Electricity At Moorings

[Regulo]

Standard definition of electricity in relation to meters is kWh - i.e 1000 Watts for 1 hour, or 2000 Watts for 30 mins etc.

[JennyMorgan]

Reply from the BA & Matt Dane in particular. Before anyone asks, and in my opinion, Matt is as straight as the day is long and I would have thought reasonably resistant to brainwashing. His very reasonable reply suggests to me that he was aware of the reason for my asking the question, or am I just so utterly predictable?!

Dear Mr Waller,

 

Thank you for your enquiry about the electric costs at Broads Authority electric pillars.

 

The cost of electricity from the supplier to the Broads Authority is an overall average of 15.37 pence per kw/ hour calculated from all our electric point sites and based on the 2015/16 actuals and 1% inflation. The difference between 21p ( the new rate at which electricity is supplied to the public now from our meters) and 15.37p (5.63 pence difference)   goes towards the cost of the cards supplied to the public, administration, maintaining, repairing and electrical testing of the pillars, but does not fully reimburse the BA for the electrical pillar service provided.

 

Please also note that we have had to upgrade/replace the meters on all our sites due to the old type of meter no longer being made and to maintain the one system which will work with one type of card. If we had not done this in good time, then it would have been only a short period of duration, before we had to close some of the pillars down as and when the meters malfunctioned, which several of them do every year. The new meters are the modern recommended equivalent.

 

Yours Sincerely, Matt Dane.

[Mark]

On ‎08‎/‎04‎/‎2017 at 6:17 PM, SueH said:

I posted mine to the BA on Monday.  It will be interesting to see if they come back before our next trip up there on 22nd.

I posted mine  back to the BA in early March and received  the new ones  back on Fri 7th April

 

[grendel]

31 minutes ago, JennyMorgan said:

Reply from the BA & Matt Dane in particular. Before anyone asks, and in my opinion, Matt is as straight as the day is long and I would have thought reasonably resistant to brainwashing. His very reasonable reply suggests to me that he was aware of the reason for my asking the question, or am I just so utterly predictable?!

Dear Mr Waller,

 

Thank you for your enquiry about the electric costs at Broads Authority electric pillars.

 

The cost of electricity from the supplier to the Broads Authority is an overall average of 15.37 pence per kw/ hour calculated from all our electric point sites and based on the 2015/16 actuals and 1% inflation. The difference between 21p ( the new rate at which electricity is supplied to the public now from our meters) and 15.37p (5.63 pence difference)   goes towards the cost of the cards supplied to the public, administration, maintaining, repairing and electrical testing of the pillars, but does not fully reimburse the BA for the electrical pillar service provided.

 

Please also note that we have had to upgrade/replace the meters on all our sites due to the old type of meter no longer being made and to maintain the one system which will work with one type of card. If we had not done this in good time, then it would have been only a short period of duration, before we had to close some of the pillars down as and when the meters malfunctioned, which several of them do every year. The new meters are the modern recommended equivalent.

 

Yours Sincerely, Matt Dane.

An Honest answer at least.

when you consider that camp sites can charge£5 - £6 per night for an electricity hook up (unmetered supply) it brings it into proportion, at least you dont pay those rates.

As for the cost of getting the electricity to the site, the cable itself is quite expensive, but the trenching to get it to where its needed is exorbitant, one of our contractors can easily charge £1000 to dig a hole big enough to connect a cable to the main cable.

[Poppy]

3 hours ago, Hockham Admiral said:

But they chose to update the b****y posts, Pops..... I certainly didn't ask them to!    

Neither did I  - in fact I didn't ask them to install the b****y things in the first place, especially using my toll money !

[ranworthbreeze]

2 hours ago, DaveB said:

Reading further into that Ofgem document, it seems that Ofgem state that any costs incurred due to the supply infrastructure, e.g the posts themselves, cabling, maintenance and supply must be met by an alternative funding stream and not from an increase in the unit price to the end user?

I stand to be corrected if this is not the case  

Hi Dave,

That's the way that I read it.

Regards

Alan

[JennyMorgan]

Some one else can write the next letter!

[grendel]

57 minutes ago, ranworthbreeze said:

Hi Dave,

That's the way that I read it.

Regards

Alan

I think if you look upon the cards as tokens, the argument that an alternate funding stream is necessary goes out of the window, as the way I read the document its the cost of the electricity plus an apportioned standing charge, which addition of the cost of the disposable token and repair and replacement would be seen as reasonable as there is only one way of recovering the costs- ie via the token.

