Octopus Tracker

MultiFuelBurner

Android has Octopus Compare
Gas tracker.uk is also good for gas and electricity and emails of prices daily.

Perhaps that's your misunderstanding of what is available for android users @Slinky ?

I have put a few friends and family to tracker but have advised them lately with the upcoming formula change and their areas (London and East of England) they are going to be on the expensive end of the formula changes.

It may be the case come July/August/September and the increases expected in energy prices by predictors such as Cornwall Insights leading into October 1st Q3 2024 that the difference between SVT and Tracker December 2023 v1 formula be down to between 5-15% on average for some regions (again this is all best guess at this stage)

For those of us that have already saved money from being on tracker this won't be an issue we will average it out over months or years and take the highs with the lows but it does become less easy to explain as a saving tariff to new adopters especially with no cap (well very high caps)

Regardless I personally will stop pushing tracker until we have seen later into this year for the reasons given above.

Spoonie_Turtle

MultiFuelBurner said:

Android has Octopus Compare
Gas tracker.uk is also good for gas and electricity and emails of prices daily.

Octopus Compare is not something I'd recommend for people who aren't tech savvy.  I'm reasonably competent but still found it pretty fiddly.  The gastracker page is far simpler.

Slinky

We downloaded Compare but it was too complicated for them. I've also sent them a link to gastracker which I think we got loaded onto their phone, but a visitor turned up so we couldn't go through it in great detail.  They aren't the sort to keep checking daily. I don't think they even knew how to look at their bills on Octopus!

It never ceases to amaze me how people will waste money on energy bills and resist attempts to help them sort themselves out.  My hairdresser who works from her home salon has no idea if she is heating water using gas or electric. It's just permanently being heated 24 days but she doesn't know how. I nagged her last time, to have a look and switch from electric to gas, but she leaves it all to her partner and then moans about 'bloody Octopus' raising prices again.

Spies

Spoonie_Turtle said:

Spies said:

… I don't get why anyone would choose to be on the SVR rate really. 

Perhaps reasonable certainty of price, hectic lives leaving no time and/or mental capacity for having to make a decision and deal with it if the price spikes (especially with the 9-month wait to go back on, not like freely switching back and forth between tariffs in the past), lack of understanding of energy pricing at all and thus not wanting to take what feels like a risk on something they don't fully understand, etc.

Edit: though for people active here on this forum, most of those are less likely to apply.

Even without thinking about it you can save money on Tracker though, Agile on the other hand is a LOT more involved.

Qyburn

Slinky said:

I've pushed my neighbours into moving onto Tracker. They've got Android phones so monitoring isn't as easy for them, plus I don't think they are the sort to keep checking, 

Why not suggest they sign up for the Gastracker emails? Email each morning with today's and tomorrow's price.

Spies

Just for context, these are my colleagues savings and he does not load shift AT ALL.

Slinky

Qyburn said:

Slinky said:

I've pushed my neighbours into moving onto Tracker. They've got Android phones so monitoring isn't as easy for them, plus I don't think they are the sort to keep checking, 

Why not suggest they sign up for the Gastracker emails? Email each morning with today's and tomorrow's price.

Good idea, thanks

Spoonie_Turtle

Spies said:

Spoonie_Turtle said:

Spies said:

… I don't get why anyone would choose to be on the SVR rate really. 

Perhaps reasonable certainty of price, hectic lives leaving no time and/or mental capacity for having to make a decision and deal with it if the price spikes (especially with the 9-month wait to go back on, not like freely switching back and forth between tariffs in the past), lack of understanding of energy pricing at all and thus not wanting to take what feels like a risk on something they don't fully understand, etc.

Edit: though for people active here on this forum, most of those are less likely to apply.

Even without thinking about it you can save money on Tracker though, Agile on the other hand is a LOT more involved.

The reasons I speculated were mainly psychological barriers (which isn't to say they're not completely real, just they're mainly internal barriers rather than external).  For some those barriers would outweigh the potential savings.

And again, people engaged enough with their energy to be regularly on here and find out about Tracker themselves. probably don't have those kinds of things to contend with.

Spies

My parents (well my dad) are stubborn and wont move to anyone other than British Gas 

MultiFuelBurner

Spies said:

My parents (well my dad) are stubborn and wont move to anyone other than British Gas 

Same here despite him being very intelligent.