Energy Suppliers

[BigBoy]

.. maybe - the hugo app wants a credit card imprint to validate your address so that they can get your data(not ideal), but it looks like their game is recommending supplier swaps (perhaps less relevant now), moreover I'm not sure they will give you your data in a raw csv/excel format.

Hugs app is third party, and will only give data from daily updates not the concurrent data the CAD will provide. The data is in CSV.......

-----------------------------

(on a different topic) - Question to other luddites on dumb meters
I submit readings about every 6 months, their estimates are currently running 300 units too much - with April price rises in mind, it seems economic to
submit a reading nearly matching their estimates(or even greater), so they consider those units have been used at the current lower priced rates, and subsequently send in reduced values that agree with the meter (eg. I was on holiday for April, so extra low usage)

It's dream over the course of the year it will work it's self out, short term win maybe but long term you will end up paying for it no matter what.

 

[Richie]

So I've had the "You're ready to renew" email this morning... Let have a look at before and after. Bear in mind that I have a pretty efficient home:

• Current Tariff (Eon)
  • Elec Unit: 17.9p
  • Daily Charge: 7.35p
  • Gas Unit: 3.45p
  • Daily Charge:.7.35p

• New Tariff (Eon)
  • Elec Unit: 27.84p
  • Daily Charge: 49.65p
  • Gas Unit: 7.34p
  • Daily Charge:.27.22p

So I will go from £33/month to £71/month or more than doubled. This may not seem like a lot in monetary terms to some on here but it's a 215% increase.

The standing charge increase of 525% is particularly galling.... Robbing bar stewards come to mind...

 

[Mickie]

Nothing has changed regarding the supply of gas and electric, I cant believe they can get away with the standing charges.

 

[arknor]

Nothing has changed regarding the supply of gas and electric, I cant believe they can get away with the standing charges.

The less energy you use the higher your standing charge it seems

I'm on a prepayment meter though, I just contacted support saying I want moving to a credit meter, if they don't let me I will start asking competitors if they would let me have a credit meter if I switched.

never had debt, never needed to use the emergency credit, sure don't have a bad credit rating from bills, but never built up credit either.

 

[SDK^]

Nothing has changed regarding the supply of gas and electric, I cant believe they can get away with the standing charges.

The SC for electricity is increasing to cover the cost (£1.8bn) of moving the people with suppliers who went bust, to the Supplier of Last Resort. It’s loaded onto electricity because not everyone has gas.

 

[SDK^]

So I've had the "You're ready to renew" email this morning... Let have a look at before and after. Bear in mind that I have a pretty efficient home:

• Current Tariff (Eon)
  • Elec Unit: 17.9p
  • Daily Charge: 7.35p
  • Gas Unit: 3.45p
  • Daily Charge:.7.35p

• New Tariff (Eon)
  • Elec Unit: 27.84p
  • Daily Charge: 49.65p
  • Gas Unit: 7.34p
  • Daily Charge:.27.22p

So I will go from £33/month to £71/month or more than doubled. This may not seem like a lot in monetary terms to some on here but it's a 215% increase.

The standing charge increase of 525% is particularly galling.... Robbing bar stewards come to mind...

Your current tarif was cheaper than average, so the jump to the latest prices was always going to be significant.
At least you rode the cheaper wave for longer than most.

 

[Richie]

The SC for electricity is increasing to cover the cost (£1.8bn) of moving the people with suppliers who went bust, to the Supplier of Last Resort. It’s loaded onto electricity because not everyone has gas.

So if the fund value is known and the amount of domestic electricity accounts are known, then the end date of the bailout should be known... Right?

If that's known, then this is the date when Standing Charges drop significantly as the energy companies no longer need that extra money... I mean, they won't keep the SC high just because people will have been used to paying it... Right?

/Sarcasm

 

[SDK^]

So if the fund value is known and the amount of domestic electricity accounts are known, then the end date of the bailout should be known... Right?

If that's known, then this is the date when Standing Charges drop significantly as the energy companies no longer need that extra money... I mean, they won't keep the SC high just because people will have been used to paying it... Right?

/Sarcasm

The sector is heavily regulated by Ofgem, so if they are doing their job correctly then……

 

[theone8181]

The sector is heavily regulated by Ofgem, so if they are doing their job correctly then……

That fills me full of confidence then.

 

[jpaul]

The SC for electricity is increasing to cover the cost (£1.8bn) of moving the people with suppliers who went bust, to the Supplier of Last Resort. It’s loaded onto electricity because not everyone has gas.

the ofgen documents specify minimum charge if there is 0 consumption, or the 12K units avg. consumption - vendors could have offered a tiered weekly/daily unit charge so that low users payed the same net rate per unit as high users - Martin Lewis seems complicit in propagating this misinformation.

( if you heard his comment today about people used to worry about whether to get a haircut or a take-away , but now worry about food/heating - he lives in cuckoo land. )

 

[Sinbad2000]

Just a little FYI as I'm sure some of you would like to know a bit more about the data and data access as no API is ever going to be available directly from the DCC regarding Smart Meter data.

Ive been working on a project at work (EDF Energy) to do with access to data, so far the best live solution we have found is via Chameleon Consumer Access Device (Info Here). Other CAD products are available but the Chameleon is the best we have found, unfortunately I don't have a price for it.

The basics are, the CAD gets the data from your smart meter, connects to YOUR WiFi and uploads the data to the Chameleon cloud in an accessible format for the end user/property owner. The CAD can be purchased by the user (home owner) and added to the smart network as its an allowed device, then giving you live data access and logging from when the meter was first installed to present day (live data as in up to the last 1min).

