A smart meter may help your business save money and time

What is a smart meter?
Put simply, your business’ smart meter automatically sends gas and electricity readings to your business energy supplier. By reducing the need for manual readings, your life is easier and your bills are more accurate, as you’re only charged for the energy you use.

How does a smart meter for your business work?
In order to submit your readings, a smart meter for business uses similar technology to a mobile phone (though you don’t need a mobile phone signal to get one) with energy data transmitted to your supplier through a wireless network.

With the help of top cyber security experts, including the government and GCHQ, smart meters have been designed specifically to operate on their own dedicated communications system.

By default, readings will probably be collected once a month, though you can request to have more regular readings if you’d prefer. However, later this year, new microbusiness customers won’t be able to opt out of sharing their electricity meter readings on a half-hourly basis, though existing microbusiness customers will continue to be able to opt out until they change supplier or contract.

And although the process is entirely automatic, if you are with a supplier that provides them, the in-home display enables you to monitor your energy usage. This could help you to reduce costs and improve your business energy efficiency.

For more information about the benefits of installing a smart meter in your workplace, visit the Smart Energy GB at smartenergygb.org