Octopus Tracker

pfpf

zoonyx said:

masonic said:

zoonyx said:

And of course ‘new’ tracker, at least at the moment, looks almost like they just want to close it down really.

do we think they will ever improve tracker or is it only going one way now?

It has been repriced to include costs that have come into play in the years since the tariff was originally launched. If they wanted to close it down, then they could make it unavailable to new customers and renewals at any time. It would be a lot less hassle than playing around with the costs every quarter. Even the new formula looks a bit better than SVT over the long run.

There are good reasons to think prospects elsewhere will be better (such as Agile, or Tomato Energy if you dare, or a fix if you believe next year will be more like the past month than the spring/summer), but if you are suddenly questioning things in the middle of a period of supply shortage, then that is a red flag. This is not the first time prices have spiked and it will not be the last.

To be clear: I was the one who posted this yesterday having a go at people panicing over a spike.

HOWEVER.. stand by for an about turn.  I'm fixing.  I've been on tracker for years now, but my reasoning is as follows:

Both fuels are on December 23, and expire in February 24.  The fix currently is around 22p for me,and **IGNORING THE CURRENT SPIKES** it's not often its consistently below that even on December 23.  On October 24, it will be even higher so I don't see the point in sticking.

In Feb, the fix will likely be higher according to predictions, and if I leave now at least the tracker 9 month cool off starts now rather than feb.

Please feel free to point out the flaw in my plan, but I'm now pretty certain I may as well fix.  

This is electric only - I'd prob leave Gas on tracker for now, but Gas is pretty boring anyway. 

Funny. this is what i said which was closely followed by your original comment. it now appears we're thinking in similar terms although i've gone the other way and am still "holding".

pfpf said:

i'm undecided. last week i was "holding firm" till mid feb when contract ends, now i'm thinking of jumping to the fix (electricity only) as 21.99 doesn't seem too bad in the scheme of things and gives some thinking time with no exit fee.
only two months till end of contract so how much can i save switching vs how much more will it cost if i stay? decision day.

what have been the best recent fixes as i expected it currently to be more than 21.99?

zoonyx

masonic said:

zoonyx said:

masonic said:

zoonyx said:

And of course ‘new’ tracker, at least at the moment, looks almost like they just want to close it down really.

do we think they will ever improve tracker or is it only going one way now?

It has been repriced to include costs that have come into play in the years since the tariff was originally launched. If they wanted to close it down, then they could make it unavailable to new customers and renewals at any time. It would be a lot less hassle than playing around with the costs every quarter. Even the new formula looks a bit better than SVT over the long run.

There are good reasons to think prospects elsewhere will be better (such as Agile, or Tomato Energy if you dare, or a fix if you believe next year will be more like the past month than the spring/summer), but if you are suddenly questioning things in the middle of a period of supply shortage, then that is a red flag. This is not the first time prices have spiked and it will not be the last.

To be clear: I was the one who posted this yesterday having a go at people panicing over a spike.

HOWEVER.. stand by for an about turn.  I'm fixing.  I've been on tracker for years now, but my reasoning is as follows:

Both fuels are on December 23, and expire in February 24.  The fix currently is around 22p for me,and **IGNORING THE CURRENT SPIKES** it's not often its consistently below that even on December 23.  On October 24, it will be even higher so I don't see the point in sticking.

In Feb, the fix will likely be higher according to predictions, and if I leave now at least the tracker 9 month cool off starts now rather than feb.

Please feel free to point out the flaw in my plan, but I'm now pretty certain I may as well fix.  

This is electric only - I'd prob leave Gas on tracker for now, but Gas is pretty boring anyway. 

I don't plan on staying beyond Feb, and will probably jump to Agile. This week has been a timely reminder that doing so prematurely carries some risk.

You seem sure that the only way is up, while I have a very loosely held conviction that prices will not be as high over the festive period and summer months. Let's see whose crystal ball works better.

