Octopus Energy takes on Avro customers

Consumerist

polymaff said:

Consumerist said:

I wonder, has anyone had any thoughts on how the £200 energy loan may be implemented from October?

It occurs to me that by October, we will have built up a huge credit balance over the Summer if the full capped rates are applied until then.

. . . If I leave my DD at the present level I build up no credit balance at all over April to October.

The question for me is whether suppliers will allow DDs to be set at a level which builds up no credit balance over April to October.

MWT

Consumerist said:

polymaff said:

Consumerist said:

I wonder, has anyone had any thoughts on how the £200 energy loan may be implemented from October?

It occurs to me that by October, we will have built up a huge credit balance over the Summer if the full capped rates are applied until then.

. . . If I leave my DD at the present level I build up no credit balance at all over April to October.

The question for me is whether suppliers will allow DDs to be set at a level which builds up no credit balance over April to October.

Octopus at least, is usually pretty relaxed about the DD as long as you don't go negative and leave it that way.

keithgawler

I've not posted for a while, as my ex-Avro account was migrated with most and after one blip when I needed to email Hello@octopus I've been getting a bill at month end once I've submitted my readings.

My "dumb" 5 year old BG gas smart meter seems to have been migrated into true smart meter form just before Christmas. Octopus confirmed this when I checked with them, though the electric meter is still very much dumb - they say this will follow in due course. Out of the blue, having submitted my usual month-end readings I then received a first automatic smart meter generated gas bill for the first 5 days of Feb yesterday, so yet another step towards "normality".

By the way, has anyone crunched the numbers to get a feel of the order of magnitude of the likely increases for ex-Avro customers from April? In anticipation I uplifted my monthly DD by 50% just before Christmas. Happy to run with a bit of credit over these winter months to get used to the pain when new rates kick in, when I'll then do a recalc of my expected use for the next 12 months, but again with allowance for further increase next Oct.

polymaff

MWT said:

Octopus at least, is usually pretty relaxed about the DD as long as you don't go negative and leave it that way.

I agree.  Today my balance is plus £80.  It may need a small top-up or two over the less than average period, which I take to be mid-April to mid-October.

wild666

I pay Octopus £48 per month and I will have to increase the DD by 39% to keep a small credit balance on my account or just use less electric and gas. Presently I have just over £136 credit on the account but if the kWh rates rise to 28p E and 7p G with standing charges of 45p E and 27.2 G If I let the credit run down for two months then increase the DD by 39% it will just about see me keep a small credit balance. 

wild666

Consumerist said:

I can imagine the outcry from people with large credit balances being asked to increase their DD from October.

Interesting times ahead, methinks.

If anything like the credit I had with Bulb before I left them, £900, then the supplier would be wrong in increasing the DD by an amount so that the customer still has a credit of £900 or more after the increase. The credit should slowly dwindle until such a time that the supplier requires the DD to be increased to stop a debt occurring on the account. 

Pete99

If you make one off payments every month or so with a debit card you won't need to mess about with your direct debit payments, that way you can prevent building up credit or debit, then if the situation changes and switching is viable again massive debt or credit won't be a problem.

Consumerist

keithgawler said:

. . . By the way, has anyone crunched the numbers to get a feel of the order of magnitude of the likely increases for ex-Avro customers from April?

It depends on your region but the average increase is around 54% on the October 2021 charges.

This is based on your annual consumption and not necessarily the DD you are paying.

We will be getting a £200 "loan" credit from October but this will be paid in instalments so should help to offset the likely increase in the October 2022 cap.

Consumerist

Pete99 said:

If you make one off payments every month or so with a debit card you won't need to mess about with your direct debit payments, that way you can prevent building up credit or debit, then if the situation changes and switching is viable again massive debt or credit won't be a problem.

Yes, that's what I've been doing since my Octopus account became active/functional.

By leaving my DD set at Avro's level and making manual top-up payments monthly, I can, more-or-less, pay monthly on demand whilst keeping the lower capped rates for paying by monthly DD.

It will be interesting to see how long Octopus will wear that process.

MWT

Consumerist said:

It will be interesting to see how long Octopus will wear that process.

Unless something changes in their attitude you'll probably be able to do that indefinitely, I've been operating like that for 4 years now.