Octopus energy tariffs

[rotorhead]

Sorry NOT an Octopus Energy posting.

I posted earlier about my 7kWh charger taking 6 Hours to charge from 18% to 100% (316 Miles).

E-on Next(Sainsbury's Energy) are charging me 21.8p/kWh Inc VAT, so that makes it about £9.20.

I hope my calculations are correct, 6 x 7 x £0.218 = £9.156.

I haven't included the Standing charge of 40.52p/Day, as I pay that willy nilly, with or without charging.

I know I won't get the full 316 miles range, but, it's far cheaper that my Peugeot 308 1.6Hdi.

For a £99 fill up, I would probably get 550 Miles.

 

[Gomev]

Can anyone help me sort out if I need to try to get on Octopus?

I am with Scottish Power fixed until March 2023.

I feel that I might be better off on Octopus. But I am not very good ( useless ) to be honest ) with figures.

I love the car, but as with most would like to save a few bob if possible.

I do a longish journey every couple of weeks to my motor racing events average 200 mile round trip. Other than that it’s shopping 5 mile round trip.
Most of the figures that are quoted on here don’t make any sense to me.

I know that what I am asking is a big ask but you are a friendly lot so I’m hopeful of getting a reply

@Vipar and anyone else that's interested. As requested I have tried to work some figures and have put them in a new thread, see here

Renamed - the immersion heater thread (was about about cost of SVR vs Go)

Following on from another thread where @Vipar wasn't sure whether it would be worthwhile switching to Go from the Standard Variable rate, I have created a simple spreadsheet to show the break even point between the 2 tariffs. I have kept it very simple, taking no account of standing charge as...

www.mgevs.com

 

[siteguru]

FWIW the SVR tariff with EDF is 33.76p per unit plus 50.67p per day standing charge.

 

[tsedge]

What confuses me is that my standing charge is almost doubling from 25p to 49.11p. How can that be? Looks like a sneaky way to raise extra revenue.

Their Flexible tariff works out to approx 34p.

Standing charges were raised back in April to reflect the costs of bailing out suppliers that went bust and distributed differently around the country to reflect the higher costs of transmission in some areas.

This meant they increased everywhere and doubled for some (including me in the South West). This was an Ofgem decision, not Octopus and not a popular one, but the rationale is that people who live in expensive to service and maintain areas should pay more.

If you are only seeing this change now it is probably because you have come off a fixed rate or other deal agreed before that change.

 

[tsedge]

When the (average household) “cap-on-unit-price-and-standing-charge” increased from £1,971 to £2,500, which is a 26.8% “typical usage” increase, the standing charges were not increased much or at all and because they are part of the cap
calculation this means that unit rates actually increased well above 30%, albeit offset by the £66/£67 rebate for six months.

This is why many people are seeing bigger increases than they expected for October, especially as “typical usage” is a median (middle value), not the most common (modal) or arguably more useful mean average.

The off-peak reduced tariffs are also capped to average to a similar amount, which is where the 12p/40p comes from, again presuming a typical mix that is not representative of many people’s usage.

The whole system is a confusing mess that needs to be simplified.

 

[Lovemyev]

He is a an interesting video covering the Octopus rate rises and the affects on EV ownership.
It covers some other interesting items as well.

 

[siteguru]

FWIW, the MG4 (in my opinion) is akin to a Vauxhall Astra in size, class etc. To get a petrol automatic Astra you'll pay similar money as an MG4 SE SR costs, thus there's not really any "EV premium". This means that you can essentially make a direct comparison of "fuel" cost in pence per mile.

For me, even if I only get 160 miles range from 50 kWh battery (3.2 mpkWh) charged at 34p per unit, that equates to 10.6p per mile ... I doubt an equivalent Astra using unleaded E10 petrol would achieve anywhere near that.

 

[NickHeynes]

Wellin another spectacular u turn the govt has announced that the energy cap freeze will end in April rather than in 2 yrs .
Thanks a bunch guys!

 

[jackois]

A couple of points with respect to the video content.

Firstly, EV charging cost. Having just done a run north to Leeds and back, using Bonnett to charge at 44p a Kw, the whole trip was completed for less than half of the cost of my previous car. This was a Polo, 2018 1.0 Tsi, which I considered quite frugal. Couple that with Octopus Go, fixed at 7.5p for the charging period, running the 5LR is still money saving. I didn't buy to save on fuel costs but every little helps.

Second point, EV destination charging. Whilst the ongoing roll-out of larger and larger charging stations is fine and to be lauded, something should be done with respect to the number of chargers that seem to have been given up on by operators. These seem to be 'legacy' chargers, I suspect, installed in conjunction with Local Authourities and pretty much without maintenance. I've tried charging at one particular charger that is 'advertised' as working fine, but generally, contactless isn't working, Bonnet won't connect and so on. I've reported it on numerous occasions but no-one is bothered.

