Energy Prices (Strictly NO referrals!)

[delta0]

Started a switch from British Gas to Octopus on Saturday, using a £50 referral link from a friend. Got a call from BG this morning offering me £75 to stay. Declined because they're an awful company and have regularly made billing and meter reading errors since I was forced over to them, but it was interesting that suppliers are suddenly feeling competitive again despite the caps.

Octopus have been a delight to deal with compared to BG. When I moved house I had to take over the account for the property and it was BG. They wouldn’t even honour the price cap and couldn’t explain why their unit price was above it. As I had an EV coming soon anyway it didn’t matter as I was switching to Octopus. They have been perfect.

 

[cheesyboy]

Most of the offshore wind farms are signed up to Contract for Difference (CfD) contracts - which means when the price goes high (over their agreed contract 'strike' price), the difference is paid back, via a Government scheme.
This doesn't directly benefit home consumers, but is effectively a windfall tax going back to the Government.

CFD excess comes back to the energy retail companies, reducing their overheads.

In normal times, it's the energy retailers who fund CFDs.

 

[Psycho Ned]

i wonder if the "big 6" are starting to worry a bit with the customers octopus are stealing... i just hope they do not over stretch. am sure they wont, they seem a well run outfit and generate a lot of their own power which am sure makes them a good profit to soften any other blows.

Was thinking this the other day they're surely in the 'big 7' by now? They're like the only energy provider you ever hear of anyone changing too these days and have a massive advertising presence (Been in London for the weekend and their adverts are everywhere on the tube!).

Absorbing like 2 million Bulb & Avro customers must have put them up there as well. Certainly not a plucky startup anymore anyway!

 

[Curlyriff]

Was thinking this the other day they're surely in the 'big 7' by now? They're like the only energy provider you ever hear of anyone changing too these days and have a massive advertising presence (Been in London for the weekend and their adverts are everywhere on the tube!).

Absorbing like 2 million Bulb & Avro customers must have put them up there as well. Certainly not a plucky startup anymore anyway!

They are top 4, which considering they are only about 7yrs old as a company is pretty mad how quickly they have become a staple in energy market and often leading in tech and solutions.

Hopefully this huge influx they don't faulted though. That is a huge % of customers to increase by in such a short period.

 

[jpaul]

Octopus still made a loss 2022, like shell ... so these companies need some money to sustain good service, solicited referrals .... (kraken aside)

The courts are still looking into whether govt giving them Bulb was an above the board life-line, or lobbying shennanigin.

e: their separate car leasing business maybe a master stroke in add-on sales

 

[Curlyriff]

Octopus still made a loss 2022, like shell ... so these companies need some money to sustain good service, solicited referrals .... (kraken aside)

The courts are still looking into whether govt giving them Bulb was an above the board life-line, or lobbying shennanigin.

e: their separate car leasing business maybe a master stroke in add-on sales

They are owned by a much larger company and are a world wide. It has some out of date elements on here but gives a much broader view that they will be okay financially.

It operates in 13 countries with 23 million+ customers on the energy side though. Was kore just thinking just pure staff count to customers as they basically doubled the customers and certainly don't appear to have doubled employees for it.

Octopus Group - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[413x]

Yep. I think a few of us said a while ago.. Octopus must be on way to swallow up the others.

When my fix ends I can't see going to anyone else but octopus. Scottish Power are so far behind in technology. I dont even think they offer the savings hours thing

 

[cainer]

Guys shall i put in a meter reading as my cheap fix ends today?

I've been with EDF for years on monthly DD and was paying £75* a month, my term with them is mid January to mid January with a review half way through the year,
i put my reading in when requested in January and they upped my monthly bill to £127 which i'm fine with...
so shall i put in a reading today or won't it make a difference? would they even accept a reading as i put one in just 5/6 weeks ago?

*it should have been around £60 as i got £194 back at the end of last term

 

[Kill_Phil]

Guys shall i put in a meter reading as my cheap fix ends today?

I've been with EDF for years on monthly DD and was paying £75* a month, my term with them is mid January to mid January with a review half way through the year,
i put my reading in when requested in January and they upped my monthly bill to £127 which i'm fine with...
so shall i put in a reading today or won't it make a difference? would they even accept a reading as i put one in just 5/6 weeks ago?

*it should have been around £60 as i got £194 back at the end of last term

Yes you should unless you are on a smart meter?

 

[cainer]

Yes you should unless you are on a smart meter?

No smart meter

 

[Kill_Phil]

No smart meter

So yeah get reading submitted and take pics just to be on the safe side.

