid.
8         I'm aware that your contracts and systems have not been used for this kind of investigation yet, however that doesn't mean it is impossible, nor that someone else couldn't do it for you.  If E.ON's engineers are able to do it, perhaps that would be a solution which could be arranged?
9         The second best way to get some idea of what the relevant levels of electricity usage &export have been, would be to install a check meter next to the current meter to gauge the relevant levels over the coming weeks.  This method would at least give us an idea of what the magnitude of the overcharge is on a daily basis and we could therefore extrapolate from that the probable levels of historical use, generation & overcharge.
10         This option would give us accurate levels of incoming & generated/outgoing electricity on a daily basis for as long as you want.  This would give date to allow us to calculate what the historical figures were – I have the historical generated levels and these could be paired with similar levels during the Check Meter period to enlighten us all to what level of incoming andoutgoing electricity have been hidden behind our 1 incoming meter reading. 
11         So for example we’ll have realistic figures for what happens on a 5 unit day, a 10 unit day and a 20 unit generation day.  This will allow us to combine these figures with the estimated ones I have on a daily basis from PVspot (http://solargis.info/index.html) – 99.7% accurate on average – for our specific system.
12         For me, simply guesstimating the average level of excess generation & overcharge is simply too open to inaccuracy one way or another.
13         I feel that an estimated figure of 6 units per day overcharge in a rebilling is on the low side but I'd actually be happier with an evidence-based figure of an average 6 units per day (representing the daily generated & exported units), because at least I'd know there was a data-based and accurate source to it.
14         You see I'm sure that on some days we've been overcharge by less than 6kWh, however on days when we've been generating 20, 25 and 28 units it's likely we've been exporting 3 and 4 times that figure.
15         I am not willing to pay for the replacement of our meter (once a solution has been agreed), nor for the use of a Check Meter.  As our electricity supplying company, I believe it is your responsibility to ensure that the meter is working correctly and it has not been doing since the day Ovo took over.  Although this was the case under E.ON I was unaware of the problem and I believe that they are now unable to act as you are the current supplier. 
16         Your response to this could assist us to get some resolution and cooperation from E.ON however simply offering a re-bill credit of 6 units per day is not very helpful. Please acknowledge receipt of this message and let me know, either by e-mail or mobile, what the timescale for a response is.


Many thanks,
Paul Johnston-Knight




I quickly received an automatic reply promising a response within 5 working days.

On Mon 23rd July they called me at 5.55pm to suggest a totally unexpected solution: would we be interested in moving our account back to E.ON?

This sounds a bit barmy, as in the first place I moved from E.ON to Ovo for a cheaper (and hopefully better) service!


The rationale was that as a small supplier they don't have the systems in place to get the relevant data from the faulty Siemens meter, however they said, as a large supplier, E.ON will have such processes and it wouldn't be a problem for them, and, kind as they are, Ovo would waive the early departure fee (they actually said this!) and accept whatever data comes from the buggy Siemens meter.  


I asked whether they knew that E.ON have such software / hardware / systems and she said, "I'm sure they will have" ... I'm not exactly brimming with confidence yet!


I've taken a week to work through some other possible routes to a solution and am now going back to Ovo to insist that they don't simply body-swerve the issue and deal with it.




Sorry about the very wordy post, but hopefully you get the drift of how frustrating the saga has been!

The next will contain details of the many dead-ends I've been sent down on my wild-goose chase, and hopefully some more progress on a solution!

The problem ...

Our problem began when we installed Solar PV electricity generation panels & an inverter.

The solar PV system was not a problem, but ...

The micro-generation Feed-in-Tariff (FiT) scheme seemed too good to ignore, we were still in time to get the installation & commissioning done before the government's first review was due in March 2012 (though it was expected to be earlier).  


So after my dad did a lot of research and got many quotes, we followed his lead and had JA Solar panels and a Fronius inverter installed by the local Leeds company, Eclipse Solar, on Friday 18th November 2011.


The guys from Eclipse were very helpful, from the first discussion to the clearing up after the scaffolding was removed, they were all quite efficient, very friendly and got the job done in good time.


The process of registering our system with our then electricity supplier E.ON was relatively painless, Eclipse had helped with all the tricky bits of the complicated forms and we soon had our FiT number which meant we'd be paid for every unit we generated from Unit 1.


