Contact Energy issue

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147 posts

Master Geek

#3157121 7-Nov-2023 20:25

wellygary:
Rikkitic:

My concern is that I have a very old wooden power board in an old farmhouse. I am not utterly against a smart meter in principle, but I am very worried about opening a can of worms if anyone touches the power board. It could well disintegrate if it is opened. I cannot afford any major repairs and I don't want to tempt fate here. What does the installation of a smart meter actually entail? If anyone can tell me I would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks as always for the help!

If you are that worried about futzing with the original power board, then your best solution is talk to them about installing the smart meter in a supplementary meter box, separate from the power board,

They are reasonably common these days, with the meter box being on the outside of the house and the "fuse" box and distribution board inside somewhere else;

Note that you will have to pay for this. We have just done it recently and it was not particularly cheap

fe31nz

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#3157822 9-Nov-2023 22:58

BlargHonk:

Note that you will have to pay for this. We have just done it recently and it was not particularly cheap

I am very surprised to hear this, as the meter is owned by the electricity supplier or metering company and they normally prefer to use a smart meter as it costs them a lot less to do the meter readings, even including the cost of the new meter. All the smart meter installs I have ever heard about were free and generally initiated by the supplier.

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#3157827 9-Nov-2023 23:53

Moving to a smart meter isn't the cost. Its the installing the supplementary meter box + wires + wire routing that adds up.

Back in the day - some rollouts just did meter boxes to avoid having to deal with old powerboards but believe most companies now will swap out the old meters and drop the new meters in place.

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BlargHonk

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Master Geek

#3157861 10-Nov-2023 08:39

cokemaster:

Moving to a smart meter isn't the cost. Its the installing the supplementary meter box + wires + wire routing that adds up.

Back in the day - some rollouts just did meter boxes to avoid having to deal with old powerboards but believe most companies now will swap out the old meters and drop the new meters in place.

Yep all the extra cost was the new exterior metal box, getting the lines company to cut off the power at the street, getting the meter certifiers to recertify the new meter, running new thick cables to the exterior box, and the sparkies time.

We had an old crappy black asbestos switchboard with the meter on it before. They had replaced that to a new smartmeter with no issues a few years ago with no cost to us. The only reason we moved it was we wanted to get a new switchboard with RCD protection to be a bit safer, and the location we wanted it didn't have enough room for the meter too. Hence moving it outside.

Rikkitic

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#3173337 19-Dec-2023 12:47

I won! I can't believe it. After months of back and forth emails that didn't go anywhere, after the parties involved all seemed to quit replying to me, after a long silence when I had resigned myself to things not going anywhere, I suddenly had a very nice email out of the blue from a Contact Energy Customer Advocate informing me that the meter readers have been given my phone number and asked to call before they come! I can hardly believe it.

I had involved Utilities Disputes by submitting a formal complaint but even they seemed to have given up. Then I received an email suggesting that I could try to contact the Citizens Advice bureau or the Commerce Commission. I thought this was just an attempt to exit gracefully and didn't take it too seriously. Then I suddenly received the email from Contact Energy. I don't know if the Commerce Commission suggestion had anything to do with it. I don't care. The principle has been established.

I don't know how this will work out in practice but I was asked earlier in this thread to report any result and that is what I am doing here. Sorry it took so long.

Plesse igmore amd axxept applogies in adbance fir anu typos

Rikkitic

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#3194235 12-Feb-2024 10:52

I thought I was finished with this thread but here is a final conclusion. Recently I finally connected with a meter reader. He was specially sent out because my meter hadn't been read for a few months. I don't know how much that was connected to my dispute, or how much to other issues. Anyway, I was able to talk to him and ensure that they had my correct phone number (he still had the old one on his device) and they understood they were supposed to contact me before coming out. Today I received a very nice email from the Customer Resolutions department informing me that everything was sorted and my complaint was being officially closed. They also said they were waiving the charges accrued while I was getting estimated invoices, $146.54!

Well done Contact Energy. Sometimes it pays to complain!

Plesse igmore amd axxept applogies in adbance fir anu typos

neb

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#3194411 12-Feb-2024 18:31

Rikkitic:
I don’t know, but I suspect, this has to do with changes in Contact’s procedures as they become too big and bureaucratic and forget their customers are people.

Yup, just remember that "Contact" has an invisible "No" in front of it, it's essentially impossible to get through to them to get anything done. One thing you might try if something like this happens again is to arrange for some sort of anomaly they'll notice, then once they contact you reply to whoever it was who contacted you.

Not that I've done that or anything.