Then lube up for the prices you're going to be paying. I'm guessing you have your annual usage now to hand? You can use this to calculate what your likely payments will be moving forwards

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

No smart meter

Put in reading, take photo.
If they dispute for some reason you have proof

 

[cainer]

Then lube up for the prices you're going to be paying

This is the thing, i'm happy with them upping it from ~£60 to £127 per month which they've done,
but i don't really want to see my bill go above that (which might happen if i put a reading in??) as it doesn't take into account the economising i'll be doing going forward,
i did think about switching to paying the full bill every 3 months but i'd prefer to keep the payments the same every month

 

[Captain Chaos]

This is the thing, i'm happy with them upping it from ~£60 to £127 per month which they've done,
but i don't really want to see my bill go above that (which might happen if i put a reading in??) as it doesn't take into account the economising i'll be doing going forward,
i did think about switching to paying the full bill every 3 months but i'd prefer to keep the payments the same every month

Easiest way will be to figure out your annual gas and electricity average consumption figures that you have been using up to now. You will then be able to figure out a yearly figure based on your use. Don't forget to include the daily standing charge on both of them also.

As others have said I would personally submit a reading and take a photo as proof.

 

[jpaul]

They are owned by a much larger company and are a world wide. It has some out of date elements on here but gives a much broader view that they will be okay financially.

hmmh so is shell ? with the large windfarms&hydrogen arms.
it's going to become hard to differentiate your company, with transparency of wholesale rates, and customer eyes now on profits,
hadn't appreciated octopus had been so open about their benevolence

Octopus Energy said it has decided against making its first ever annual profit after ploughing £150m into attempting to keep customers’ gas and electricity bills down.
The energy supplier said it would have made a slim annual profit of £9m but instead decided to invest in protecting customers from the worst of the energy price increases caused by a sharp rise in wholesale gas costs linked to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The decision resulted in a £141m operating loss for the last financial year, to the end of April 2022.
The Octopus head of finance, Stuart Jackson, said executives had made a “conscious decision” to “shield customers from the significant rise in wholesale costs”.

It may be morally unjustifiable, but it is possible to see why a company such as Shell would prefer to reap the enormous profits of the energy crisis without getting involved in the messy business of dealing with the people who actually use that energy. Since Shell entered the supplier market back in 2017 (with the $200m purchase of First Utility), its domestic energy arm has reportedly made pre-tax losses totalling at least £300m. Last year, Shell spent £1.2bn in the form of cash and loans to help its retail arm meet its liabilities.
“Shell’s retail business is too big to be irrelevant but too small to invest in making it good,” pointed out the energy insider. Why bother with all of that when it’s making record profits from its upstream arm?

 

[Jokester]

Pretty sure Shell have said they want to pull out of the market as well now.

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

Wasn't really sure where to post this and as we have picked up on solar and wind a bit in here worth dropping in here for the next time we get one of the regressives who is anti green progress

Study into the number of bird deaths caused by offshore turbines.
After two years and 10,000 birds they couldnt find one

I guess they will need to make up some more excuses to avoid progress now

Of birds and boats: Offshore wind developers step up efforts to curb environmental impacts

New research projects aim to minimise disruption to seabirds and decarbonise operations vessels

www.businessgreen.com

 

[bigmike20vt]

a similar test was done for onshore (no link sorry it was a while back i was looking at it) and some deaths were recorded.. it was only a handful however... certainly far less than the number which fly into the big glass fronted building i work in that no one complains about (a few years back an unfortunate mallard crashed into it then inconventiently landed on my lunch table sitting outside pooh went everywhere......... surprisingly despite being hugely stunned - so much so i was able to pick the bird up) the duck survived (it was one of our residents) a lot are not so fortunate..

 

[Freakbro]

Wow, Octopus are already immeasurably better than EDF even though they have messed up our transfer!

Phoned 3 times today, all answered quickly (40 mins wait time with EDF) - explained the transfer application we recently did had a postponed date of the 21st March (since we are currently on a fixed tariff until then) which she confirmed all the notes on our account said the same, but for some reason the transfer went through immediately on the 23rd Feb

She asked was the delay requested because we were on a fixed tariff as that would cost us a lot more for the next month, I said yes, and straight away she said that I just need to confirm the unit rate we are currently on and they after the 21st Mar they will work out how much we should have paid this coming month and credit us the difference back!

Ok, they messed up the transfer, but that's the sort of customer service that seems so rare nowadays.

 

[fez]

Phoned 3 times today, all answered quickly (40 mins wait time with EDF)

Yeah, I had issues moving onto their tracker and called them 3 times and each time they picked up in seconds. Actually had someone who knew what they were doing as well. I'm sure like all businesses they will move to a "**** the customer if we can make a few quid extra" but for now they are very good.