The first three months were good compared to the expected levels of generation - Dec - Feb were all ahead of the prediction and on 22nd Feb I submitted our first FiT generation meter reading of 474 units.  By the time we received the £200 payment from E.ON directly into the nominated bank account, we were well into March and some very good weather.  

The good weather was great and helped with better generation figures but it showed we had a problem ...

As the days became longer and sunnier, it seemed that whenever there was a very good week for generation (sunny, light cloud) we had a particularly heavy week for imported electricity usage.  This seemed strange because although we were not paranoid about electricity use (we'd had a simple clamp-meter but this was rendered impractical when we began micro-generating) we were careful.


It was even stranger as the explanation I was offered could not be true.  This was that seeing the sunny weather we were switching everything on to capitalise but actually were overdoing it and having to import more.  I knew this was wrong because again, though we were being careful about switching things on, it was rare that we were able to do this in the day as we all work and are not able to organise our lives and our appliance use around what the sun and clouds are doing!

This suggestion was useful though, because it set me thinking ...  

I wondered whether the extra generation during those sunnier weeks could possibly be contributing to our apparently imported electricity usage.


At first this was a relaxed, inquisitive curiosity - after the (still record) bumper week of generation at the end of March, I was concerned but not convinced.  With a very full working life & a busy family home, I soon found this was not a priority and believed that it was pure coincidence.


In mid-June, after the next peak week, I started looking again, more worried about what I'd seen in the stats I'd collected - that there really was an issue.  By the time the 3rd week of high generation came (early July) I was almost neurotic and obsessed, so keen was I to find the source of the problem.


I started reading blogs and forum posts about solar PV generation and the issues, in particular reading about analogue meters going backwards (ours was digital so that wasn't the issue).  I wanted to see where I might find the right kind of people: helpful, knowledgeable, friendly and open to stupid questions, so I could post my own:

• "Is it possible that our Solar PV generation & export during sunnier weeks is contributing to excessive electricity import during those same weeks?"

But even before asking my question, on 5th July, 3 months after I'd begun noticing the unusual trend and 8 months after it had started, I found the answer.


A very helpful contributor to the MoneySavingExpert.com forums, furndire, had been having terrible trouble convincing her electricity company that there was a problem, after she had Solar PV panels installed.  She wrote about the saga here: WARNING SOLAR PANELS & some Siemens S2AS-100/ Siemens S1AS-100 Meters.


Guess what I did next!
That's right, I went out to see what meter we have ... and yes, it's a Siemens S2AS-100 meter!

I couldn't believe it ... I was right, the sneaking suspicion I'd had was true and the thing I'd not dared to believe was actually the case: our incoming meter was faulty and was adding to our incoming readings every unit we were generating but not using and therefore exporting to the National Grid.  

I also could not believe that others, including furndire had had this problem more than a year before and I hadn't known about it.  What's more, they'd had to persuade their power suppliers of their problem without being able to point them to a set of forum posts about the known issue, as I could.  Thank goodness I was able to use their story to support mine, I can only imagine the frustration they must have had of trying to battle without that support.


Actually it isn't a fault in the meter but a bug - it has an in-built anti-tamper feature which means that it can be programmed to add units of electricity passing in either direction across the meter to the "Used, incoming, imported, chargeable electricity units" reading.  This feature was included so that if people tried to defraud the utility company by switching the terminals on the meter (so it appeared as though electricity was only leaving the property and they were not using anything) the meter would also register it as being used and therefore charge for it.


Needless to say, this meter, at least in the way its internal software was programmed on ours, was totally unsuitable for use in a micro-generation scenario.  This was not noticed by Eclipse, their surveyor or electricians, nor by E.ON when we registered our system and began to sell them electricity.


I cannot be too critical of Eclipse as when I spoke to them this month (July 2012) I was the first person they'd heard of with this problem.  Nevertheless, it is a known issue and it would have prevented a great deal of trouble if they'd known / noticed this during installation.  


This problem is difficult to diagnose though as it is only really obvious in the summer when the days are longer and sunnier and more is generated than can be used.  Additionally as it is a rare situation most companies, even large ones, do not acknowledge that it can happen or know what to do when it does.

The solution, or at least the search for it ... that's a story for another day!

• To be continued .....