Posted by: @editor

↑

I’d be interested to hear the feedback and consensus on the tariffs we discussed recently and if you agree:

I watched a couple of days ago and have to agree with @jamespa that it didn't necessarily bring any clear answers.  In particular there seemed to be a head on disagreement between one person who said it was madness to run a heat pump without batteries and someone else who doubted if buying a battery to grid charge made sense, pointing out the 7p overnight tariffs are loss leaders and can't last forever.

I am still pre-heatpump and i must say the tariffs question is daunting.  Some calculation needed to work out the costs.  I want to do the right thing in terms of CO2 emissions but not at any cost...

I have an EV and am on Octopus Intelligent Go at the moment.  Where would I go if I got a heatpump?  Last years consumption, about 15500 kWh of gas, about 5250 kWh of electricity, of which about 2700 kWh went to charge the car.  No solar or house battery at present.

Staying with Octopus, they don't recommend Cosy for EV owners.  I think it is more complicated that.  Cosy would definitely almost double the cost of charging the car.  On the other hand, in the winter it might well be cheaper to be on Cosy than to stay on Intelligent Go.  Battery storage might help with load shifting but large capital cost.  If buying a battery, maybe best option would be Cosy in the winter, Intelligent Go in the summer, storing grid electricity and charging the car in the cheap rate periods.

Ovo looks interesting because it seems it would be possible to have Charge Anytime for the car and Heat Pump Plus for a heat pump (as long as it was the right brand).  I'd expect to be safely cheaper than gas for heating as long as I had a decent heat pump installation.  On the other hand, I would lose the ability to save money by running the washing machine and dishwasher on the cheap rate.  An extra complication is that if I wanted to install solar and have Charge Anytime, I would need a different car charger.  That's a pity because I've got a pretty new Ohme epod that I had installed especially because it worked with both Intelligent Go and Charge Anytime.  Apart from the cost, it just feels like an awful waste to replace it so soon

So that's all pretty complicated and I've only looked at 2 energy suppliers so far!

Matthew

@matthew_w

It's a complex area and every case is different so in fairness to the podcast difficult to summarise.  It also changed frequently.

I have a heat pump, EV and solar panels but no battery.  I did some modelling and eon next drive turned out best.  In fairness there wasn't much between a couple of leading options.  I'm locked in for 12 months because of the export tarrif (and my import tarrif is guaranteed for 12months.  I see it as an annual job.

Here is my update on the move to Eon Next drive.  Customer service is a bit slower than Octopus, but the tariff is great. 

They couldn't read my smart meter for about 4 months, which was the most expensive time of the year. December to March. They said that I will be charged the normal price, but they will refund me the money once the meter starts working. I'm copying their response here. It took a few calls and a few months, but we finally got there.

Hello Andras, We’ve just reviewed your account and found that we did not receive some Half-Hourly data from your smart meter. But don’t worry! We’ve added our Standard Variable tariff to your account for the affected days and have manually calculated the difference between this and the NEXT DRIVE FIXED V5 tariff to credit your account to ensure you’re not losing out. Here’s how we worked this out: Half-Hourly reads not received between 10/12/2024 and 01/01/2025, 01/01/2025 and 05/03/2025. Your average usage split is: Day 19.68%, and Night 80.32%. You had a total of 85 days missing half hourly data, which had a total combined usage of 4239Kwh. With these periods billed against the Standard Variable Tariff for their respective periods the total cost is £1081.27. We have applied your average usage splits and their respective tariff rates to these days which comes out at a total cost of £484. In order to make sure you’re not losing out, we have credited £597.26 to your account which will show on your bill as credit. Sending Positive Energy, E.ON Next Team

@arundalep Do they check you have an EV, what if you buy an EV and sell it, do they then automatically take you off the EV tariff.

What about if you say yes to getting an EV, but then cancel the order as import tax gone up so you're delaying the purchase.

@agentgeorge for Octopus Intelligent Go, yes you need either a compatible vehicle or charger. The onboarding process includes setting up the vehicle battery size and carrying out a test charge (controlled from their end). The huge benefit to Intelligent are the ad-hoc off peak periods during the day, especially if you have a heat pump and battery storage. If they detect a lack of charging activity they will kick you off the tariff. 

Standard Octopus Go, I don’t believe they have any way to verify if you actually have an EV so even if you have to agree to having one, they can’t prove either way. 

Hope that helps

@arundalep good advice about needing an EV to stay on the tariff.

when I joined Octopus, I did their quick questionnaire to match my system to their best tariff.

It works better if you have an Octopus compatible Battery and EV socket, its not a charger as that is in every EV, currently limited to 11kW max.

I have growatt which is not on their list, so cant make use of the intelligent tariffs.

i found out recently when I had a power outage, you have to spend around £1k to upgrade the system to off grid use. I didn't ask what you got for that, it was ridiculous on cost.

@agentgeorge Not with Eon Next. The only reson I left Octopus as they said i can't have intelligent octopus for 7 hours as I have no EV. I was on Octopus go for 5 hour EV time paying 8.5pkw. Then I moved to Eon Next as u can have 7 hours at a tarrif of 6.75p/kw.