Dont get me started on smart meters! In Victoria (Au), we had smart meters made mandatory by our last set of overlords, there was no way out it was install them or else. Then the new overlords came in promising to look into them and let us know it was ok to stop the installers in the meantime. Should have known it was all for naught because the day after the electricity man came to my door (and I told him politely to get the hell of my property) the libs said they had decided that we had to have them after-all.

As for an opt out system, they'll just keep piling on more and more fee's until the have big enough profits to send burly lawyers to everyone's doors. Sickening.

I'm pretty shaken up about this whole thing. I live in British Columbia, and we recently caged our meter and faxed out the formal refusals of installation after my partner chased the installers off the property. We were the only ones on the block left unscathed.

We are living with family, moving out soon, to look for an apartment. Renting is an extremely passive position to be forced to take in the wake of the smart meters. I wonder, am I going to have to put out ads to start soliciting for a smart-meter-free living space? I'm not sure what else I can do, besides pray for a sympathetic landlord and that this whole thing gets thrown out of the province?

Any other renters that are EMF-sensitive out there and under the impending threat of a smart meter?

I emailed BC Hydro back when I had my last apartment, asking them to verify what type of meter I was paying for, since they had been recently "serviced," and our suite was adjacent to a bank of 10, 20, 30, god only knows how many meters. ONE MONTH LATER they replied and said, despite the fact that I pay for my meter, since I do not own the apartment building, they refuse to disclose the information of what type of meter I have.

Incredible. It's the equivalent of spraying DDT through the house, 24/7.

Originally posted by kalamatas
All it took was a few buttons pushed on their automated system and we were opted out.....for a $75 fee plus a monthly charge of an additional $10!

$10/mo?

I could easily read 20-30 meters an hour in my neighborhood, where the houses aren't too far apart, so this means $200-$300 an hour for a meter reader? Plus, I don't think they even read the meter every month, it seems like they read it every other month and amke an estimate in the months they don't read it.

So this makes it more like $400-600 per hour for a meter reader, isn't that kind of steep? I'll be glad to do the job for only $300 an hour.

Then I can hire someone to do it for $30 an hour and pocket the other $270 per hour. LOL.

I think you're getting hosed with that $10 a month surcharge.

I got one of them notices in my bill too. After thinking about how they can charge you whatever they want or turn on and off your power at will just to punish you if they really wanted to I decided the real reason they call them smart meters is because they can be used to inflict pain... as in OUCH THAT SMARTS!

I got a new opt out policy. It's called solar. Then there's the gradual opt out policy where you start out by spending 75 dollars on your initial set up and then you add $10 towards more panels per month. Sound familiar?