BC Hydro smart meter

[summit]

Ahhh, these threads never fail to entertain me!

[pf983]

BC Hydro came by this morning to install smart meter in my place. I asked the installer why there are people seeing their bill jump after the new meter is in place. He said that with the old meter BC Hydro has no idea how much power you are using. The billing amounts are guessed between meter readings. If you didn't have a meter read before the change over, the first bill will carry the actual from the old meter. After that month to month should be your actual usage.

[Slopster]

BC Hydro came by this morning to install smart meter in my place. I asked the installer why there are people seeing their bill jump after the new meter is in place. He said that with the old meter BC Hydro has no idea how much power you are using. The billing amounts are guessed between meter readings. If you didn't have a meter read before the change over, the first bill will carry the actual from the old meter. After that month to month should be your actual usage.

Just another way Hydro gets it's paws on your money...Did you say no to the install??

[dZilla]

I still don't understand why people are refusing, honestly though. Is it because they are afraid of increases on their bill? or that their bill will be more accurate? Or some wireless monster will be created in the tumours of people?
Or that there is a chance that somehow someone in an office of BC Hydro's lair they will be automatically increasing everyone's hydro by half a penny which will then go into a secret hydro account which will accumulate millions?
And if people are concerned with the RF signals that will be coming out of it, just put a piece of aluminum around the thing, that'll catch it
There are ways to refuse to get the smart meters but it has nothing to do with getting a 'sign and putting it up.'

Ok those last two were jokes but I was serious on the others, lol.

[Slopster]

I still don't understand why people are refusing, honestly though. Is it because they are afraid of increases on their bill? or that their bill will be more accurate? Or some wireless monster will be created in the tumours of people?
Or that there is a chance that somehow someone in an office of BC Hydro's lair they will be automatically increasing everyone's hydro by half a penny which will then go into a secret hydro account which will accumulate millions?
And if people are concerned with the RF signals that will be coming out of it, just put a piece of aluminum around the thing, that'll catch it
There are ways to refuse to get the smart meters but it has nothing to do with getting a 'sign and putting it up.'

Ok those last two were jokes but I was serious on the others, lol.

Afraid of increases, NO, Tired of them, YES. Answwer this question, Why would you want the smart meter???and if your going to go off about anything like Hydro needs the increases for all the work that they are doing , yadda yadda type of thing, Let me tell ya Hydro is there own worst enemy, I've worked in Hydro substations for 20yr's with an Independant Contractor andf let me tell you, if any one is going to screw something up It's Hydro plain and simple...
I've been on jobs that were slated for 1 million dollers at completion and 6 months to 8 months in the job goes to 5 million, Why?? because Hydro has too many Chiefs at the helm and they can't get there crap togeather to come up with the right answer to fix something, so they will sit on a problem for weeks before getting or coming up with an answer. All in the meantime Money is just being thrown out the window for no appearant reason.
So with these Smart Meters your Rate seems to change over night??? Why? because now Hydro needs to recoup the loses from many and I mean Many jobs that they screwed up on, plus the huge salaries it pays to there exectives, Heres an example hydro's engineering dept has over 400 employees, we get a contract set of drawings, we build as per, now nothing works out in the field but it looks good on the drawing right? You ask for the engineer to come out and look at the problem at hand, won't happen till 2 to 3 weeks down the road, finally the engineer comes out, looks at it agrees that yes it will not work, we get that in writting, no problem, but wait there is a problem,the engineer now has to go back to the office and try to make a discion on what to do, that takes at least another 2 weeks. And all in all Hydro has to pay a premium rate for the general contractors workers to sit by idle when in fact not one of those 400 engineers with Degrees can not figure out left from right.
And you ask if we are afraid of increases??????Like I said this is a Cash Grab and it's the only way Hydro can recoup there loses for there stupidity.
I've worked in close to 40 substations in BC and not one job in the last 20yr's has come close to being done on budget or on time, every job is a gong show..Why, It's Hydro.......

Cheers
Rob..

[gklaw]

My meter is inside my locked and gated yard so I'm not sure how they would get inside. That being said, I'm not sure how they are doing meter readings unless they are able to get inside my yard. Hmmmm....My fence is like 6 feet high too.

Why not send them a letter and ask them how they figure out your usage

[Slopster]

Why not send them a letter and ask them how they figure out your usage

They Guesstamate (sorry my spelling is off tonight must be getting late) That's what happened to my brotherinlaw yr's back and his bills where high, so he put the fence on the back side of the meter and his bill went down.
But now it will go back up as they put on a smart meter when he wasn't home, more bad policy as far as I'm concerned..

[effox]

Being a geek I'm more interested in hearing the security risks of using wireless. There's a reason the secret service disallowed wifi for the white house network because of more advanced computer users war driving, to put it simply. If "Anonymous" can DDOS government sites, and change data on other sites independently, what's preventing others from manipulating these "smart meters" of others, let alone their own?

I guarantee there's going to be a transition from "rebel" electricians and home owners committing fraud, to another technological trait. Where would that liability lie, as a home owner if someone cracked the encryption and manipulated "your" system them self? I don't care if they're using WPA2 or double-dutch, given enough information one can reverse-engineer it.

[Slopster]

Being a geek I'm more interested in hearing the security risks of using wireless. There's a reason the secret service disallowed wifi for the white house network because of more advanced computer users war driving, to put it simply. If "Anonymous" can DDOS government sites, and change data on other sites independently, what's preventing others from manipulating these "smart meters" of others, let alone their own?

I guarantee there's going to be a transition from "rebel" electricians and home owners committing fraud, to another technological trait. Where would that liability lie, as a home owner if someone cracked the encryption and manipulated "your" system them self? I don't care if they're using WPA2 or double-dutch, given enough information one can reverse-engineer it.

How's that saying go again, Oh" You hit the nail on the head"

[STANKYfish]

We watched on Global tv News that the installing has been stopped for the time being. It was talking about the "pros" of having a smart meter. Tomorrow will be the "cons" about the meters. Think this is going to be going on all week long on the 6 oclock news.