It would possibly be an idea to query offgen about this, but I reckon the BA must have already had similar discussions in the past re- the previous posts, plus surely the manufacturers would have also only built within the bounds of the current legislation.

[addicted]

We were told today that as and when the electric posts break down on our marina (Brundall Bay ) they will be replaced with the new digital ones. The cards work on the same principal as topping up your mobile phone apparently, the only slight problem is that the marina won't be able to feed your meter on phoned request during your absence in the same way as they do now. It will be necessary for you to leave the card with them and phone a request for them to top it up. As the new cards are non disposable apparently the BA is still trying to come up with a way of collecting them . one suggestion is for boxes to be installled adjacent to the posts on the moorings for used cards to be posted into. One would have thought that such a basic requirement would have been properly thought out prior to altering the posts.

 

 

Carole

 

[JennyMorgan]

Just curious but why would the used cards be non disposable? Why would the BA want to collect them? Surely just slinging them into the nearest blue bin would see the plastic being recycled! 

[marshman]

If you chuck it in the bin, it will go to landfill - perhaps they are being socially responsible!!

[ZimbiIV]

The cards are probably re-chargeable like hotel key cards.

The easiest way would be to be hand them back to a retailer who sells them when you buy more, or am I being stupid in trying to make life simple?

paul

[LondonRascal]

Paul that is sensible but yes, stupid to think the Broads Authority could do such a thing so simple.

There is no doubt going to be very little information to hirers who will use it and throw it. I'd also expect there to be a short supply of cards over time with the Broads Authority thinking we do not need as many as are returnable and can be re-credited, but many using them as if disposal plastic cards.

What would be amazing is if the retailers had the reader so you take your card back (to the shop at Ranworth for example) and ask for it to be re-credited - hand over your money and away you go freshly topped up and ready to go again.

 

[Paladin]

I can't see why any of the retailers would want to take on the extra responsibility and administration of taking back and recharging used cards. What's in it for them?

It is notable that some of the largest hire firms are not on the BA list of card suppliers, yet some of them hire out boats that are very reliant on the charging posts.

Although the upgrading has been in the pipeline for a long time, there are gaps in the information that has been disseminated to those actually operating the system, let alone the end users. The responsibility for that lies at a higher level than department heads, who are doing their best under rather difficult circumstances.

Perhaps speculation and criticisms should be held in reserve until the actual short-comings are revealed, and those responsible for them can be identified. I know, because I have spoken with them, that there are some within the system who are even more frustrated than we are with how this is being handled.

[JennyMorgan]

The attraction of a warm, mellow, sometimes flickering glow of a lovingly polished, slightly battered old oil lamp grows stronger by the day! 

 

[ExMemberBobdog]

10 hours ago, JennyMorgan said:

Just curious but why would the used cards be non disposable? Why would the BA want to collect them? Surely just slinging them into the nearest blue bin would see the plastic being recycled! 

I believe that in principle the cards are rechargeable.  As yet the BA haven't worked out how they are going to manage recharging, because it requires some kind of computer attached device to do the job, and these would have to be provided to all the card suppliers (presumably at some considerable expense).  Before the usual suspects launch the diatribe about why the BA then chose these cards; it's because that is what is now available to them, there is no simpler alternative.

[brandenjg]

Shame we couldn't buy a single card, top the card up as much as we like but be able to also load as much as we like onto a meter if that makes sense.

[JennyMorgan]

I have some sympathy with the BA on this one. Reading Bob's post it does seem that they have fallen into a hole not of their own making. When the scheme was introduced the BA at the time grabbed at what they thought was to be the future of inland waterways, namely electrical propulsion. They worked at it with some enthusiasm, encouraging people to buy into electrical propulsion by offering tolls discounts and grants to convert boats to electricity. What started off as something of an impractical pipe dream has probably now turned a tad sour as the demand for electricity has turned away from propulsion to microwaves. Indeed this has probably become the death knell of electrical propulsion as boats thus powered can't find a vacant power point.

In the meantime I really do think that the industry needs to get behind the Authority on this one. The yards build boats that need external power thus it's in their interests to co-operate. If a boatyard sells diesel then it buys a pump to dispense it, if it sells electricity then logic suggests that they invest  in the equipment to do the job and not leave it all to the Authority which in turn means us toll payers, a large proportion of which don't have a need to plug in.

