Octopus or Ovo EV charging

[BarryH]

I'm not sure if pricing is per area???. So for our area my two options appear to be:
Octopus EV - which will charge us about 7p/8p more per kwh during the day, than we are currently paying but only 10p per kwh for 6 hours at night. I am not good at scheduling things so not sure I'd be great at using the dishwasher/washing machine timer and we don't have an immersion heater.
Ovo - which is the same rate as we are currently paying, my understanding is that I can charge anytime if I add the EV upgrade on we have an Indra charger which I believe can be linked.
When I look on both websites there are no other tariffs available to us
Neither of the options have an exit fee.
Also another quick question as new to all this car charging stuff, is it best to charge the car each day or just a couple of times a week, and do I charge to 80% or 100% we have aa long range MG zs.

Thankyou for all your comments so far.

Thanks you made me check and I'd actually quoted the Electricity standing charge in error.

Every cloud though as I logged in to check I was offered to spin the "Wheel of Fortune" and one a £1 credit on my bill so thanks @Babylon

Here are my rates on Go

And my typical useage (16.40 kWh) on a non-EV Charging day. Notice there is only a small amount of power from the Grid around tea time when use exceeds the 3.8 kW output of the FoxESS Inverter.

On an EV Charging day it looks typically like this:-

 

[BarryH]

Yes, this is always the problem with battery storage: do the savings justify the outlay?

Let's say it is £7.5k for 10kWh storage installed (probably more), so that's £125/month over 5 years.

Will you save that much?
Will pay back actually be 10 years?
Will cheap off peak still exist then?
Will the battery last that long?
What return could you get on £7.5k invested for the same period?

A 2.5/2.6 kWh battery is under a grand I have 4 plus couple of hundred for the BMS and Isolators. If you add-on that to your PV installation it's VAT free. Standalone you of course also need to factor in the Hybrid Inverter and you could pay £7.5k. But I'm saving 10 kWh a-day into my batteries at 12p/kWh rather than using grid power in the day at 44p/kWh so saving £3.20 a day x365 = £1168.00 which would be payback in 6.4 years.

However, in my case since I have 4.8 kWp PV for half the year at least I'll be saving not 32p but 44p per kWh as I won't need to charge them from the Grid overnight and during the day having batteries smooths out the peaks and troughs of power from the Solar PV I'd have had with Solar PV alone so eliminating daytime power consumption from the grid. I've modelled the payback using the past 121 months Smart meter data and even if tariffs don't go up in the next 5 years I would break even in well under 4 years since I had the batteries commissioned as part of the PV project and it added about £4,400 to the bill for 10 kWh storage since the PV Inverter was a Hybrid at very little cost over a simple PV Inverter.

 

[tsedge]

A 2.5/2.6 kWh battery is under a grand I have 4 plus couple of hundred for the BMS and Isolators. If you add-on that to your PV installation it's VAT free. Standalone you of course also need to factor in the Hybrid Inverter and you could pay £7.5k. But I'm saving 10 kWh a-day into my batteries at 12p/kWh rather than using grid power in the day at 44p/kWh so saving £3.20 a day x365 = £1168.00 which would be payback in 6.4 years.

However, in my case since I have 4.8 kWp PV for half the year at least I'll be saving not 32p but 44p per kWh as I won't need to charge them from the Grid overnight and during the day having batteries smooths out the peaks and troughs of power from the Solar PV I'd have had with Solar PV alone so eliminating daytime power consumption from the grid. I've modelled the payback using the past 121 months Smart meter data and even if tariffs don't go up in the next 5 years I would break even in well under 4 years since I had the batteries commissioned as part of the PV project and it added about £4,400 to the bill for 10 kWh storage since the PV Inverter was a Hybrid at very little cost over a simple PV Inverter.

Thanks for sharing the details Barry, very helpful. It sort of confirms what I said, that with solar a battery makes sense but alone the financials are much harder (assuming that this is the motivation for getting one).

 

[smokie]

Yes, interesting, thanks. There are still some assumptions there though - electricity is likely to go down later this year, not up, and maybe by quite a chunk. Batteries have a finite life (number of cycles) so they may have paid for themselves within x time but not have much life left, I don't know.

I am kicking myself a little as I had to have an inverter swap in 2020 and priced up a hybrid and batteries but at the time even using man maths it was difficult to justify the extra cost, and I happened not have the cash lying about at the time. Still, the panels payment per kWh is going up to 68p + deemed export around 5p in April so mustn't grumble

 

[Cocijo]

It seems silly regarding paying and installing home battery storage, when you have at a 60kwh battery sat on your drive.
Of course in most cases you can’t use your car battery pack for your home.
The future is that all EV’s become an integral part of your home storage solution when needed.

 

[BarryH]

Yes, interesting, thanks. There are still some assumptions there though - electricity is likely to go down later this year, not up, and maybe by quite a chunk. Batteries have a finite life (number of cycles) so they may have paid for themselves within x time but not have much life left, I don't know.

I am kicking myself a little as I had to have an inverter swap in 2020 and priced up a hybrid and batteries but at the time even using man maths it was difficult to justify the extra cost, and I happened not have the cash lying about at the time. Still, the panels payment per kWh is going up to 68p + deemed export around 5p in April so mustn't grumble

You're on FIT from about 10 years ago I therefore suspect. I Had Fit from 2011 in my previous house which I had to leave behind. Mitigating that this time by splitting my investment between PV which is fixed and Battery which is relocatable should I wish to remove it when and if I move in the next 10 years.