 

[Gomev]

Wellin another spectacular u turn the govt has announced that the energy cap freeze will end in April rather than in 2 yrs .
Thanks a bunch guys!

In it's current form. It will be re-evaluated, the same as the Labour party said they would only do it for 6 months.

 

[Ian Key]

One thing to bear in mind especially if doing short journeys. An EV will be operating at its best from the off, a petrol or diesel takes several miles/minutes before it's operating at its most efficient.

 

[mj224]

Now hear this...Wholesale gas prices are cheaper now than when Ukraine was invaded. As electricity prices are based on the gas price, am I naive to expect fuel costs to return to "normal" soon...

Yea, pull the other one...:-(

 

[Hotlush]

View attachment 12011

Now hear this...Wholesale gas prices are cheaper now than when Ukraine was invaded. As electricity prices are based on the gas price, am I naive to expect fuel costs to return to "normal" soon...

Yea, pull the other one...:-(

Problem is they don't buy the gas to generate electricity today, at todays prices.
They'll have placed orders literally years ago saying to buy X amount of gas in Y months.

It'll take a few months for the prices to settle down again and for that to filter through to us.

 

[smokie]

Elsewhere I've read that the Go tariff in its current format is unlikely to exist within the next year, some say 6 months or so. Likely to be superseded by Intelligent Octopus, which puts the control of charging your car at cheaper rates more with Octopus, and likely also does away with the opportunity to use other significant amounts of power at the same cost/time.

 

[jamie07051975]

Elsewhere I've read that the Go tariff in its current format is unlikely to exist within the next year, some say 6 months or so. Likely to be superseded by Intelligent Octopus, which puts the control of charging your car at cheaper rates more with Octopus, and likely also does away with the opportunity to use other significant amounts of power at the same cost/time.

We don't know what's down the road but I don't think they'll do that. They want people to use more off peak power and to do that users will need incentives such as allowing battery storage, they even have batteries on their hub page advertising the fact that's what you can use the cheap rate for.

But like I said, we don't know.

 

[Silver estate]

One thing to bear in mind especially if doing short journeys. An EV will be operating at its best from the off, a petrol or diesel takes several miles/minutes before it's operating at its most efficient.

A diesel on a cold day doing a 5 mile journey may not even get to temperature
I had a transit connect van that in the winter on local roads never got to temperature

 

[smokie]

No, of course we don't. But it would be foolish to ignore the possibility if you were about to go and buy an electric car or battery bank based on a tariff which may have a limited life.

I would add that I'm not trying to scaremonger, that's not my style, and the source isn't a place of just idle chatter, speculation and fake news, it's a closed chat room of (usually) well informed and smart people on it. But for sure we don't know.

Wrt to your comment that "They want people to use more off peak power ", with control of car (and probably battery) charging passing to them, they can charge in exactly the slots they want/need to balance the load over any cheaper period, which wouldn't necessarily be what we currently would call off-peak, and this can vary dynamically and, to us, unpredictably.

 

[jamie07051975]

No, of course we don't. But it would be foolish to ignore the possibility if you were about to go and buy an electric car or battery bank based on a tariff which may have a limited life.

I would add that I'm not trying to scaremonger, that's not my style, and the source isn't a place of just idle chatter, speculation and fake news, it's a closed chat room of (usually) well informed and smart people on it. But for sure we don't know.

Wrt to your comment that "They want people to use more off peak power ", with control of car (and probably battery) charging passing to them, they can charge in exactly the slots they want/need to balance the load over any cheaper period, which wouldn't necessarily be what we currently would call off-peak, and this can vary dynamically and, to us, unpredictably.

Makes complete sense and I agree.

I've managed to get a good deal on a solus 6kWh hybrid inverter plus 2xPylontech US5000. ROI under two years.

Hopefully it will be worth it!

 

[tsedge]

My current car, a petrol Karoq, costs about £80 to fill from empty and will do maybe 350-400 miles. Something like 22p/mile.

My MG4 LR on the 34p current cap will cost £20 for 250ish miles, or 8p a mile. So even if there were no off peak tariffs it is much better. With Octopus Go at 12p off peak, will cost 3p a mile.

So, cheap off peak rates are great but not the end of the world if they go.

 

[Gomev]

No, of course we don't. But it would be foolish to ignore the possibility if you were about to go and buy an electric car or battery bank based on a tariff which may have a limited life.

...

Trouble is there are many possibilities, can we take them all into account? Is there any more real indication that it will stop than there is that it will stay. If it changes it changes, but change doesn't mean stop.
Should I delay buying in case that next model comes out that might be cheaper and have a bigger range, etc. etc.

Be aware but make decisions based on currently known information otherwise you will never do anything.