Using your smart meter in-home display – instructional videos

Once you've plugged in your Chameleon IHD3 PPMID smart in-home display, it should turn on automatically. Or, to turn it on, press and hold this button on the back. The seven buttons on the front make it easier to use your display and find out how much, when and where you're using energy in your home. The home button returns you to the home screen at any time and shows your energy use so far today.

If you have a prepayment meter, you can also see your remaining balance here. The now button lets you see how much electricity you are using right now. The fuel button allows you to see your gas, electricity or combined fuel usage. You can use the calendar button and left and right arrows to see your energy usage so far today, this week, this month or this year.

The OK or menu button allows you to access the menu options of your display, including your account information, budget and settings. Use the arrows to navigate through the menu followed by OK to confirm your selection. The energy usage dial of your display shows your electricity or gas usage as either low, medium or high.

The coloured lights along the bottom of your display also show your real time electricity usage as low, medium or high. You can set a budget to help you monitor and manage your energy use better. The display is set to a default budget, but you can change this and set your own. To set your budget, press OK, go to settings, and press OK.

Select set budget, and press OK. Use the fuel button to choose the fuel type, and the calendar button to choose the time period. Use the arrows to set your budget and press OK to complete. The energy usage dial on your home screen helps you to monitor your budget easily. You will hear an alarm when your budget has been exceeded.

Over time, the device will learn your typical usage and the scale of the dial will automatically adjust to reflect that. You can also customise some of the settings on your display. To do this, press OK and scroll through to settings. You can adjust the screen brightness and enable or disable night mode, where the screen will dim between midnight and 7am, key tones, budget alert, and choose the language, either English or Welsh.

For prepayment tariff customers, your in-home display offers additional features allowing you to see your available credit in pounds and pence, receive low credit alerts, input your top up UTRN code as an alternative top-up method, and reconnect your electricity supply in case you're cut off. You can view your credit at any time by pressing the home button.

If you have both gas and electricity meters, you will see the meter with the lowest balance. Your smart in-home display will notify you when your credit balance is running low. You will get an audio alert and the low credit symbol will appear on your screen. If the emergency credit is available, your in-home display will notify you when you can use that feature.

To activate emergency credit, press OK. Use the arrows to scroll. Select emergency credit, followed by OK. Press home to view your remaining meter balance. In case you are cut off, once you have topped up your meter balance, you can reconnect to your electricity supply using your in-home display. From the home screen, press OK.

Scroll through to activate electricity supply, followed by OK. Press home to return to the home screen. You can also see your last five top ups. To do this from the home screen, press OK. Use the arrows to navigate to account information. Press OK. Select previous top ups and use the arrows to scroll through the information.

Press home to exit and return to the home screen. To find out more about this in-home display, or to download the user guide, please visit chameleontechnology.co.uk/inhomedisplayhelp.

If you need more information, or your in-home display was not covered by this video, you should visit the Citizens Advice website. You can find troubleshooting advice, help to identify different models and digital user guides for many more in-home displays. Go to citizensadvice.org.uk/ihd

The Trio Touch Button in-home display from geo shows energy use for gas and electricity smart meters. The device has five buttons, home, navigation, left and right arrows, select, return. The home button accesses the main menu, or when in a menu, returns to the home screen. The left and right arrows can be used to navigate through menus and screens.

The button in the centre has two functions. It selects items in the menu and switches how energy is displayed, in pounds and pence, or kilowatt hours. The return button will take you back to the previous screen. The display will always start on the energy now screen. This screen shows your electricity and gas consumption.

The dial on the left shows your electricity usage in near real time, and the flame on the right shows your gas usage. The needle of the dial will move as you use electricity in your home, and the flame will change colour as you use gas. Press the centre button to switch between seeing the usage cost per hour in pounds and pence, and in kilowatt hours.

You can move between the energy now screen to the energy today screen by using the navigation arrows. The energy today screen shows the total electricity and gas used today against set budgets. The colour of the circle indicates the amount of budget used. Green: the system predicts usage is under budget.

