Hey guys,

I am looking for a good electrician to swap my analogue meter for a digital one. With a digital meter you can reduce your electricity bill during winter months by 70% using the different rates plan. The problem is that is really difficult to find an electrician that's licensed to change meters.

I don't want to sound paranoid, but the reason for this is Energy Australia not wanting people to reduce their bills.
Think about it, up until 2 years ago was completely free to swap your old analogue meter for a brand new digital meter. This way you can change your rates.

If anyone has experience with this, please share.

Cheers,
Mike

Before you do you need to ask yourself,.. does the energy company really want you to pay them LESS money than you do already?
The answer is NO.
Now this might come as a complete surprise to you because you probably read the glossy brochure which said they wanted to save you money.
It was a LIE.
They don't want to save you anything.
In fact they would like to charge you more. And if they can then they will. It's a business, not a charity.

What they also want you to do however, is use less power in the peak periods so they don't have to install more generating capacity.
I think you will find that after you install the new smart meter, you will pay less for the power you use in off peak peiods but it will be neutralised by the higher rate they will charge you for the power you use in peak periods.

You might win out if you have electric hot water or something like that which you can re-time to off peak, but if your power is mainly used for things which can't be retimed for off peak, then you wont save anything at all.

Ok. I moved houses last January. At my old property I've changed through Energy Australia (at the time when this was free) the meter from an Analogue to a Smart meter. I've reduced my bill from 879 AUD to 368 AUD. I am pretty sure in my case this would make a great difference, because I leave everyday at 7AM and come back after 7, as the rest of my family. So every bit of energy we use happens during night time or weekends.

DunkO said..

How does a meter save you money?? Unless it's stopped working :)

It's not the actual meter that saves you money it's the plan. Because moving to a smart meter you will be able to change your plan from a standard plan (being charged 45 cents per kw all the time) to a time of day plan. For example, from 7:00AM to 15:00PM you are being charged 50 cents per kW, from 15:00PM to 21:00PM you are being charged 80 cents per kW, and from 21:00 PM to 7:00 AM your are bing charged 10 cents per kw.

So if you are not at home during the day much (which most of us aren't), it makes sense to choose this preferential plan. But in order to change it, you need to have a meter that allows you to do so, which is the smart meter.

So that's how you can save the old buck!

What company charges 45 cent per kw/h? The plan we are on charges about 25 cents per kw/h and this is with an analogue meter. There is no way I'm going to a digital meter unless its forced on us or I get photo voltaic panels on the roof. The electricity companies would not be encouraging consumers to have digital meters if it saved the consumers money.

Do not go solar. It's a total rip off. You might save on average 200aud per qrt. But your inverter will die. Then all the money you save goes back into purchasing another inverter and your back where you started. Zip. I know first hand cause I install new inverters for customers where there supplying company s have gone bank rupt

Mikedobee said..
In my case the real advantage is because of the heaters. We are running 3 heaters. Each 2400 W. During summer it's not a great deal, but when the winter comes, my last bill got up to 1300 AUD per quarter. If I would've had the time of use plan, it would've been probably 500 AUD top.

I know a lot of people are reluctant to changing, but in some cases, it can be beneficial.

Hang on, when are you running the heaters? Most people would be running heaters at the highest cost time.

Mikedobee said..

Harrow said..

Mikedobee said..
In my case the real advantage is because of the heaters. We are running 3 heaters. Each 2400 W. During summer it's not a great deal, but when the winter comes, my last bill got up to 1300 AUD per quarter. If I would've had the time of use plan, it would've been probably 500 AUD top.

I know a lot of people are reluctant to changing, but in some cases, it can be beneficial.

Hang on, when are you running the heaters? Most people would be running heaters at the highest cost time.

Night time. That's the only time we're ever home.

Night time? The peak price goes until 8pm for me, and then shoulder cost is from 8pm to 10pm. That is because everyone wants to run they're heaters at this time, and demand is highest in winter around 6pm. You don't get off-peak rate until after 10pm. Be careful what you do. I don't think you'll get the saving you envisage, unless you are turning your heaters on rather late and leaving them on all night. If that was the case, you'd save more money by buying thicker dooners and turning the heaters off. Reverse cycle air conditioning is also another option you could consider, as it runs about 1/3rd the cost of normal electric heating.

Mikedobee said..
In my case the real advantage is because of the heaters. We are running 3 heaters. Each 2400 W.

3 heaters at 2400 watts each!

That's the worst form of heating you can have.
Unless you are in a rent house and will be moving out next week you should throw them away and get 3 X 3KW output inverter aircons.
They will use about 750 watts power each running flat strap and ramp down to about 250 watts each once the room is heated up.
They are very efficient at low power settings with a COP of around 4. i.e four times more heat output than energy input.
It's one of the few things in this world that you get more out of than you put in.
And your smart meter wont save you a cent.
When you get home at 7pm and the house is freezing cold in winter, you will be running the heaters at the most expensive rate.
When you all go to bed and the heaters are turned off, then the rate will come down, and you wont be getting it becaue you will be wrapped up snoring in bed.

Harrow said..

Mikedobee said..
In my case the real advantage is because of the heaters. We are running 3 heaters. Each 2400 W. During summer it's not a great deal, but when the winter comes, my last bill got up to 1300 AUD per quarter. If I would've had the time of use plan, it would've been probably 500 AUD top.

I know a lot of people are reluctant to changing, but in some cases, it can be beneficial.

Hang on, when are you running the heaters? Most people would be running heaters at the highest cost time.

You don't need digital power, you need thermal underwear.

Mikedobee, sounds like you live somewhere very cold. I've lived a fair bit of time in towns with altitudes around 1000m and it does get cold. However I never had electric heaters running all night. Its a real joy to in a bed with plenty of blankets and quilts and be warm as the house cools down. Then you wake up with frost inside the windows in the morning...... That is tough. One place I lived in had a fireplace and we went out every couple of months to a friend's farm and collected a trailer load of firewood. It was a good day's outing and kept us warm in the house all winter. Another place I lived in had a big gas heater which warmed the house up. This house had no insulation so the heater was on when we were up. When we went to bed it was turned off.

Anyway my current electricity supplier is I think Origin and I pay about 25 cent per kw/h. As more electricity is used the rate goes up. That is kind of strange as usually when you consume more of something, the price goes down. Last year we bought a new fridge, an Electrolux that is rated at using 318 kw/h a year. This fridge replaced a ten year old LG fridge rated at using 600 kw/h a year. However I'm pretty sure it used more. After we swapped fridges our power bills went from about $500 a quarter down to about $320 a quarter. We don't have air conditioning and our cooking and heating is electric. Our place is fairly cool as its full brick and the building has a massive thermal mass. It never warms up, even in a heatwave of a few days the walls are still cool to touch. This is great in summer but is freezing during winter.

I do little things to save electricity, like run my laptop on battery at home and charge it up at work. Also turn appliances off at the wall when they are not being used.

If it's a rented house, make sure you get the owners approval before you do anything.
It's really annoying for the owner when the tenants leave and they discover some half baked 'improvement' done on the place which costs thousands to have fixed up properly due to the shoddy job which the tenants did.

pweedas said..

If it's a rented house, make sure you get the owners approval before you do anything.
It's really annoying for the owner when the tenants leave and they discover some half baked 'improvement' done on the place which costs thousands to have fixed up properly due to the shoddy job which the tenants did.

Example?