Half Hourly Meters Guide
Half hourly meters are essential for businesses that have high electricity usage. This guide explains everything you need to know.
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Half Hourly Meters From UK Suppliers
Why Use Half Hourly Meters?
Businesses that use high amounts of commercial electricity and commercial gas, such as enterprise and corporate businesses, are required to have half hourly electricity meters installed in order to ensure correct billing.
Commercial energy suppliers will also offer half hourly electricity tariffs for businesses that use these meters. These rates are calculated based on your business' electricity usage - information that is downloaded from your half hourly meter, ensuring you are not overpaying for your commercial electricity usage. Where instant prices are not available, a energy procurement process will ensure a tariff is found for you.
What Are Half Hourly Meters?
Half hourly meters are electricity meters for businesses with high energy consumption. Half hourly electricity meters automatically submit a reading every 30 minutes through AMR technology, ensuring businesses that have them installed will be billed accurately.
It is a legal requirement for businesses with a peak demand of 100 KVA of electricity in any half-hour period to have this type of meter. You will be able to find this information on a recent electricity bill.
Despite not being a legal requirement, companies that have a peak demand above 70 KVA but below the high consumption threshold see benefits of a half hourly meter.
Having a half hourly meter in place also unlocks tailored business electricity tariffs that are designed to fit exact requirements in terms of consumption, monitoring and insights. Customers with half hourly meters can benefit from instant prices, as well as tariffs offered by commercial energy suppliers through a bid and tender system known as energy procurement.
Your electricity meter will have half hourly capabilities if the MPAN has a “00” in the top corner next to an S.
What Is Peak Demand?
Peak demand, measured in kVA, is the total power a premises over a given time period. For businesses, this is measured over a half hour. If the power used in your business exceeds 100 kVA in any half hour period, then you are required to install a half hourly meter to ensure accurate billing.
How Do Half-Hourly Meters Work?
Half-hourly meters send readings to your supplier every 30 minutes using an AMR (automatic meter reading) system to ensure billing remains accurate. This system uses a fixed phone line or a mobile signal depending on your half-hourly meter set-up. There’s no need to take any manual readings.
Do I Need A Half-Hourly Meter?
Half-hourly manage business electricity for large consumption users, such as corporate and enterprise customers. Businesses with a peak electricity demand of 100 kilovolt amperes (KVA) or more must install a half-hourly meter.
Larger businesses using lots of electricity can cause difficulties when measuring usage with a standard or even a smart meter. Half-hourly customers are billed using data every 24 hours with readings recorded every 30 minutes. This helps identify electricity wastage to the hour and day to become more efficient, save money and ensure that bills are correct.
Benefits Of A Half-Hourly Meter
- Fully-automated meter readings
- Accurate billing with no estimates
- In-depth consumption data available to help you identify ways to save money
- Improve budget forecasting with data to predict usage during busier periods
Half-Hourly Meter Readings
You do not need to perform meter readings on half-hourly meters as they are automated and sent directly to your energy supplier. There may be an occasion where your supplier might need to ask you to supply a manual meter reading on your half-hourly meter reading. This will be done the same way as any digital meter.
Half-Hourly Meter Quotes From UK Suppliers
Our panel of suppliers that offer half-hourly meters are in the table below. Check out their Trustpilot reviews and what business types they would be great for.
| Supplier | Trustpilot Rating | Number of Reviews | Great For | Compare Prices |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shell Energy | 4.8 (Excellent) | 127 | Large Businesses | Compare Deals |
| Crown Gas & Power | 4.8 (Excellent) | 104 | Custom tariffs for large businesses | Compare Deals |
| TotalEnergies Gas & Power | 4.7 (Excellent) | 5,808 | Renewable electricity & SSE specialises in business electricity | Compare Deals |
| EDF Energy | 4.4 (Excellent) | 85,145 | Renewable tariffs as standard | See Prices |
| E.ON Next | 4.3 (Excellent) | 91,878 | Online-only small business electricity supplier | Compare Deals |
| British Gas | 4.1 (Great) | 230,165 | Great customer reviews and small business specialist | See Prices |
| SmartestEnergy Business | 4.0 (Great) | 2,344 | Large businesses focused on sustainability | See Prices |
| Valda Energy | 3.9 (Great) | 2,313 | Renewable as standard | See Prices |
| nPower Business Solutions | N/A | 61,088 | Custom tariffs for large businesses | Compare Deals |
| Drax | N/A | Large Businesses | Compare Deals |
Trustpilot Score and Reviews as of 2024.
Get a new half-hourly meter today and save even more on your monthly energy bills.
