Octopus energy company. Anyone use 'em?

[Zoon]

Greshamst said:

Anyone else’s still not updated from 21st, or just me?

That little ghost means you didn't opt in

[KTF]

My numbers are in for February. 175kWh of electricity used and Tracker saved me £16.82 compared to Flexible or £9.83 compared to Agile.

Assume the savings will be greater when the government cap changes.

I have seen on MSE that when it comes to renewal, people are automatically being rolled over to stay on Tracker so hopefully that will still happen come renewal time.

[LordGrover]

Tracker (electricity) doesn't suit my usage, I'm making decent savings against most other tariffs - working out c. 15p /kWh


This shows c. 20p, but February bill was 15.3p

[okgo]

"Based on your usage we recommend a monthly payment of £341.75, reduced to £274.75 by the Energy Bills Support Scheme."

Idiotic, basically on zero balance, about to go into spring where heating bill will fall dramatically, yet the system says no lol. I was paying £250 which would have built a nice buffer over summer, now won't let me go below 274

[HughG]

Zoon said:

Greshamst said:

Anyone else’s still not updated from 21st, or just me?

That little ghost means you didn't opt in

I’ve got that too even though I definitely opted in. Will give it a day or 2 then complain if it doesn’t sort itself.

[EAuserUK]

(Octopus thread post, or standalone thread?)
Winter 2021/2 vs winter 2022/3
In East Anglia, and looking at our winter energy costs this year vs last year, after making some changes to prepare for expected increases.
Total energy cost - eletricity and heating oil - including VAT December 1 2021 – February 28 2022 £1206
Total energy cost - eletricity and heating oil - including VAT December 1 2022 – February 28 2023 £1348, or £1147 after allowing for three months of the Energy Bills Support scheme.
I think the Energy Cap saved us around £612 over those three months, so our bills this year would have been about £1960 without the cap (not allowing for the Energy Bills Support Scheme).
We’re on a standard long-term tariff, not Agile.
2 people, house is 3500sqft. 1960s bungalow extended around 2010 outwards and upwards. Insulation seems ok to good (rather than great) generally, although a large upstairs room has poor sound and heating insulation. Generally only 1 person from Monday to near end of Thursday. Heating (and hot water) mostly via oil boiler, but spot-heating occupied rooms with oil-filled electric radiators – supplemented sometimes with heated throws. House's main oil boiler-fed heating thermostat winter 2021/2 at around 20C, but this winter generally at 14C. Standalone electric radiators at similar temperature to last year, although when using heated throws, some were a bit lower. Not sure how we saved this much electricity.
We don’t have many visitors, but when we do, we put the temperature up a few degrees for a few hours.
Heating oil use this winter dropped approximately 20%, but the price rose 65p/L end 2021 to 85p/L end 2022
Cost electricity last winter, 19.33p/kWh
This winter, the first main bill was at 50p/kWh reduced with the Energy Price Guarantee (Cap) to the standard 33.39p/kWh. The latest winter bill was 65p/kWh, reduced with the Energy Price Guarantee (Cap) to the standard 33.39p/kWh (these exclude the effect of the Energy Bills Support Scheme £400 over six months).
December 1 2021 – February 28 2022 we used 2955 kWh
December 1 2022 – February 28 2023 we used 2052 kWh
We don’t feel we’ve made more than a minor reduction in comfort levels. The house is cooler overall, but we really only notice it in hallways. The oil boiler radiators are on in all rooms, to prevent frost damage, mould etc, but are low in unused rooms.
December 2022 was much cooler than December 2021 (England average, 3.5C 2022 to 6.1C 2021);
January 2023 was slightly warmer than January 2022 (England average, 4.9C 2023 to 4.6C 2022)
Not sure about February.
Standing charge rose 2021/2 22.87p/day to 2022/3 35.52p/day. Standing charge and kWh figures are before 5% VAT; oil price is with VAT. There are a couple of calculation working out issues, but nothing significant, I hope.

Too much detail?!

Edited by EAuserUK on Wednesday 1st March 16:36

Edited by EAuserUK on Wednesday 1st March 17:43

[Elroy Blue]

okgo said:

"Based on your usage we recommend a monthly payment of £341.75, reduced to £274.75 by the Energy Bills Support Scheme."

Idiotic, basically on zero balance, about to go into spring where heating bill will fall dramatically, yet the system says no lol. I was paying £250 which would have built a nice buffer over summer, now won't let me go below 274

At risk of repeating myself. Call them and ask to be put on a variable direct debit. You just pay for what you use.
Can't get much simpler

[Armchair_Expert]

Bizarre, been paying 250 a month since last Summer - remained at zero balance or around minus 80 pounds, and our DD has now reduced by 60 a month to 190 automatically. I queried it with Octopus and was told it was correct.

