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Why Your Home Needs Heating Controls

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The energy used by Irish households is staggering. As much as 1/4 of Ireland’s energy use is created from the residential sector.

The findings which come from an SEAI report has also found that since 2014 the residential sector has begun to see a rise in carbon emissions from Irish homes.

Oil Heating still remains at the top when it comes to home heating methods. This type of heating accounts “for 37% of all final energy used in the residential sector in 2016”.

Any increase in, or failure to decrease, energy use is having serious consequences for our planet and our society. The effects of high energy use includes increased carbon footprint, increased energy costs and a reduction in energy supply.

Houses built pre-2006 are eligible for an SEAI grant which covers the costs of implementing heating controls in your home. Smartzone are one of the only companies in Ireland that provide heating controls with a smart security bundle at no extra cost. This means that we charge only for the security package at €199 installation fee and don’t charge for heating controls. The reason we do this is because we can claim the SEAI grant on your behalf meaning you can relax and leave all the hefty paperwork to us.

So, if you’re not fully convinced yet here are some reasons you need to implement heating controls into your home.
  • As mentioned above, there are many unappealing consequences to failing to reduce your energy use. Losing control of your heating schedule raises your carbon footprint further harming the earth. With Smartzone, you can easily control your schedule through our app meaning you have control and full knowledge of your energy use.

 

  • Save money. When using energy controls our customers can see savings of up to €300 per year!

 

  • All in one app. At Smartzone we like to make your life as easy as possible. This is why all our services are controllable under one app, which can be used on a mobile phone and tablet. You can change the temperatures downstairs or upstairs with the simple touch of a button.

 

Smartzone-Heating-controls-thermostat-smart-new-home

 

  • Works to your schedule. Our heating controls and smart thermostat work intelligently with out Smartzone hub. In doing so, the hub tracks where you are in the house or if you’ve even left. the heating controls adjust to where you are. If you are out picking up messages the smart thermostat will decrease the temperature in your home to save one energy. It can also recognise when you have left a window or door open to reduce temperatures accordingly.

 

  • Ultimate comfort. As well as saving energy, the thermostat learns how you spend your day in your home to create a warm, comfortable atmosphere in a perfect temperature room that suits you.

 

  • Easy installation. Our products are wireless ensuring that installation is easy, straightforward and doesn’t interfere with your schedule.
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Setting up Heating Schedules

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Setting up Heating Schedules

Setting up Heating schedules allow you set up times and temperatures for each zone so you always wake up or come home to a warm house and keeps it at a lower temperature when you’re out of the house or asleep to save you money. This is how you set up your Heating Schedules:

 

1 – Login to alarm.com using your login details

This will bring you to your Home page (see example below).

 

2 – Choose any thermostat by selecting the arrow on the top right

This will bring you into the administration site for thermostats.

3 – Choose Schedules on the top orange bar

On the top left choose the Thermostat you wish to change (‘Living Thermostat’ selected here).

 

4 – Choose number of days

At the bottom of the page you see you have a choice of selecting 5 +2 or 7 day. If you select 5 & 2 then you get one setting for weekdays and 1 setting for weekends (as above)

If you select 7 days you can change temperature for 7 days (see below)

5 – Choosing number of time bands

The other option you have is 2 or 4 settings per day. Two settings is often just used for Home or Away and 4 settings could be for Home in morning and evening, ‘Away’ during the day and ‘Sleep’ as in example No. 4.

 

6 – To Set the Heating Schedule (Times and Temperatures)

To set the heating schedule you simply drag the end of each time band back or forward to the time that suits your needs and amend the temperature with arrows above. Arrows to the right will increase the temperature and arrows to the left will decrease the temperature.

7 – Save your Settings

Scroll down to the end and click Save.

You will get a pop up message saying Scheduled changes have been saved.

8 – Copying the Schedule

Scroll down to the bottom of the page.

If you have more than 1 zone you will need to set up the Time and Temperature for each Thermostat. You can do this the same way as in example No. 6.

You can then do the same for other Thermostats or just simply Copy the Schedule as per the example below and you’ll receive a message confirming your changes have been made.

9 – Heating boost

Finally, if you want to boost your heating the simplest way is from the App.

 

Heating Control from the App.

 

To Control the Heating

  1. Go to the Alarm.com app
  2. Go to Thermostats (assuming Heat Mode is on)
  3. Select the zone you want to change ie Upstairs
  4. The current temperature is displayed on the top right where it says ‘Current’.

The target temperature is displayed in the middle

  1. To increase the temperature select the Up arrow and bring the temperature higher than the Current temperature
  2. To decrease the temperature select the ‘Down’ arrow and bring the temperature lower than the Current temperature
  3. The temperature will return to the schedule when the schedule changes

 

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