Smart Home SolutionFAQ & Troubleshooting

 

FAQ

Household energy consumption accounts for about 15% of Singapore’s energy consumption, of which air-conditioners and refrigerators consume the most energy in a typical household. However, the proliferation of relatively new appliance types may have changed household energy consumption patterns. This has led to the National Environment Agency (NEA) initiating the Singapore Households Energy Consumption Survey.

This Survey aims to identify emerging end-use demands and energy consumption patterns in Singapore households, along with investigating behavioural and socio-economic factors related to household energy consumption.

Using energy metering solutions and Resync’s Smart Home mobile app, NEA also intends to understand the behavioural response of residents to receiving energy information in real-time.

NEA has engaged Resync and OneBerry to execute this survey.

There will be 3 Acrel Smart Energy Meters and 7 MokoSmart Smart Plugs installed in each household. This is to ensure that at least 80% of the total electricity consumption in each household is accounted for.

Both devices are incredibly safe to install and use. The installation is carried out by professional electricians. The smart meters possess IEC 62052-11:2003, Anbotek, and CE certificate for smart metering equipment with highest safety standards. The smart plugs are UL/FCC/CE/UKCA certified, are made of flame-retardant material, and have childproof design.

All the devices and the mobile app* are leased for free of cost to you during the monitoring period free for being a part of the survey. The meters and plugs consume minimal power consumption. The smart meters consume less than 1W of power, meaning over a period of a month, it will cost you much less than 1$.

The data packets transmitted are a few bytes from the meters and plugs. Over the course of the 4-month period, the data consumption shouldn’t exceed more than 2000 MB.

Our meters and plugs use a combination of 2.4GHz and 5GHz bandwidth on your network. They can be set on a low priority 2.4GHz network as needed. In our previous large-scale testing, we have observed that using both these bandwidths in your devices will have virtually no effect on your Internet performance.

Once you have completed the onboarding survey, the OneBerry call centre will reach out to you via the contact details you have provided to find a suitable date and time to schedule the installation.

We will also send you a reminder via SMS message two days prior to the installation. In the event that you wish to reschedule the installation, please contact the OneBerry call centre at [number].

For removal of devices, we will reach out to you 1 month before the end of the 4 month monitoring period to schedule a date and time for the removal. We will send you a reminder text 2 days before the removal.

The installation procedure should typically take between 45-150 mins. We will ask for some additional information beforehand to make your experience as seamless as possible.

The removal procedure should typically take about 45 min, as this will involve patch work for the drilled holes that were done for the DB and wall.

You can prepare the Wifi SSID and password beforehand, as the professional electricians will need to use these log-in details to connect the sensors to your Wifi.

You can expect around 2-3 Professional Electricians and 1 OneBerry surveyor to conduct the installation.

The Professional Electrician will install the energy meters next to the electrical DB,connect the CTs from the meters to the DB. They will identify the major appliances by switching on and off the circuit breakers.

For few appliances which cannot be measured via energy meters, smart plugs will be installed. During the installation, our OneBerry surveyor will be assisting you in completing the Appliance survey form. Please feel free to ask them any queries regarding the study if you have any.

You should expect minimal disruptions. For safety reasons, your power may be turned off for a few minutes to bring the smart meters live. We may ask for access to your router in some cases, if we have trouble accessing the internet.

Professional Electricians engaged by the surveyors will carry out the installation of the Smart Meters and Smart Plugs.

Troubleshooting

If your appliance is broken, please reach out to our call centre at [number of call centre] and we will provide you with the next steps.

Given that each Smart Plug is uniquely configured to the appliance, Resync will provide you with a new Smart Plug that is pre-configured with your Wifi and password. Please refer to the Standard Operation Manual for more details on how this can be done.

As part of the requirements from NEA, we advise that you avoid removing the Smart Plugs if there is no fault occurring in the appliance or the Smart Plugs, as this will result in a high risk of data loss.

If you haven’t been able to see data for any period under 1 hour, it is possible that the data is still being processed and uploaded into the mobile app. This is being done every 15 minutes.

However, if you haven’t been able to see data for more than 1 hour, we will reach out to you to check that the Smart Plugs are functioning as intended. If they aren’t functioning, please refer to the Standard Operation Manual for further instructions.

  1. Restart your router by switching it off and on.
  2. Switch off the plug by switching off the power socket and then turn on the power socket again.
  3. Once the plug turns on, you must see the Wifi symbol and ON button symbol glowing on the plug. Refer to the second image.
  4. If the On button is not glowing (see the first image), press the button on the plug. Now both the lights will glow.
  5. If the plug is still not connecting, try to place the plug somewhere close to the router and switch it on.

    For the Smart Energy Meter, we advise that you avoid switching it off and on at the Electrical Distribution Box, as it can be unsafe to do so for untrained individuals. It should eventually come back once the router is restarted.

Try the above procedure to cut the power from the smart plug and then turn it on. If you face the same issue again, then the plug will be replaced.

Please reach out to our call centre at [number] and inform them of the situation.

We advise against changing your Wifi SSID or password during the monitoring period, as you will be disqualified from the Survey. If you are changing your Wifi provider, try to set up the SSID and password the same as the previous router. In this way, the meter and plug will automatically connect to the new router. If you change your Wifi password, we will not be able to receive data and you will be disqualified from the survey.

As indicated in the image below, the plug might blink yellow light. This is because the plug is reset.

Please reach out to our call centre at [number] and report the issue.

  • When the plug blinks blue or yellow
  • When the plug is not switching On, even after the socket is switched off and on.

Please reach out to our call centre at [number] and report the issue. Please prepare your Wifi SSID, password, and appliance that the plug was originally attached to prior to calling the centre. We will inform you of the next steps.

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