Amber: the system predicts usage is over budget. Red: usage is over budget. You can set your budget in the main menu. To do this, press the home button. Scroll down to settings using the right arrow. Select budgets, next, select the fuel type and adjust the budget using the left and right arrows. Once you have set your budget, press the home button to save your changes and leave the menu.

You can view your previous electricity and gas usage by pressing the home button and selecting electricity usage or gas usage. The history screen is split into four tabs: days, weeks, months, year. You can navigate through the tabs using the left and right navigation arrows. The display will also show the total for the period and whether your budget was exceeded.

If one or more of your meters is in prepayment mode, your in-home display will have a prepay balance screen. This screen shows your remaining credit and the circles will drain of colour as credit is used. It will also give an indication of how many days your credit may last for, based on your usage. It will also show when emergency credit is available by including an ‘E’ in the circle.

The low credit alert displays when your credit drops below a set level. You can adjust the alert setting in the advanced menu. There are three states for emergency credit. Credit available, credit in use, and friendly credit. Friendly credit is automatically available during certain times, such as overnight, on weekends or public holidays, and you will not be cut off during these times.

Your energy supplier will be able to tell you what their friendly credit periods are. When credit is in use, the screen will show how much debt is on the system. Friendly credit will be displayed on the screen as non-disconnect underneath the circle. It will also show how much debt is on the system in the middle of the circle.

To find out more about this in-home display or to download the user guide, please visit geotogether.com.

If you need more information, or your in-home display was not covered by this video, you should visit the Citizens Advice website. You can find troubleshooting advice, help to identify different models and digital user guides for many more in-home displays. Go to citizensadvice.org.uk/ihd

If you are blind, partially sighted or have difficulties with dexterity, an accessible in-home display could make tracking your energy usage easier. The Trio Accessible in-home display has been developed in partnership with the Royal National Institute for the Blind and has additional features to a standard in-home display.

The additional accessibility features include tactile buttons with feedback of button press, text to speech function for easy screen navigation, adjustable volume for the text to speech function, coloured LEDs, which indicate current electricity usage, large typeface and a high contrast colour scheme, which is optimised for visual impairment and colour blindness.

There are six large buttons, with three on either side of the display. From top to bottom on the left hand side, the buttons are home, back, navigation (to go from the previous item or screen) and on the right hand side, menu, OK, navigation (to go to the next item or screen). The LED lights on the top of the in-home display show the current electricity usage as green, amber or red.

These lights will change as your electricity usage goes up or down. The middle LED is also a button which can be used to turn the speech on or off. The speech function will describe what is being displayed on the screen and instructions of what you can do. Speech is turned on automatically when the device is first powered on.

To turn the speech off, press the middle LED button for about two seconds. It will say that speech has been turned off. It will also give a reminder about how to turn the speech back on in case it has been turned off by accident. To turn the speech on, press and hold the middle LED button for two seconds. It will say speech has been turned on and the information on the screen will be read out. The middle button can also be used to interrupt the speech or repeat it.

You can view the home screen by pressing the home button on the left hand side of the display. This screen has three tables which show you how much energy is being used now, how much energy has been used today, and for prepay customers, their prepay credit.

You can navigate between the three tabs on the home screen by using the left and right navigation buttons. The main menu button is the top button on the right hand side of the display. The speech will describe what is being displayed and instructions of what you can do on that screen. When you're in the main menu, you can use the navigation buttons to scroll up and down through the options, which will be read out by the speech function.

To select the item you want, press the OK button to select that option. The accessible in-home display is being offered at no extra cost to selected customers. If you think you would benefit from one, contact your energy supplier to request one and check availability. To find out more about this in-home display, or to download the user guide, please visit geotogether.com.

If you need more information, or your in-home display was not covered by this video, you should visit the Citizens Advice website. You can find troubleshooting advice, help to identify different models and digital user guides for many more in-home displays. Go to citizensadvice.org.uk/ihd