Octopus Tracker

k_man

Umiamz said:

DeeQS said:

CanNeverThinkOfAUsername said:

While i have been on and off tracker for gas for years, i have never known how i find the prices, lol. with Agile it's easy, i can see all the 30mins slots with the prices. But as i use so little gas i have never looked into it before. My account says.......

"Octopus Tracker July 2022 v1
5.66p/kWh
27.22p/day
(All rates inc. VAT)"

Does this mean today i am paying 5.66 today please? and this changes daily yeah?

Yes, The App shows the daily rate and is updated each day.

The charge each month though becomes the blended daily rate * the unit usage. Octopus told me that you don't pay the day rate for that days usage, even with a smart meter. It's always a monthly blended unit rate.

Which is incorrect. Last time I was on Tracker (earlier this year) they used the day rate for each day's usage. They only used an average if there were any gaps in the smart meter data. If I asked, they would fetch the missing data and recalculate the usage. It never deviated from actual usage by more than 10-15p in total, though.

To add to this, part of the confusion is that the 
Your charges in detail section of the bill, includes a single value for unit rate:
†Average unit rate charged per kilowatt-hour

But this is your average (†Your average unit rate) based on units used each day at that day's rate, shown further down the bill:

How we work out your average unit rate:

Total Cost £xx.xx ÷ Total Energy Used xxx.x kWh × Convert to pence 100 = Average unit rate xx.xx p/kWh

SJMALBA

DeeQS said:

CanNeverThinkOfAUsername said:

While i have been on and off tracker for gas for years, i have never known how i find the prices, lol. with Agile it's easy, i can see all the 30mins slots with the prices. But as i use so little gas i have never looked into it before. My account says.......

"Octopus Tracker July 2022 v1
5.66p/kWh
27.22p/day
(All rates inc. VAT)"

Does this mean today i am paying 5.66 today please? and this changes daily yeah?

Yes, The App shows the daily rate and is updated each day.

The charge each month though becomes the blended daily rate * the unit usage. Octopus told me that you don't pay the day rate for that days usage, even with a smart meter. It's always a monthly blended unit rate.

Even with a non-smart meter, they use the actual daily URs, which are applied to the apportioned daily usage (using their industry data...); for example:

They then work out your average daily UR for the month...

... which is the UR that's shown in the 'Your Charges In Detail' section of the bill.

EDIT. @k_man beat me to it!

SJMALBA

Another fall in electricity DA today, so, for me, 17.94p/kWh tomorrow.

Griffindog

SJMALBA said:

Another fall in electricity DA today, so, for me, 17.94p/kWh tomorrow.

Excellent news. So many times over the summer I thought I had done the wrong thing by sticking with Tracker but it is really paying off now. Knowing that I won’t pay over the EPG is a bonus. (V3)

Chrysalis

Gas 5.61p today.

Cheaper than April cap now.

Chrysalis

QrizB said:

macman said:

I presume there is some fiendishly clever formula for this, but what is it?

I'm in the same boat. There is some sort of model behind the scenes, but I don't think Octopus have shared it with the world.

They have I think.

When I was thinking of joining the trackers they have a graph which shows typical usage patterns, they said they use that formula for when a smart meter isnt been used for a particular day.  So they assume you using it more of it during peak e.g.

QrizB

Chrysalis said:

Gas 5.61p today.
Cheaper than April cap now.

5.82p for me, not that I'm complaining!

There's a suggestion that it might be even cheaper tomorrow. Won't know until the market closes tonight.

SJMALBA

Octopus' 'Our Tariffs' has been updated with EPG, though potentially a bit misleading with Tracker...

Griffindog

Version 3 today, and those are today’s rates. It’s a shame it doesn’t quote the cap prices too. Why does it call them “reduced unit rate” when they are the actual prices?

SJMALBA

I think they have just labelled all of their tariffs in the same way, perhaps to identify them as having been updated for EPG, but, as per my previous post, potentially misleading for Tracker; in the grand scheme of things, though, not a major problem, I guess?