Metering

Smart meter installations are the retailers’ responsibility.

Customers should contact their retailer to discuss.

Outside of customer requests for smart meters, retailers will be responsible for replacing smart meters according to an agreed plan, overseen by the AER, by 2030.

Essential Energy does not install smart meters so we are unable to advise you on the how much it will cost but your retailer should be able to advise you.

The agency that makes the energy rules, the Australian Energy Market Commission, has recommended some consumer protections be implemented as part of its overall strategy to accelerate the rollout of smart meters including:

• No up-front charges for customers who have not requested a replacement of their legacy meter, and
• Retailers must provide new smart meter customers with a minimum of 30 days’ notice if pricing is to change. 

Customer benefits of transitioning to a smart meter include:

• Provides visibility on how much energy is being used at different times of the day – this enables customers to know when to use appliances to take advantage of cheaper periods.
• Provides access to new technologies which can assist in reducing energy costs.
• Greater variety of retailer offers.
• Enables you to install solar panels or a battery.

The data from smart meters will assist networks to more efficiently optimise network performance, as well as plan for future investment, resulting in downward pressure on customers’ network charges.

Existing regulations do not allow Essential Energy to provide any financial support to customers for installing smart meters.

Any customer subsidy provided to customers would need to be recovered from all customers. 

Essential Energy does not apply a charge for smart meters. The costs of smart meters are recovered by the retailer.

Essential Energy is responsible for the older style meters (those installed before 2018). Essential Energy recovers costs associated with funding the metering equipment, required maintenance, and meter reading.

Essential Energy is responsible for recovering the costs of those meters, which the AER has requested that we recover by the end of the 2024-29 period.

Meters must have certain capabilities to be classified as smart meters. These requirements include such things as the ability to collect usage data in 5 minutes intervals, the ability to be remotely read, and the ability to enable the customer to be remotely connected.

Older style meters that do not support all of the required smart meter functions such as those listed above will be replaced with a smart meter by a retailer.

Typically, smart meters utilise cellular networks to allow for the meters to be read remotely. Meter providers can also use cost effective bespoke telecommunications solutions to fill gaps in cellular coverage.

Where suitable telecommunications networks are not available to enable remote reading, smart meters can still be read by meter readers who attend the customers physical metering installation and download the readings from the meter. 

The Australian Energy Market Commission found if the rollout is accelerated so that all customers have a smart meter by 2030, all customers benefit.

However, accelerating this rollout means bringing forward costs of older, legacy meters. These costs include funding the metering equipment, maintenance, and meter reading. Essential Energy does not cover the installation or ongoing costs of smart meters – which the retailer is responsible and for which they recover from customers.

Essential Energy is also expecting additional costs to repair assets where some customers legacy meters are currently sited (such as on poles), to enable the installation of smart meters.

Whether or not a customer has a smart meter, is often not within their control but instead depends on their retailers’ roll-out plan.

As more and more customers move or are moved onto smart meters, Essential Energy’s costs of servicing the remaining legacy meters will become relatively more expensive per meter as they are likely to be in rural and remote locations.

We asked our Essential People’s Panel about whether it is fairer to spread these costs more widely. They supported spreading the costs as widely as possible, given all customers will benefit with 100% smart meter penetration.

Once all customers have been transitioned to smart meters, and costs fully recovered, the cost of old meters will be removed from customer bills. Most of these costs will be recovered within the next 5 years.