Covid-19’s impact on smart meter installations revealed

Disappointing but expected figures

According to Government figures, just 135,000 smart meters were installed between April and June, a decline from the 980,000 recorded in the first three months of 2020.

The number of smart meters installed in small business properties came in at just 2,000 during the three months, 20,000 less than the number recorded in the preceding period.

While the fall was expected due to energy suppliers no longer able to send engineers out to customer premises thanks to the lock down, the new data reveals that the target of installing a smart meter into every domestic and small business property in the country by the end of 2025 is looking even more unlikely.

The deadline has already been pushed back twice from the initial target of 2020, then due to technical issues, it was delayed to 2024 and now as a result of the lock down to 2025.

“The replacement of outdated gas and electricity meters with smart meters is a vital energy infrastructure upgrade that will help make our energy system cheaper, greener and more efficient.

'The current pandemic has had an inevitable impact on progress, however with 21.5 million smart meters across Britain and installations safely scaling up again, millions of consumers are already taking control of their energy use and cutting their bills,” said a spokesperson from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS).  



Read more: What’s going wrong with the smart meter project?

Less than half the meters installed than were originally planned at this point

The smart meter rollout has faced criticism since it was first announced and has faced a myriad of problems.

The new government data showed that 4.1 million smart meters are still operating as a conventional meter due to some energy suppliers continuing to install SMETS 1 meters.

“The number of smart meters operating in smart mode at the end of Q2 2020 is almost unchanged from the previous quarter (an increase of 0.4%),” said the BEIS.

A SMETS1 meter is a first-generation smart meter. Energy suppliers have been installing them since 2013, but lots of these meters stopped sending automatic readings if a consumer changed their energy supplier.

'It is disappointing to see that 4.1million homes still have a "smart" meter operating like regular meters and little progress has been made in updating meters that have lost smart functionality. In theory, smart meters should help households save money on energy bills – but they meet this worthy goal if they work properly,” said Peter Earl from Compare the Market. 

Rebound on the cards?

Data released by Energy UK showed that in July the number of smart installations jumped by 120% when compared to June suggesting that energy suppliers are quickly scaling up their installation efforts.

During July, 519,700 customers switched their energy supplier, an increase of 17% on the previous month of June. 

Energy Suppliers need to step up

With the lock down being eased nationally energy suppliers now have to prove that they’re doing their best to hit their smart installation targets.

Failure to demonstrate that they’re doing everything they can to encourage their customers to adopt smart meters can result in enforcement action by the energy regulator Ofgem.

Half of energy suppliers are failing to reach their smart meter installation targets with several being 10% outside of the allowed tolerance.

Read more: How to sell the benefits of smart meters to consumers





Further Reading

OVO Energy pays out £1.2 million to Ofgem for smart meter installation failures

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