 

[tsedge]

It seems silly regarding paying and installing home battery storage, when you have at a 60kwh battery sat on your drive.
Of course in most cases you can’t use your car battery pack for your home.
The future is that all EV’s become an integral part of your home storage solution when needed.

But will that ever happen? I fear the difficulty getting V2G approved against all the regulatory/standards hurdles, vested energy interests and general bureaucracy mean that it won't ever happen (in the UK).

 

[BarryH]

It seems silly regarding paying and installing home battery storage, when you have at a 60kwh battery sat on your drive.
Of course in most cases you can’t use your car battery pack for your home.
The future is that all EV’s become an integral part of your home storage solution when needed.

Yeah, that's true if you leave the car there all day when the sun beats down on your Roof Top PV and you can operate your car as V2H which few can. MG's V2L does make a viable V2H solution as it has to be either in a charging or discharging session. V2H floats the car in a mode which switches back and forth. In addition EV onboard chargers aren't designed to charge efficiently at below something like 1.4 kW which is why home charge points and controllers such as Zappie don't charge by default unless your surplus to the grid is in excess of that figure. Yes, I know it can be overridden but the efficiency of the car's charging circuits isn't very good.

By contrast, a home battery inverter/charger can nimbly toggle between charging and discharging in milliseconds and can charge your batteries when there are just a few watts available essentially, smoothing out the power from your solar and powering your house when insufficient sunlight to do so.

 

[sandra54]

I'm not sure if pricing is per area???. So for our area my two options appear to be:
Octopus EV - which will charge us about 7p/8p more per kwh during the day, than we are currently paying but only 10p per kwh for 6 hours at night. I am not good at scheduling things so not sure I'd be great at using the dishwasher/washing machine timer and we don't have an immersion heater.
Ovo - which is the same rate as we are currently paying, my understanding is that I can charge anytime if I add the EV upgrade on we have an Indra charger which I believe can be linked.
When I look on both websites there are no other tariffs available to us
Neither of the options have an exit fee.
Also another quick question as new to all this car charging stuff, is it best to charge the car each day or just a couple of times a week, and do I charge to 80% or 100% we have aa long range MG zs.

Thankyou for all your comments so far.

Pricing is definitely according to area. I’ve just got an EV but neither the car ( MG ). Nor charger( Rolec ) are supported by Octopus so could only get 4 hours at 12p! I decided to go with Octopus Agile. It doesn’t give very cheap rates but varies throughout the day so I charge when it’s at its lowest, and I use as little energy as possible between 4-7 . Suits my lifestyle but probably not families

 

[Kayged]

I'm not sure if pricing is per area???. So for our area my two options appear to be:
Octopus EV - which will charge us about 7p/8p more per kwh during the day, than we are currently paying but only 10p per kwh for 6 hours at night. I am not good at scheduling things so not sure I'd be great at using the dishwasher/washing machine timer and we don't have an immersion heater.
Ovo - which is the same rate as we are currently paying, my understanding is that I can charge anytime if I add the EV upgrade on we have an Indra charger which I believe can be linked.
When I look on both websites there are no other tariffs available to us
Neither of the options have an exit fee.
Also another quick question as new to all this car charging stuff, is it best to charge the car each day or just a couple of times a week, and do I charge to 80% or 100% we have aa long range MG zs.

Thankyou for all your comments so far.

Every time I have tried to get on an EV tariff I get the same answer "existing customers only" My daughter referred me to Octopus and all I get from them is they are not taking on customers in my area at the moment but sign up for an email in case we start again.

 

[Cocijo]

Every time I have tried to get on an EV tariff I get the same answer "existing customers only" My daughter referred me to Octopus and all I get from them is they are not taking on customers in my area at the moment but sign up for an email in case we start again.

Have you tried phoning them?

 

[am84]

Every time I have tried to get on an EV tariff I get the same answer "existing customers only" My daughter referred me to Octopus and all I get from them is they are not taking on customers in my area at the moment but sign up for an email in case we start again.

I’ve recently joined OVo and on their anytime tariff . 10p to charge car anytime of the day.

 

[BarryH]

Pricing is definitely according to area. I’ve just got an EV but neither the car ( MG ). Nor charger( Rolec ) are supported by Octopus so could only get 4 hours at 12p! I decided to go with Octopus Agile. It doesn’t give very cheap rates but varies throughout the day so I charge when it’s at its lowest, and I use as little energy as p

Pricing is definitely according to area. I’ve just got an EV but neither the car ( MG ). Nor charger( Rolec ) are supported by Octopus so could only get 4 hours at 12p! I decided to go with Octopus Agile. It doesn’t give very cheap rates but varies throughout the day so I charge when it’s at its lowest, and I use as little energy as possible between 4-7 . Suits my lifestyle but probably not families

Pricing is definitely according to area. I’ve just got an EV but neither the car ( MG ). Nor charger( Rolec ) are supported by Octopus so could only get 4 hours at 12p! I decided to go with Octopus Agile. It doesn’t give very cheap rates but varies throughout the day so I charge when it’s at its lowest, and I use as little energy as possible between 4-7 . Suits my lifestyle but probably not families

I had a PodPoint installed as part of the original MG ZS deal. I afterwards discovered that neither the PodPoint nor the car had timed or delayed charging something which both the dealer and MG themselves had overlooked. I followed the example of someone on the SpeakEV forum and wired in a WiFi Timer into the PodPoint and I've been using Octopus Go ever since as a timed charge. Subsequently, PodPoint has added a scheduling feature to the PodPoint App and it works but isn't as flexible as the home brew solution I have. I could with a little bit of effort make my WiFi switch link into Octopus Agil but since I also schedule a very significant amount of my electricity consumption into that 4-hour window Go is by far the better option for me.