£1.2 million paid as SSE Energy Services failed to hit smart meter targets
Press release
- Publication date
- Industry sector
- Supply and Retail Market
SSE Energy Services missed its target to install gas and electricity smart meters for customers in 2019. Ovo Energy, which acquired SSE Energy Services in January 2020, will pay out £1.2 million for SSE Energy Services' historic issue.
Under the Government’s smart metering implementation programme, suppliers are required by their licence to take all reasonable steps to rollout smart meters to all homes and small businesses by mid-2021.
To work towards this, suppliers set individual annual targets for smart meter installations and Ofgem monitors performance against these targets.
SSE Energy Services failed to meet its smart meter installation target for 2019, before it was acquired by Ovo Energy in 2020.
Due to the voluntary payment of £1.2 million to Ofgem’s consumer redress fund, Ofgem has decided not to take formal enforcement action.
Ofgem is closely monitoring suppliers’ approaches to the rollout of smart meters and will use its discretion to hold suppliers to account if they do not meet their obligations.
Notes to editors
- Ovo Energy acquired SSE Energy Services in January 2020.
- Between 2016 and 2019, larger energy suppliers (those with more than 250,000 customers) had to set annual targets for the proportion of their customers that would have smart meters by the end of each year. These targets are commercially confidential.
- Smart meters help households control their energy use and save money. They mean that households will no longer have to take meter readings or be landed with bills based on estimated readings.
- In 2019, SSE Energy Services paid £700,000 to the energy redress fund after it failed to meet its smart meter target for gas meters in 2018.
- In June 2020, in light of Covid-19, the government announced that the current rollout obligation will be extended until 30 June 2021 and that a new obligation to roll out smart meters will commence on 1 July 2021, which will see the rollout continue until mid-2025.
- For more information about Ofgem’s voluntary redress fund, see: Ofgem appoints Energy Saving Trust to distribute payments from rule-breaking energy companies to charities.
- For more on the smart meter programme, see our website.
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