I have no idea. I have a good understanding of tracker, but don't bother keeping up to date with the specifics of the production market.  I just think Tracker is a victim of it's popularity.  It might become a niche product again in the future but for a year and a half it's been a no brainer.  Octopus have clearly been inundated from MSE and elsewhere - and seemingly now want to make it less of a deal.  That's their choice really.  I'm certainly not sure either way, but I think it's unlikely to drop/improve any time soon.

zoonyx

pfpf said:

zoonyx said:

masonic said:

zoonyx said:

And of course ‘new’ tracker, at least at the moment, looks almost like they just want to close it down really.

do we think they will ever improve tracker or is it only going one way now?

It has been repriced to include costs that have come into play in the years since the tariff was originally launched. If they wanted to close it down, then they could make it unavailable to new customers and renewals at any time. It would be a lot less hassle than playing around with the costs every quarter. Even the new formula looks a bit better than SVT over the long run.

There are good reasons to think prospects elsewhere will be better (such as Agile, or Tomato Energy if you dare, or a fix if you believe next year will be more like the past month than the spring/summer), but if you are suddenly questioning things in the middle of a period of supply shortage, then that is a red flag. This is not the first time prices have spiked and it will not be the last.

To be clear: I was the one who posted this yesterday having a go at people panicing over a spike.

HOWEVER.. stand by for an about turn.  I'm fixing.  I've been on tracker for years now, but my reasoning is as follows:

Both fuels are on December 23, and expire in February 24.  The fix currently is around 22p for me,and **IGNORING THE CURRENT SPIKES** it's not often its consistently below that even on December 23.  On October 24, it will be even higher so I don't see the point in sticking.

In Feb, the fix will likely be higher according to predictions, and if I leave now at least the tracker 9 month cool off starts now rather than feb.

Please feel free to point out the flaw in my plan, but I'm now pretty certain I may as well fix.  

This is electric only - I'd prob leave Gas on tracker for now, but Gas is pretty boring anyway. 

Funny. this is what i said which was closely followed by your original comment. it now appears we're thinking in similar terms although i've gone the other way and am still "holding".

pfpf said:

i'm undecided. last week i was "holding firm" till mid feb when contract ends, now i'm thinking of jumping to the fix (electricity only) as 21.99 doesn't seem too bad in the scheme of things and gives some thinking time with no exit fee.
only two months till end of contract so how much can i save switching vs how much more will it cost if i stay? decision day.

what have been the best recent fixes as i expected it currently to be more than 21.99?

Well, I did say it's an about turn, although I don't think it was your specific post I was replying to when I lit the fire.  Besides, I'm not moving because we've had some crap days.  I'm moving (or potentially moving) because the goal posts have semi-permanently moved.

masonic

zoonyx said:

masonic said:

zoonyx said:

masonic said:

zoonyx said:

And of course ‘new’ tracker, at least at the moment, looks almost like they just want to close it down really.

do we think they will ever improve tracker or is it only going one way now?

It has been repriced to include costs that have come into play in the years since the tariff was originally launched. If they wanted to close it down, then they could make it unavailable to new customers and renewals at any time. It would be a lot less hassle than playing around with the costs every quarter. Even the new formula looks a bit better than SVT over the long run.

There are good reasons to think prospects elsewhere will be better (such as Agile, or Tomato Energy if you dare, or a fix if you believe next year will be more like the past month than the spring/summer), but if you are suddenly questioning things in the middle of a period of supply shortage, then that is a red flag. This is not the first time prices have spiked and it will not be the last.

To be clear: I was the one who posted this yesterday having a go at people panicing over a spike.

HOWEVER.. stand by for an about turn.  I'm fixing.  I've been on tracker for years now, but my reasoning is as follows:

Both fuels are on December 23, and expire in February 24.  The fix currently is around 22p for me,and **IGNORING THE CURRENT SPIKES** it's not often its consistently below that even on December 23.  On October 24, it will be even higher so I don't see the point in sticking.

In Feb, the fix will likely be higher according to predictions, and if I leave now at least the tracker 9 month cool off starts now rather than feb.

Please feel free to point out the flaw in my plan, but I'm now pretty certain I may as well fix.  

This is electric only - I'd prob leave Gas on tracker for now, but Gas is pretty boring anyway. 