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snnet

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#3194442 12-Feb-2024 22:06

The metering side of things is owned by others - not contact or any other retailer... I'd probably opt for the smart meter route. Doesn't matter how old your board is, they don't care about that - if it can physically be mounted they'll do it

neb

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#3194443 12-Feb-2024 22:11

One thing if you are going to do that, ask for an export meter in case you ever decide to go solar in the future. If you don't do that, they'll charge you yet again to rip out the existing meter and install a replacement that's exactly the same except for the firmware.

snnet

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#3194444 12-Feb-2024 22:15

neb: One thing if you are going to do that, ask for an export meter in case you ever decide to go solar in the future. If you don't do that, they'll charge you yet again to rip out the existing meter and install a replacement that's exactly the same except for the firmware.

These days the meters are export enabled by turning flags on - same meter, config change. They often charge a fee for the config change but it's not the cost of a new meter (you won't get the flags turned on without export ability signed off by an inspector)

neb

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#3194445 12-Feb-2024 22:17

In my case they had to install an entirely new meter, old meter was 2021-22, new meter was 2023, so it may be only some meters, or very recent meters.

snnet

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#3194446 12-Feb-2024 22:19

neb: In my case they had to install an entirely new meter, old meter was 2021-22, new meter was 2023, so it may be only some meters, or very recent meters.

Do you know if any seals were broken at all? If so, they also won't just re-seal the meter - they opt to replace it

neb

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#3194447 12-Feb-2024 22:23

No idea, but Contact just told me they'd send someone out to replace the existing meter with a new one that handles export, so unless there's electronic notification of seal state they wouldn't have known before sending someone.

Rikkitic

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#3266320 30-Jul-2024 13:15

I keep thinking this has reached a conclusion and then something else keeps happening that really demands an update so here it is:

In spite of Contact conceding my points and agreeing to my request and giving me the impression that all was settled, I suddenly received an email out of the blue from another company on their behalf on 26 June stating that my meter was going to be replaced in August. No discussion, no negotiation, just imposition. A technician was going to show up one day and replace my meter whether I liked it or not. (They didn’t say that last part but that was certainly how I took it.)

I don’t want to get into another discussion about the virtues or otherwise of having a smart meter, or why I object to one. This is not about that. It is about Contact Energy and their inflexible, top-heavy, unyielding bureaucracy. After all I had already been through with them, and their ‘customer resolutions’ people even accepting that I was within my rights, they still insist on having their way through a back door if not the front.

So I did the only thing left to me. I changed provider. Coincidentally I had seen some materials relating to Grey Power, which my age qualifies me for membership, and they also have a special energy service for members which I thought ought to be a little more accommodating of older people.

Today, more than two weeks after the change, a meter reader (!) showed up at my address to read my meter. This is someone I know from the before time and I was very glad to see her. We had a nice chat and I learned some things.

There are two different meter reading companies that serve my area. One is the one I used to deal with, which the lady who showed up today works for. I regard her as a friend, or at least a friendly acquaintance. She is older and I like her. She is just a very pleasant person. The meter readers from the other company are also older, all male, and there is nothing wrong with them but they are not particularly helpful or chatty. They just read the meter and go. They haven’t been around for months, though, and I keep getting estimated invoices from Contact. According to my lady friend, Contact cancelled the contract they had with her company, and went over to the other less helpful one which is about when my issues started.

In spite of repeated attempts on my part, and repeated requests to Contact, which eventually they agreed to, I could not get the new company to warn me when they wanted to read the meter. They would not communicate with me at all. They also seemed incapable of updating the outdated contact information they had for me, so the same issues kept arising.

Now having the old company back again is like a breath of fresh air. They talk to me. They listen to me. They are friendly. This is how it used to be. The meter lady took my new phone number in front of me, deleted the old one, and promised to text me when she knew when the next read date would be. Customer service! So beautiful! So easy!

My meter reader friend also confided that a lot of her current work comes from reading faulty smart meters and she is constantly challenged by people complaining about their smart meters, as well as the campaign currently underway to force everyone else to get once. She says the pressure on people verges on blackmail. I can certainly vouch for that!

I don’t know if someone will still show up here with a new meter. The email claimed it was a compliance issue, not a Contact Energy one but I don’t trust that. My spider sense says they are trying to conflate commercial and official policy. I am pretty good at ferreting out weasel words and I suspect they are trying to make a commercial operation sound more authoritative than it really is.

My new provider seems a lot easier to communicate with and hopefully more reasonable as well and not so obsessed with their way being the only way. If I absolutely have to have a smart meter then I will reluctantly accept that. At least I won’t be a customer of Contact Energy!

Stay tuned for further details.

Plesse igmore amd axxept applogies in adbance fir anu typos

OldGeek

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#3266359 30-Jul-2024 15:28

In respect of a digital meter this will give you significantly more insight to your electricity consumption and billing. You can clearly navigate around Geekzone so should have no trouble navigating around your new supplier's website to view your consumption, usually by 30-minute increments. If in doubt, read the current consumption on the digital display off your meter and compare it to what is reported. No need to wait until you get a bill to report any inaccuracy.

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