Octopus Tracker

MultiFuelBurner

It's literally one page Robgmun said:

MultiFuelBurner said:

How much electricity/gas do you use a year in kWh?

I lost the data for the whole year because we joined Octopus in Match I believe. I didn't keep track of what our usage was when we were with EDF

Well I doubt you are saving £80 a month then if you don't know your exact monthly usage in kWh and are tracking the savings against the price cap rates.

What did you use in kWh last monthly bill with octopus for elec and gas?

Telegraph_Sam

@Spoonie_Turtle
I think your last para applies most days. I can't say I load shift like in the days of Go Faster when there was a predictable advantage in so doing.
I might try comparing my meter readings with those charged on a few "sample" days to see if the system works in principle. 
Are your start and finish meter readings shown on your bills? I fell out (nicely) when Octopus couldn't do this for Go Faster.

MultiFuelBurner

Telegraph_Sam said:

Re billing formula: I thought the whole process was automatic. That the system averages the recorded daily consumption over the past month, and multiplies this by the no of days to produce the monthly total. Then if there was any slight deviation this would be covered in a swings & roundabouts fashion such that the overall monthly total tallies.
If we want to check the daily recorded figures this strikes me as a lot of work for a possible small gain. Unless there have been large movements in price between one day and the next. I suppose one could do this on a "sample" basis to cut down on the workload.
Heavy stuff for the average user! Please point out any errors in the above.

Here's an example from.our last bill



As you can see we used less kWh when the price was 16.05p kWh and used more when it was 14.28p kWh and then went full out when 13.30p kWh.

The outcome of the above is an average price of 14p kwh before vat (5% so 14.75p kWh)

If Octopus didn't have our smart meter each day we would have paid 14.55p kwh before vat(5% 15.27p kWh)

masonic

Xbigman said:

Strange. Since July I've averaged 17.36p a kwh on Tracker (Midlands). Have you remembered to add VAT to the average price that shows on your bill?

In my case I am pulling the prices and consumption from the API and not using any figures from my bills, but the total I'm being billed matches my own figures almost to the penny.

Telegraph_Sam

I might well replicate what you have done. In a simple spreadsheet should not be too onerous. Did your smart meter results tally with billed daily amounts?
[reply to MultiFuelBurner]

MultiFuelBurner

Telegraph_Sam said:

I might well replicate what you have done. In a simple spreadsheet should not be too onerous. Did your smart meter results tally with billed daily amounts?
[reply to MultiFuelBurner]

It tallied exactly.👍

Alnat1

@Telegraph_Sam Have you scrolled right down to the bottom of your bill, past all the contact pages. That is where the daily breakdown of prices appears.

Pat38493

Telegraph_Sam said:

Re billing formula: I thought the whole process was automatic. That the system averages the recorded daily consumption over the past month, and multiplies this by the no of days to produce the monthly total. Then if there was any slight deviation this would be covered in a swings & roundabouts fashion such that the overall monthly total tallies.
If we want to check the daily recorded figures this strikes me as a lot of work for a possible small gain. Unless there have been large movements in price between one day and the next. I suppose one could do this on a "sample" basis to cut down on the workload.
Heavy stuff for the average user! Please point out any errors in the above.

If you are on a smart meter, and there are no data gaps, they should be billing you based on your actual usage with the correct price for each day.

If there are gaps in data it seems like they sometimes invoice you based on a formula for the whole month.

I've also seen suggestions that people without data gaps were invoiced using the formula "randomly" on some months for reasons only known to Octopus.

Shedman

At least the Australian LNG strike situation seems to have been resolved for now per Reuters article so hopefully that will help counterbalance ME issues somewhat for gas futures

"An Australian union alliance on Wednesday agreed to endorse deals on pay and conditions at Chevron's (CVX.N) two liquefied natural gas (LNG) facilities in Australia, ending an impasse that had led workers to threaten renewed strikes this week.

The Offshore Alliance union said it had called off strikes originally planned for Thursday at the U.S. energy major's Gorgon and Wheatstone projects in Western Australia, which supply around 6% of the world's LNG."

Telegraph_Sam

@Alnat1. I am on the defence in all this since since switching back to Tracker from Go Faster I have yet to receive a bill. Hence my query whether the (smart) meter monthly start and finish readings are shown on current Tracker invoices
In view of the daily fluctuations I think the fair way to judge Tracker's performance would involve some form of averaging over time. I suspect that somewhere out there this data exists alongside a suitable yardstick for comparison.