Prioritising prepayment would delay smart rollout, warns the DCC

Battle lines have been drawn in the energy industry over whether smart prepayment meters should be rolled out ahead of other smart meters, as recommended by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in is recent inquiry into the market.

In a slew of submissions on the CMA’s proposed energy market remedies published this week, the Data and Communications Company (DCC), which is managing the smart communications network, warned that prioritising prepayment meters would delay the rollout and force it to revisit its strategy.

Some suppliers joined the DCC in its criticism of the prosed remedy, with First Utility, Flow Energy and Good Energy agreeing that it would cost more to replace recently installed non-smart prepayment meters and remove the potential savings of a geographical rollout.

However, Ecotricity, Ovo Energy and Co-operative Energy welcomed the idea, telling the CMA that prepayment customers should receive the benefits of smart metering, such as a wider range of tariffs currently prevented by technical constraints, as soon as possible through a prioritised rollout.

Good Energy called for an earlier completion date for prepayment customers of April 2019, rather than the 2020 deadline for the entire smart meter rollout, as an alternative to a prioritised rollout.

In its submission, Good Energy said: “This still prioritises smart prepayment, but means an accelerated mop up rather than having to do prepayment meters first, [it] would allow a majority of prepayment meters to be changed as part of a supplier’s normal, efficient rollout strategy.

“However, before implementing this we would want to see evidence that customers with smart prepayment meters, are more likely to switch compared to non-smart prepayment meter customers, otherwise the benefits will not materialise.”