I don't plan on staying beyond Feb, and will probably jump to Agile. This week has been a timely reminder that doing so prematurely carries some risk.

You seem sure that the only way is up, while I have a very loosely held conviction that prices will not be as high over the festive period and summer months. Let's see whose crystal ball works better.

I have no idea. I have a good understanding of tracker, but don't bother keeping up to date with the specifics of the production market.  I just think Tracker is a victim of it's popularity.  It might become a niche product again in the future but for a year and a half it's been a no brainer.  Octopus have clearly been inundated from MSE and elsewhere - and seemingly now want to make it less of a deal.  That's their choice really.  I'm certainly not sure either way, but I think it's unlikely to drop/improve any time soon.

Now? The big hikes were in December last year, and then again in April. Prior to that it was a great deal (most of the time), especially during the pandemic. It was over 18 months ago that they were most recently flooded from social media exposure and had to implement a wait-list. It will almost certainly be that influx that prompted them to review the pricing and get us all on at least the moderately hiked version.

See page 500 onward (Jan 2024) for the first wave of discontent over Tracker no longer being a good deal: https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6261575/octopus-tracker/p500

I agree with you that it is unlikely that Octopus will change the formula significantly in the customer's favour, but they don't need to for prices to fall compared with where they've been recently - the increases over the second half of this year have been wholesale price related. Either way, I think there are better options that don't involve fixing, and have only suck around this long because I'm on the Dec 23 rates. It's less than a month before we'll find out what pricing will be available when most of us need to renew.

la531983

Pricing back below the cap tomorrow and will be even lower Sunday, happy days are back.

Qyburn

masonic said:
... The big hikes were in December last year, and then again in April. Prior to that it was a great deal (most of the time), especially during the pandemic. 

From what I recall (and as shown on Gastracker) it didn't go above SVT during those times. Going back a year further it exceeded SVT in Nov/Dec 2022 and brushed up against it in April 2023.

reddwarf2002

I've been on Tracker for 18 months now. The savings recently have been miniscule and with prices climbing up I've made the switch to 12 months fixed just now.

QrizB

bristolleedsfan said:

People can bang on as much as they like about gas being cheaper than SVR or not much different than fixed rates,12 month averages, does not alter fact all tracker gas customers are paying more so far this winter than consumers with/without smart meters who fixed with no exit fees late July - first week in August ( 5.39p kWh ish as well as early October.5.47p kWh ish.

Gas is 5.58p/kWh for me today, which is less than either the current Nov24v3 fix of 6.08, or the Oct24v1 fix of 5.60. Jul24v1 was 5.54 which is fractionally less.

It'll be interesting to see how the whole month averages out. November's bill averaged at 5.72, which (for the ~1000kWh I used that period) cost me an extra ~£1.80 vs. the July fix.

I'm also saving a couple of pence a day on the standing charge vs. any of those fixes.

masonic

Qyburn said:

masonic said:
... The big hikes were in December last year, and then again in April. Prior to that it was a great deal (most of the time), especially during the pandemic. 

From what I recall (and as shown on Gastracker) it didn't go above SVT during those times. Going back a year further it exceeded SVT in Nov/Dec 2022 and brushed up against it in April 2023.

There seems to be a fair bit of conflation of formula (which Octopus can control and most certainly has wielded to our disadvantage on those dates I mentioned) and wholesale price (which it can't control). 

Also, as bristolleedsfan mentioned, it used to be subject to the energy price guarantee and those early variants had a low standing charge and product price cap. I'm not sure if that has been factored in to the Gastracker plot. Either way, price spikes like the one we have seen this week are not unprecedented, though this could be the first time some long term Tracker customers have been exposed to the full force of one.

Xbigman

I've just had my electric bill for the month running up to the 12th of Dec averaging 21.77p. That's lower than the summer fix I looked at and just below the current fix I could get from Octopus. 
My only concern is the new formula for Tracker would only generate a small saving over the year, and is thus probably not worth it. For me it will be Octopus Agile or a Tomato fixed TOU tariff come Feb the 15th.



Darren