So I take care of Gas/Electricity switching for my grandmother, so her account is linked to my e-mail address as I submit meter readings online for her and such since she's basically a technophobe for anything more than a TV, and when I checked my e-mails this morning I had one from EDF saying "Thanks for booking an appointment to have Smart Meters installed"

I hadn't made any such appointment online, and my grandmother had made no such appointment on the phone either, so EDF had simply taken it upon themselves to book a Smart Meter installation for her in 2 weeks time.

Fortunately I was able to login to her account online and find the not very obvious link to cancel the appointment (When you go into the appointment, there's huge buttons for rescheduling it to another time, but the link to Cancel is somewhat hidden. It's basically in a sentence that said "Or if you'd like you can Cancel your booking" with the word cancel just being a Hyperlink), but it's certainly worrying that they're now just forcing appointments on people without even asking and, had I not been able to check my e-mails due to being on holiday or away with work then in 2 weeks time some stranger would have just turned up at my grandmothers door telling her he was there to change the meters.

The main reasoning behind not having smart meters at the moment is simply due to the number of stories I've seen in the past year or two about poor installation jobs leading to gas leaks, boiler breakdowns, electricity surges damaging equipment, etc. Last thing we want to risk right now is for someone barely trained turning up, rushing a meter swap and leaving asap and then a woman in her late 80s being left with no heating in the current weather conditions.

Just thought I'd post this as a word of warning for anyone else with EDF to keep a lookout for.

EDF are not the only ones trying different tactics to switch people over to smart meters.

Don't know if you have seen this thread

https://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?491170-Smart-Meters-A-discussion&p=5158484&viewfull=1#post5158484

Particularly this post

https://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?491170-Smart-Meters-A-discussion&p=5171984&viewfull=1#post5171984

Everybody should know that meter swaps are voluntary, not compulsory. The only time a smart meter will be installed is when a meter change is needed.

It's one thing to try and make people think they're compulsory, but just outright saying "We've booked an appointment to come fit one without even asking" is taking it even beyond that.

Just today they sent another two e-mails, one saying "Great News! You can now get a smart meter installed" and another "Please re-book your smart meter installation"

Our family has decided that we aren't going to cancel any more of these, we are just going to tell them to s** off when they arrive - if anyones in that is.

I'm sorting out 'proper' locks for the property with outside meters. They will have to knock/book now if they even want to meter read. (we all submit readings at least once a quarter)