I nearly had a heart attack when a whopping £42,000 appeared on my smart meter – my bill is normally £32

A GRANDAD was horrified when a whopping £42,241.44 electricity bill appeared on his smart meter.

Peter Chambers, 64, said he nearly had a heart attack after seeing the shocking sum.

The grandad-of-four checks his meter every morning and usually sees a 50p increase – so he was stunned when the figure shot up in December.

His usual bill is about £30 a month, so he quickly rang up EDF to report the error. He was sent a copy of his proper bill, but has been waiting five months for a replacement smart meter.

Peter, a cleaner from Ipswich, Suffolk, said: “I was thinking about dialling 999 because I had a pain in my chest – I nearly had a heart attack!

“I looked at that and thought ‘how am I going to prove I don’t use that much?’ They’re going to think I’ve got a cannabis farm in my loft!”

He added: “I do check it every day without fail, because I just like to see if it’s charged me for what I’ve used or what I haven’t used.

“My total bill for the whole month is only £32, and I’m used to seeing between 30p and 50p tops.”

Peter was sure that his one-bedroom flat could not have drained that much energy by 10:30am and EDF energy could see the correct reading in their data.

The dad-of-two said: “They go ‘no your readings are fine this end, you must have faulty display’.

“For my peace of mind they did a fresh bill up to that day so I could see there was an error on the display. I saw a news bulletin about some lady with British Gas who got an incorrect reading; it’s the same meter, and they’re all useless!”

The smart meter’s display automatically reset itself in the new year, however, Peter still has not received a replacement device and currently keeps his turned off.

An EDF spokesperson said: “As with any technology, from time to time, things go wrong and we’re always keen to put this right.

“The vast majority of EDF SMETS1 meters have been upgraded and are working well, with customers able to see their daily energy use via the ‘Energy Hub’ on the EDF app, including those where an IHD might have stopped working or temporarily have shown erroneous consumption data.

“We will continue working with our customers to find the best solutions and in Mr Chambers case, a new IHD is being sent to him and in the interim he can continue to access detail about his daily energy consumption via the ‘Energy Hub’.”