British Gas launches free weekend electricity

British Gas is promising customers free electricity on Saturdays or Sundays - but only if they manage their account online and have a smart meter.

Under the FreeTime scheme, customers pay a standard tariff but get free electricity between 9am and 5pm on Saturday or Sunday. The deal will be fixed until March 2018.

The company's been trialling the plan with several thousand users, and says they've seen average savings of £60 a year. Meanwhile, British Gas gets to manage energy consumption more reliably.

"FreeTime is an industry first and will give our customers greater control of their energy use. British Gas is leading the nationwide roll-out of smart meters, and now we're the first to launch a smart plan that offers free electricity at weekends," says Sarwjit Sambhi, managing director of UK Home at British Gas.

"Our hundreds of thousands of smart meter customers already benefit from accurate bills and a greater understanding of their energy use. Now they'll be able to enjoy doing more of what they love at the weekends, knowing their electricity usage is free during the day."

It means that customers should be able to save money by doing all their laundry, for example, on their free day.

To join the scheme, though, customers will need to have a smart meter installed, which gives them an accurate, real-time picture of their energy use and sends the data back to the company.

British Gas has installed over 2.4 million smart meters so far. However, it has 8.6 million customers still using pre-pay or standard credit meters - and not all of them are suitable for a smart meter.

The government is planning for another 53 million smart meters to be installed in 30 million homes and businesses by the end of 2020, at an expected cost of £10.9 billion.

However, smart meters don't make electricity any cheaper - they just show consumers how much they're using. People's electricity bills don't actually fall unless they start using less.

Meanwhile, there have been concerns over technical issues.

"In the UK, there are concerns the first wave of smart meters will not be able to communicate with a planned new national communications network designed to allow the transmission of data between smart meters and all energy suppliers," warns a recent report from the World Energy Council.

"There are further questions about whether all locations will have the necessary wireless signal, and whether the price of the smart meters can be recouped by customers through modified energy use."

And it's not at all clear whether British Gas's deal will be the cheapest on the market.

As energy consultants Expert Energy tell ITV News, "Andy Smale, Technical Director at Expert Energy, advised consumers to shop around in order to make even more potential savings.

He told ITV News: "While this offer may at first glance appear an attractive option to consumers, there are an increasing number of reputable smaller suppliers coming on to the market which offer even cheaper deals - even after taking into account British Gas's predicted savings."