Some interesting reading from BEAMA
https://www.beama.org.uk/static/uploaded/3979baf2-ebd9-45cf-bd988ac6b1c68211.pdf

Interesting!
I'd consider one of these for integration into my HomeAssistant setup...

 

[rG-tom]

So I will go from £33/month to £71/month or more than doubled. This may not seem like a lot in monetary terms to some on here but it's a 215% increase.

your numbers are wrong, that's a 115% not 215% increase. 215% would be £~104pcm....

 

[Richie]

DOH! so it is

Still a little over double is painful. The new Standing Charge went up 5¼ times which doesn't help.

Monthly Units up £22 (average over year)
Monthly SC up £19

 

[Demon]

Just switching electricity from Bulb (EV Tarriff) to Octopus Go.

It seems too good to be true, but Octopus Go will be fixed for 12 months..

Confirmed over the phone as I started the process,
32p Peak, 7.5p off peak for 12 months on Go. (25p/day standing charge), this is marginally cheaper than Bulb post April 1st and will a lot cheaper post October 1st.

The first CS rep was miserable and tried to stop me switching for stupid reasons..
1. Said Bulb would cancel the switch if in debit for any amount, so refused to go any further until I cleared it (took me 30 seconds online to clear it!), had to phone back (another 30 mins on hold)
2. Said they couldn't quote and continue the switch unless I gave them Bulbs official annual consumption.. They refused for me to just multiple my last monthly elec usage by 12 as apparently I am not allowed to do basic maths myself.. Luckily I found the annual estimate on my account page of Bulb's website, only to find Octopus don't quote you based on their 'Go' tariff, but for their overpriced standard tariff, which is stupid and so expensive (42p/kwh) it's sounded stupid.
3. As normal with Octopus you join on a standard tariff, but they then switch you over to Go when they've 'connected' to your smart meter.. The CS Rep did this weird labouring and reinforced the point 5 times quite threateningly that they cannot and will not say how long I'll be on the standard tariff before allowed to switch to Go. I didn't even ask, I know the process, but it started putting a bait/switch thought in my head.. Is the Go deal good because they just keep you on a stupidly high standard tariff for months?

I eventually had to stop the process and phoned their EV team directly, a much nicer CS Rep who was far more realistic and positive, I got them to confirm the Go rates and that they'd be fixed at the cheaper 32/7.5p rates even though it'll take a couple of weeks to switch which goes past the 1st Apr tariff cap raise, and at least on a recorded call they confirmed this and even checked and saw my previous switching attempt last year and confirmed the switch should be fairly expedient since they've already seen data from my smart meter last time..

 

[SDK^]

Just switching electricity from Bulb (EV Tarriff) to Octopus Go.

It seems too good to be true, but Octopus Go will be fixed for 12 months..

Confirmed over the phone as I started the process,
32p Peak, 7.5p off peak for 12 months on Go. (25p/day standing charge), this is marginally cheaper than Bulb post April 1st and will a lot cheaper post October 1st.

The first CS rep was miserable and tried to stop me switching for stupid reasons..
1. Said Bulb would cancel the switch if in debit for any amount, so refused to go any further until I cleared it (took me 30 seconds online to clear it!), had to phone back (another 30 mins on hold)
2. Said they couldn't quote and continue the switch unless I gave them Bulbs official annual consumption.. They refused for me to just multiple my last monthly elec usage by 12 as apparently I am not allowed to do basic maths myself.. Luckily I found the annual estimate on my account page of Bulb's website, only to find Octopus don't quote you based on their 'Go' tariff, but for their overpriced standard tariff, which is stupid and so expensive (42p/kwh) it's sounded stupid.
3. As normal with Octopus you join on a standard tariff, but they then switch you over to Go when they've 'connected' to your smart meter.. The CS Rep did this weird labouring and reinforced the point 5 times quite threateningly that they cannot and will not say how long I'll be on the standard tariff before allowed to switch to Go. I didn't even ask, I know the process, but it started putting a bait/switch thought in my head.. Is the Go deal good because they just keep you on a stupidly high standard tariff for months?

I eventually had to stop the process and phoned their EV team directly, a much nicer CS Rep who was far more realistic and positive, I got them to confirm the Go rates and that they'd be fixed at the cheaper 32/7.5p rates even though it'll take a couple of weeks to switch which goes past the 1st Apr tariff cap raise, and at least on a recorded call they confirmed this and even checked and saw my previous switching attempt last year and confirmed the switch should be fairly expedient since they've already seen data from my smart meter last time..

Pretty much the process I went through end of Feb.
The questions they ask are easy to answer with the energy bill and usage in front of you.

I went live on 14 March and haven’t switched to the off peak rate yet. Just means I’m paying a bit more charging my car for a couple of weeks. I can see my meter is sending them the required 30min data through their customer website energy data download.

I’m getting solar and battery storage installed, so long term it’s worth it for the off peak rate.

 

[chrcoluk]

Smart meter is in, but need to wait two weeks apparently before it starts working.

Is there a chance it will be quicker?

 

[Azza]

Octopus want to increase our DD from £96 to £262.28 a month despite the fact their own annual estimates come in at £137.50 per month.

I'll be changing to a variable direct debit rather than fixed.

 

[Gav_r26]

Smart meter is in, but need to wait two weeks apparently before it starts working.

Is there a chance it will be quicker?

There's a high chance it just won't work at all based on my experience

 

[chrcoluk]

There's a high chance it just won't work at all based on my experience

Wouldnt surprise me, it doesnt fill with confidence that its not immediately giving me information.

 

[Journey]

Wouldnt surprise me, it doesnt fill with confidence that its not immediately giving me information.

Because it isn't immediate, there is a process that needs to be followed. It's not like putting a new SIM card in a phone, and you are connected to your new network.