OVO EV plans, what's the point?

[TheBinarySheep]

I'm trying to understand OVO's EV charging plans because the pricing makes no sense to me.

I'm currently on the Premium plan at £37/month which includes 250kWh of charging. In January I used 419kWh, so I paid the £37 plan fee plus an additional charge for the 169kWh over my allowance at my standard electricity rate (around 25p/kWh).

However, OVO also offers a Pay As You Go option at a flat 14p/kWh with no monthly fee.

When I compare the costs:

- My current plan: £37 for 250kWh = 14.8p/kWh (before any excess usage)
- Premium Plus plan: £59.50 for 350kWh = 17p/kWh
- Pay As You Go: 14p/kWh for any amount

For my January usage:

- Current plan cost: £37 + (169kWh × 25p) = £79.25
- PAYG would have cost: 419kWh × 14p = £58.66

Every monthly plan appears to work out more expensive per kWh than the Pay As You Go rate, even before accounting for excess usage charges. The only extras you get with the monthly plans are public charging vouchers and some perks like battery health checks.

Am I missing something obvious here? Is there any scenario where these monthly plans actually make financial sense compared to just using Pay As You Go?

[Mammasaid]

Both of those tarifs look extortionate compared to Octopus Intelligent Go.

I used more EV charge than you in December, but only paid £28.33 for it.

Breakdown by rate
Rate Consumption Cost
5.71p/kWh 495.7 kWh £28.325
28.42p/kWh 221.6 kWh £62.969
Total consumption 717.3kWh @ 12.73p/kWh † £91.29
Standing Charge 31 days @ 47.24p/day £14.65
Subtotal of charges before VAT £105.94
VAT @ 5.00% £5.30
Total Electricity Charges £111.24

[FiF]

Just looking at car charging costs in isolation isn't always the true picture.

Random month January car charging cost me just over £5 on the OVO pay as you go rate.
Yet because the other use rate is lower than Octopus albeit with a higher standing charge that saved me £18.

Devil + detail

[ucb]

I estimated recently that once Octopus introduce their cap on 6hours of cheap smart charging per day, then we would be no worse off using the OVO PAYG rate on our current usage.
Overall we are roughly using 1000kW a month (12637kWh last year) between car and house. I couldn't see the point of the other OVO tariffs unless you barely drove your EV and wanted easy convenience/fixed cost

[TheBinarySheep]

ucb said:

I estimated recently that once Octopus introduce their cap on 6hours of cheap smart charging per day, then we would be no worse off using the OVO PAYG rate on our current usage.
Overall we are roughly using 1000kW a month (12637kWh last year) between car and house. I couldn't see the point of the other OVO tariffs unless you barely drove your EV and wanted easy convenience/fixed cost

Fixed cost is the only advantage though from what I can see. All of the Plans are more expensive per kwh than being on payg.

[TheBinarySheep]

I've cancelled my EV plan for now, dropped onto PAYG.

I've looked at other energy providers. They're offering 6 hours each night. Do people find that's enough? I'm guessing if you're charging from 10% to 80% you'll need more than 6 hours?

[TheDrownedApe]

TheBinarySheep said:

I've cancelled my EV plan for now, dropped onto PAYG.

I've looked at other energy providers. They're offering 6 hours each night. Do people find that's enough? I'm guessing if you're charging from 10% to 80% you'll need more than 6 hours?

IO have cheaper rates at other hours too; if demand allows. It is usually plenty enough to charge a good 50 kwh

[samoht]

TheBinarySheep said:

In January I used 419kWh

TheBinarySheep said:

They're offering 6 hours each night. Do people find that's enough? I'm guessing if you're charging from 10% to 80% you'll need more than 6 hours?

Your 419 kWh consumed in January is approx 105 kWh a week. At 7kW that's 15 hours a week of charging, or 2.5 nights a week.

It rather depends how your driving is spread out throughout the month, but with any kind of even spread of usage, the 6 hours would suffice.

In the special case of your mileage being concentrated into long trips on a few consecutive days, the 6 hours a night won't be enough and you'd benefit from a provider that offers cheap rates up to 24/7 for charging.

[otolith]

TheBinarySheep said:

I've cancelled my EV plan for now, dropped onto PAYG.

I've looked at other energy providers. They're offering 6 hours each night. Do people find that's enough? I'm guessing if you're charging from 10% to 80% you'll need more than 6 hours?

6 hours should be enough for that if your battery is 58kWh usable or less. Assuming 10% charging loss at 7.5kW. YMMV.

[mikey_b]

TheBinarySheep said:

I've cancelled my EV plan for now, dropped onto PAYG.

I've looked at other energy providers. They're offering 6 hours each night. Do people find that's enough? I'm guessing if you're charging from 10% to 80% you'll need more than 6 hours?

Keep in mind that it’s 6 hours *every* night. It depends on your regular daily mileage. If you start every day at 80% and run it down to 10% every day, perhaps not - although keep in mind that you’re only paying full rate for the last few kWh. If you start at 80 and only run it down to 50% every day, then it’s more than enough. Just plug it in nightly, or every couple of days, rather than leaving it until it’s very low.

[TheBinarySheep]

It should be sufficient.

I start every day with 80%, maybe drop to 50-60% most days, and then lower others.

80% charge is about 60kw, so I guess even going from 10% to 80% the 6 hours would pretty much be enough.