The only change we have made is going onto the Tracker - which is much much cheaper than the standard rate we were on. Last bill was around half what we usually pay.

[Trustmeimadoctor]

well my feb bill is in
elec last year 355kwh £110.88
this year 221kwh £62.66 on standard tariff £85.99

gas last year 978kwh £78.84
this year 681kwh £46.45 on std tariff £77.71

my running year
electric last year 3761kwh
electric this year 3224kwh
537kwh saving £177.37 on std tariff


gas last year 6694kwh
gas this year 6121kwh
573kwh saving £58.68 on std tariff

[okgo]

£340 for Feb 5th to March 5th this year.

£170 for Feb 22-March 22nd last year and £216 for Jan 22nd to Feb 22nd before it.

Quite a considerable jump, hasn’t helped that it’s been pretty cold!

[Mark-ri571]

Latest electric bill just landed from Octopus. Shame the Gov £67 pm support will be ending soon as it’s been a cheap month ( all my electric car charging has been during the 4 hour cheap Go period - still waiting for IO to go live). Net payable £28.23 later this month by DD.

[Silverage]

They're still not producing bills for me automatically and every month I have to chase them up to produce one manually. I get charged for gas and electricity on the 25th of each month, but no bill ever appears.

[Philvrs]

I think their billing systems are too complicated for them.
Mine seemed to get sorted out last year and i started to get regular monthly bills again after not having any for over a year.
Recently changed from Go to tracker for my electric and it appears to have broken it again.
I’ve also tried the octo-aid app, a nice way to present the data they can get from octopus, it has also highlighted from just my account number and API data that octopus seems to still think im on Go, so i think thats part of the no billing problem.
Thankfully thats their problem, as im back in credit again due to no bill, i can reduce my direct debit a bit

[Silverage]

Philvrs said:

I think their billing systems are too complicated for them.
Mine seemed to get sorted out last year and i started to get regular monthly bills again after not having any for over a year.
Recently changed from Go to tracker for my electric and it appears to have broken it again.
I’ve also tried the octo-aid app, a nice way to present the data they can get from octopus, it has also highlighted from just my account number and API data that octopus seems to still think im on Go, so i think thats part of the no billing problem.
Thankfully thats their problem, as im back in credit again due to no bill, i can reduce my direct debit a bit

My mini-rant above reminded me to get on to them (again) about this, and to be fair they replied with the bill in just a few minutes. I asked them why this kept on happening and I'm not sure their explanation fills me with hope that I won't be back here again next month:

"It appears as though the bill was held and needed double-checking before it could be sent off."

[Zoon]

I've switched to Intelligent Octopus from Go and the homepage says they need to book me in for a meter swap?
Has anyone else had this?

[Mark-ri571]

Zoon said:

I've switched to Intelligent Octopus from Go and the homepage says they need to book me in for a meter swap?
Has anyone else had this?

Yes I had the same. I e mailed them and said my meter was less than a year old and works perfectly with Go. They agreed but I am still waiting. Latest e mail today:

Thanks for getting back in touch. It should be absolutely fine with Intelligent as well, probably just a technical glitch. I am just waiting to hear from the smart tariff team regarding this.
Many thanks
Olivia

[Greshamst]

I’m surprised there have t been anymore savings sessions. Especially with the recent weather.

I think I read they fired up additional coal stations last week, but still nothing.

Maybe they’ve got all the data they need now.

[Mikey G]

Greshamst said:

I’m surprised there have t been anymore savings sessions. Especially with the recent weather.

I think I read they fired up additional coal stations last week, but still nothing.

Maybe they’ve got all the data they need now.

I think 12 sessions were going to happen so one more I think. Maybe they wanted to gather data for a normal cold day and stress test the grid?

[heisthegaffer]

I may have mentioned previously that we had a elec smart meter fitted. In September, never worked but had them back in Feb to rectify and install smart gas meter.

Neither of them are working. In the past I've been told it takes a few weeks to connect but I just don't believe this. Installer suggested that the electric meter should. Work almost immediately.

[Evanivitch]

heisthegaffer said:

I may have mentioned previously that we had a elec smart meter fitted. In September, never worked but had them back in Feb to rectify and install smart gas meter.

Neither of them are working. In the past I've been told it takes a few weeks to connect but I just don't believe this. Installer suggested that the electric meter should. Work almost immediately.

Some parts of the country have issues with signal for the smart meters and sometimes it's a more local issue. Worth contacting octopus to see if any data has been received and if you're account is properly setup.