Can Any Business Get A Half Hourly Meter?
No. Half-hourly meters are only available to UK businesses with a peak demand of 70KVA in a single 30-minute period. Some businesses sitting around these peak demands often choose to get a half-hourly meter before they hit the mandatory threshold of 100KVA of peak demand due to the benefits.
What Does P272 Mean?
P272 refers to a piece of legislation passed in 2014 to phase profile class meters from 05 to 08 that had to be moved to a half-hourly meter.
This officially became mandatory in 2017 to help businesses and suppliers properly manage high-consumption electricity usage. This ensures that every business in this profile class is billed for the actual amount of electricity they have used and is not wrongly estimated. As the usage is high, estimated billing can cause serious cash flow problems.
How To Compare Half-Hourly Meter Tariffs
We have a dedicated team with expert knowledge of switching and installing half-hourly electricity meters.
Securing your new half-hourly meter with us means:
- Free half-hourly meter installation*
- Bespoke tariffs and great unit rates
- We can manage meter operator arrangements
- Great electricity management tools
- Competitive business electricity deals
Half-Hourly Meter Installation FAQs
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How Quickly Can I Get My New Half-Hourly Meter Installed?
We aim to complete our meter installation within 2 weeks. However, depending on the complexity of the installation, it may take longer. We’ll always be clear and transparent with the timeline.
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What Is kVA Charge?
Kilo-Volt-Ampere is a monthly charge paid to the Distribution Network Operator (DNO). To understand exactly what this charge is, you can draw comparisons to a normal standing charge. This charge is related to the power capacity provided to your business premises.
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What Is A DNO?
Your Distribution Network Operator manages the electricity network including cables and wires connecting your business to the National Grid.
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What Is a Meter Operator?
Meter operators install and maintain your electricity meter. A reliable meter operator is important for a company with high business electricity consumption as inaccurate billing can cause significant disruption to the business.
A great meter operator will:
- Ensure you’re compliant
- Install your electricity meters
- Maintain your meters
- Ensure you have accurate usage data
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How To Read A Half Hourly Meter
Half hourly meters send automated readings to your supplier. You shouldn’t ever need to take a manual reading but should you need to, it can be read like you’re reading any other meter.
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Is Business Electricity Cheaper With A Half Hourly Meter?
Typically, large consumption businesses are offered cheaper electricity unit prices as they are purchasing electricity in bulk. As large consumption businesses typically have half hourly meters installed, they also have access to cheaper business electricity unit prices.
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What Is Maximum Demand?
Maximum Demand is a business’s peak demand for electricity at any half-hour period.
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What Happens If Your Business Uses More Electricity Than Expected?
You may be charged for exceeding your Available Supply Capacity. Suppliers will display these charges on your bill as 'Excess Capacity'.
Maximum capacity will be a written agreement in your contract.
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What Charges Are Applied With A Half Hourly Meter?
Electricity suppliers may charge the following if you have a half hourly meter:
- Excess capacity - You may be charged for exceeding your Available Supply Capacity if you have not agreed to any changes in advance.
- Data collector charge - This covers charges the suppliers face to retain any data securely about your business's consumption.
- Meter operator umbrella charge - as maintenance and other costs may arise, suppliers sometimes charge a fee to cover any repairs and other miscellaneous charges related to your meter.
- Triad payment - these are three half hour periods of peak electricity demand across the National Grid. This is applicable from November through February. These three readings are averaged and then used to calibrate the system costs. These costs may be spread over your annual bill and are typically charged in advance.
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Who Is My Meter Operator?
You can find a list on meteroperators.org.uk.
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Why Do I Need A Meter Operator Agreement?
A meter operator agreement covers the installation and operation of half hourly meters. This contract is legally binding for businesses with a peak demand of 100kVA.
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What Is A Time Of Use Tariff?
Time of use tariffs allow customers with varying consumption levels at different times of the day to be charged lower or higher amounts at popular times.
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Do I Need To Take A Manual Half Hourly Meter Reading?
There’s no need to take a manual meter reading if you have a half hourly meter. Although, you may want to take a reading occasionally for your records.
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Is A Half Hourly Meter The Same As A Smart Meter?
Despite similarities, a half hourly meter is different in several ways. Half hourly meters operate more often at a high frequency (every 30 minutes) rather than a standard meter that sends reading occasionally.
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What Data Do You Get From A Half Hourly Meter?
A half hourly meter records when and how much electricity is being used at all times. This is useful for accurate billing and understanding any ways your business can become more efficient in reducing bills.
For automatic meter readings sent directly to your energy supplier every 30 minutes, get a new half-hourly meter today!