A listed company which installs smart meters around the UK has raised questions over the Government’s rollout programme.
Glasgow-based Smart Metering Systems installs and manages gas and electricity meters on behalf of major energy companies, employing almost 1,000 staff in Scotland, Cambridge, Bolton and Cardiff.
In a statement to the London Stock exchange it said it expects the programme – which requires suppliers to take all reasonable steps to install smart meters to all homes and small businesses by the end of 2020 – to “extend to the end of 2022, and potentially into 2023”.
SSE was this week fined £700,000 by regulator Ofgem for missing an initial target while recent figures showed a 16 per cent year-on-year drop in smart meter installations for the final three months of 2018.
“There are 53 million gas and electricity meters in the UK and, as of the end of December 2018, there were 14.9 million smart and advanced meters installed in homes and businesses across the country,” it said in the statement.
The company also reported a rise in revenue of 24 per cent to £98.5 million for the 12 months to December 31st while profit before tax increased by 13 per cent to £25.1m.
SMS chief executive Alan Foy said: “2018 has been a year of continued investment and growth, and I am especially pleased with the way in which we have brought our end to end solutions to the UK’s energy suppliers shown by the significant contract wins announced in the last six months.
“Building long term partnerships with our customers is key to our success. We enter 2019 with a strong order book and are well positioned to continue making progress in our core markets.”