The Daily Mail is reporting on problems with fitting "smart" meters in domestic and commercial premises. The nub, however, seems to be that electricity companies are jumping the gun and fitting their own versions of the technology, without waiting for a standardised design, the specification for which will not be announced until March.

It seems that lack of inter-operability between meter types means that rival companies can only use their own technology and not others, requiring in some cases the meters to be replaced when electricity suppliers are changed.

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Had quick browse of that stopsmartmeters.org.uk site - seems pretty useful if you live in the US but couldn't find any info on the legal position for the UK.

Would like to know how to legally prevent smart meters being installed without permission and if it is possible to force an electricity company to uninstall one - anyone got any idea?

There is plenty of 'big brother' technology around which, if the PBT are benevolent, are passably acceptable but i can see no reason whatsoever to accpet smart meters with a 'remote cut-off'. Remote metering idea isn't too bad, although the report from the US that they allow the electicity suppliers to more accurately work out your useage compared to what they decide is 'peak' time is worrying.

In short this is yet another area we need to be vigilant in but could also act as a ralying point against the PBT, so maybe will do some good once the drawbacks filter through to the 'man in the pub'.

"consumer resistance may stiffen"...Dr North.

I state categorically for the record: I will not permit a Smart Meter to be fitted in my home. End of.

The problem is that TPTB think they understand it and think it gives them more power, but they really don't understand it and so can't really control it or understand what someone else being able to control (or disrupt) it might imply; they can't see the pitfalls. The temptation for TPTB is to think it's perfect and works exactly as represented, not that they are setting up a training exercise for reverse engineers. Think about the various computer schemes which have cost billions and delivered very little. Think of the money Sony wasted on protecting games from copying only to find that their scheme was unravelled by people who unravel things like that for fun and that they had created a cottage industry fitting chips to Playstations for a tenner which defeated the protection.

The remote cut off would be a feature included but not activated or talked about much. It could take an Act of Parliament to enable it, easily foreseeable if measures to tackle climate change are causing blackouts in a cold winter. The technology would have to be sold via a Trojan Horse, such as reducing your electricity bills, which could be done by a discount for people who want them installed and all sorts of complicated tarriffs. If you are prepared to run your washing machine in the middle of the night, it costs 5% of what it costs at peak time. Power supply companies have their lives made much more complicated by peaky demand, so I guess they see it as a way of evening out demand and cutting the cost of meter reading.

I have better things to do than argue with my electrical appliances.

If this isn't nipped in the bud, they'll be forming a union:

"Brother Toaster has seconded the motion.
"On a show of euroconnectors, please ...
"Everybody out!"

Thee and me.

As Comet says TPTB think they understand it.... erm... not on the evidence I've looked at. Of course one can't expect much from the likes of the excreble Huhne - but our officials are by and large technologically illiterate too - they come from the school that says you can fix an engineering problem with a well worded memo and maybe a few meetings.

I had a look around at the hacking of the meters (immature technology - buggy) and the radiation idiot stories (it stunted my geraniums... - bring it on)

The utility companies have a variety of standards to choose from at the moment and that is leading many to view the meter as a dongle to lock in customers (probably about 250 quid to change over...)

There is an overarching problem in U.K. electricity and gas utility land at the moment - speculative billing. The utility retailers are simply taking the piss on an epic scale - I'm aware of several people locally who have been battling particularly electricity suppliers over wildly over-estimated billing (and eye-watering direct debits as a consequence) and extracting an unlawful "renewable levy". One thing that rings an alarm bell for me is the proportion of pensioners who seem to be suffering from "administrative errors"....

This is set to run, TPTB and the utilities seem to be content with ransoming rather than selling us their products - we have to change their minds....

I have no intention of letting one of these meters in to my house. However, I though you might be interested to hear of the experience of a work colleague who is the treasurer for a Church. They were required by their electricity supplier to have a smart meter fitted. After a few months they received their first bill. My colleague was looking forward to it because, as he reasoned, it would be accurate and he would only be paying for the electricity that they had used. When he saw the bill he was so confused he had to ring the company for an explanation. The bill consisted of a reading taken during the final month, on the fourteenth, if I remember correctly. The next line was an estimate of the electricity used from the fourteenth to the end of the month. The company explained that the premises were on the schedule to have the meter read on the fourteenth of the month and that, as a consequence, the remainder of the bill would be estimated based upon the previous years usage. You will not be surprised to learn that the customer service representative was only able to reiterate the same explanation when asked why the meter was not read at the end of the month. My colleague, as you can imagine, is not terribly impressed.

I am entirely serious about the accusation of speculative billing. British Gas used databases to identify and mis-sell heating "free safety checks and upgrades" targeted at pensioners - the more elderly the better and IIRC they got a fine (which went on our bills no doubt)

The speculative billing model was intensively refined by the phone companies in the 90's - I worked for a company back then manufacturing call logging equipment and it wasn't unusual for BT to try and scam a big customer for 25% extra on their bill... When presented with unequivocal evidence of their "administrative error" no communication was entered into but the disputed amount simply disappeared off the next bill.

The intransigence can be amazing - one acquaintance has paid for electricity logged (and emailed to the supplier) meter readings but the company is insisting he pays the estimated bill...... this has been going on for over a year with threats aplenty from the billing department.

I don't want to appear heartless but I think the only thing that would wake people up is if 50% of fossil fuel electricity production were to be put into spinning reserve for five hours from say, 17:00 to 22:00.