In a nutshell I don't think this one was down to the Authority. If the industry & its customers want it then surely it should be down to that industry to provide it.

[JennyMorgan]

In the meantime if we treat the cards as disposable, bit like book tokens or the phone cards of old, then surely the problem is solved.

[addicted]

10 hours ago, JennyMorgan said:

The attraction of a warm, mellow, sometimes flickering glow of a lovingly polished, slightly battered old oil lamp grows stronger by the day! 

But not the delightful brown stain it leaves on the ceiling

 

Carole

[JennyMorgan]

Oh ho, Carol, there is an answer to that! See this link:

https://shop.classicmarine.co.uk/cabin-fittings-lights/lights/spares-for-oil-lamps/other-bits/brass-smoke-shade.html

 

[LondonRascal]

So far as topping these cards up with credit, there is not much in it for local shops like newsagents in London offering Oyster Card Top Ups - but it gets people in the shop. They may then get can of Coke a bar of chocolate and £10.00 top up while their at it.

I can well imagine this being possible on the Broads - the machines should be provided at no cost to the outlet/shop but it would mean both private owners and hirers alike could easily go to a shop and top up their cards with credit, if nothing more it would at least feel like a unified system.

If we treat the plastic cards as 'disposable' it renders their technology and purpose that went into the development and system as useless.

It might as well have been a case of having new posts but opting to keep the single use paper cards. While these plastic cards may be mere pennies to buy in they will cost more than paper ones as their not only made of plastic but have a chip inside them the same as an Oyster Card or Contactless Debit or Credit Card. They are not designed to be single use and disposable.

To be fair, perhaps this goes further than the Broads Authority, because lets face it, in the main these electric posts and cards are going to be installed for use in large Marinas where the cards can be topped up with many pounds worth of credit by berth holders who then keep a single card - tap and load to their metered post for their individual berth. Such a system clearly would work very well with the Marina reception having the means to top up their many berth holders cards and usually as berth holders move to pastures new, hand back the card ready for the next berth holder to use. Only a few spares would be needed to be held for the odd one that gets lost.

Take the system out of the Marina and 'into the wild' and system falls over reverting to a disposable based way of having many many cards produced then needing to be distributed to the various locations you can buy the cards from.  To me this is wasteful and annoying when a technology is not being fulled embraced as it could be. 

Perhaps the truth is the manufactures of the electric posts, the Broads Authority and outlets you can buy the cards from don;t seem to have got together and figured a viable way to top up the cards so a higher percentage of the cards will be re-used and not disposed of. 

[grendel]

I would imagine its the security issue, knowing how people can reprogram the chips in 3D printer cartridges, with a simple device made up from a small computer and a set of contacts, I would imagine that they could be worried that the cards can be reprogrammed at home so to speak, by computer hackers, who would then get free electricity and  destroy the revenue stream from the electricity posts, I would imagine that the cards should have no visible contacts, and be programmed wirelessly, which may mean that the BA will buy them in pre programmed from the manufacturer, and thus there will be no facility to re-program them available.

[JennyMorgan]

If there is a way of abusing the system then we can be sure someone will do it 

[JennyMorgan]

On 4/11/2017 at 1:54 PM, JennyMorgan said:

If there is a way of abusing the system then we can be sure someone will do it 

I am beginning to think that the abuser is the Authority. Was talking to some folk in the pub this morning and it does appear that there is some anger amongst card users. The grouse appears to be that there is a more than 20% service charge factored into the new card that you buy, e.g. that you get less than 80p's worth of electricity for every pound that you spend. In fairness no one, least of all me, really knew for sure what they were talking about other than that no one who pays for a pound of power actually gets a pounds worth, contrary to the Ofgem regulations and suggesting, once again, that the Authority is rewriting the rules.  As I posted earlier I had a very reasonable reply from Matt Dane which I was quite happy to accept but it's quite clear that I am probably in a minority. Perhaps the BA should publish Matt's letter in a manner that ensures that all card users receive it.

If the Authority is abusing the system then the 'service charge' could possibly be charged to the Navigation account meaning that those of us who have no interest whatsoever in plugging in will find that we are paying towards it. Okay, some of you can never go under Potter Bridge but are nevertheless paying towards the dredging going on on Hickling, however I'm not convinced on that one!

I rather suspect that the BA really regrets ever becoming involved in the supply of electricity at its moorings.