Just Joined the Intelligent Octopus Tariff

[nowty]

Been having a bit of a dilemma with my gas tariff which is currently with British Gas, having been moved over because my older supplier went bust. BG are moving me to the standard variable rate at the end of this month but I wanted to move it to Octopus for simplicity, especially with the ripple wind turbine rebates.

Was a bit of a pain because you cannot do it online or via email. So had to wait a while on the phone but eventually got through. I was offered the standard capped rate which was going to be the same as my BG tariff at the end of this month. I enquired about their Gas Tracker which is like agile but has a capped maximum charge which I believe to be 11p / kWh but they did not know other than it used to be 6p but its now higher. Its an interesting tariff for me as the standing charge is only 15p and as I now only use an average of 1 kWh of gas a day it should still work out cheaper. They did not recommend it because of the high unit rate but when I explained my almost nil gas use, they let me join it automatically once my gas account is moved over.

[Stinsy]

Good work!

That standing charge has meant your price per kWh for Gas (inc SC) has been very high indeed. A supper-low standing charge will help justify keeping your gas boiler as a backup.

[nowty]

Good work!

That standing charge has meant your price per kWh for Gas (inc SC) has been very high indeed. A supper-low standing charge will help justify keeping your gas boiler as a backup.

I just checked the max gas price for the Tracker v2 tariff in my area and it turns out to be 9.17p / kWh, not the 11p I thought it was as I was going off someone from the Octopus Tariff Facebook groups but they must live in another part of the country.

So for me, the gas is,

15.09p per day standing charge.
9.17p / kWh unit rate (max, could be cheaper but probably not at the moment).

Vs on standard capped variable rate,
27.22p per day standing charge .
7.48p / kWh unit rate.

And I reckon come October, the standard capped variable rate for gas will be at least the max capped tracker rate I have now locked in for a year.

[nowty]

Looks like I timed my change of gas to Octopus just right as they have put me on their V2 Tracker with the 15.09p a day standing charge. I changed over only two days ago and I've just noticed that there is now a V3 Tracker which is 27.22p per day standing charge which brings it in line with the variable rate capped charge.

And todays unit rate for my gas is 5.81p / kWh so that's still cheaper than the standard variable capped rate of 7.48p

[nowty]

Loving todays gas unit rate on their tracker tariff even though I'm not using any.

[nowty]

Just received my first bill for gas from Octopus on their Tracker tariff where the day rate changes every day so you need a gas smart meter. For the past 2 months my unit rate has been an average of 5.1p / kWh with the VAT added. And with a low standing charge of 15.1p per day with the VAT.



I'm managing to keep my average of the dirty fuel under 1 kWh per day, cos I'm only cookin with gas.

[nowty]

Just had a meter reader round, again, I get them every 6 months or so. Its usually specifically either gas or electric but this time he wanted to see both of them.

The Octopus is probably wondering why my Intelligent APP is showing tons of car charging, but no import from the smart meter.

Sorry Octopus, its just the way it is in Summer here at Nowty Towers.

[Stinsy]

They probably have an algorithm to detect meter fraud and this creates the job lists for the meter readers. I guess you trigger the algorithm every time they run it.

[Oldgreybeard]

I had a chat with the meter reader a few years ago, I mentioned that he'd be out of a job with everyone changing to smart meters. He said it made no difference as it was the law that they have to attend to check meters so the switch to smart meters didn't change anything and his job was secure. Did make me wonder a bit, as I had thought that saving the cost of meter readers was a part of the justification for smart meters.

[nowty]

I had a chat with the meter reader a few years ago, I mentioned that he'd be out of a job with everyone changing to smart meters. He said it made no difference as it was the law that they have to attend to check meters so the switch to smart meters didn't change anything and his job was secure. Did make me wonder a bit, as I had thought that saving the cost of meter readers was a part of the justification for smart meters.

The gas meter at least is supposed to be checked for safety every two years but I have them round a lot more regular and sometimes only a week or two apart.