FIT payments

AngelwivanA

For 10 years I have religiously entered my meter reading for my FIT (solar feed in tariff) now with the cost of electricity going up so high why hasn't the tariff rate increased for all owners of solar panels....electricity is worth more.

Ectophile

Because the agreement you entered into when signing up for FIT payments was that they would increase in line with inflation every year.

Mister_G

OP - My FIT is currently at 60p/kWh.  Is yours not something similar?

jimjames

AngelwivanA said:

For 10 years I have religiously entered my meter reading for my FIT (solar feed in tariff) now with the cost of electricity going up so high why hasn't the tariff rate increased for all owners of solar panels....electricity is worth more.

It will be going up by RPI rate in December which could be 15% or more. That will make the FIT rate somewhere over 70p per kWh generated, above even the highest fixed rates for electricity at the moment. Why do you think it's not going up?

[Deleted User]

Having been a FIT recipient in the past - but no longer - I doubt that many people will have any sympathy for the OP’s concerns. Most FIT beneficiaries will have their array paid for in less than 10 years with a high income for the rest of their FIT contract - based on generation and assumed export. If the array has a predicted output of, say, 4000kWhs/year then all this energy could theoretically be used in the home.

I am sure that the OP knows that payments for the assumed (50%) export can be changed to SEG payments. Octopus Energy is currently paying 40 to 50p/kWh for measured grid exported energy.

Merlin139

AngelwivanA said:

For 10 years I have religiously entered my meter reading for my FIT (solar feed in tariff) now with the cost of electricity going up so high why hasn't the tariff rate increased for all owners of solar panels....electricity is worth more.

In a round about way the FIT payments we receive are paid for by all Electricity Energy customers through Levelisation.

Levelisation is the mechanism by which the total cost of the FIT Scheme is apportioned across licensed electricity suppliers. The cost is allocated between suppliers in proportion to their share of the electricity supply market of Great Britain. They pay it and we as customers effectively pay the suppliers through our bills.

I bet in those 10 years you have made a tidy sum and covered the cost of installation. I doubt that you have considered in that time that you were being overpaid?

My FIT payment including the export amount works out to about 21p for each kWh that I produce. More than happy with that figure because when I signed up for FIT in May of 2014 I knew what the rate would be and how it would increase for the 20 years that I would get it. Not the 25 years that you will get yours.

Telegraph_Sam

Advice please:
I installed my solar panels a number of years ago and have received regular FIT payments from (in this case) Scottish Power ever since then. Back in June I was told that my 2 year obligatory visual meter inspection was due and shortly after the reader from Morrisons Data Services made an appointment to do just that. Time passed until my next online meter submission was due when I found that access to the usual reporting site was blocked. My subscription had been suspended and the account was no longer live. It then transpired that this was due to a failure of communication between Morrisons and Scottish Power, the visual confirmation of reading had not got passed on.
I had evidence of the gentleman's visit and I sent Scottish Power in addition a pic of the latest meter reading. Thinking that it would be a quick and simple matter to get the account up and running again. Not so. According to SP this could take up to 8 weeks.
What was apparent was the total brush-off attitude adopted by the SP FIT / Customer Services Dept. It was not their affair and it was up to me to sort it out with Ofgem - with whom I have never had any contact. Being the size of organization they are it is anything but easy to get to speak to anyone on the Ofgem phone (various phone numbers), let alone someone with responsibility for FIT affairs.
I don't know if I have a case against the fob-off attitude of Scottish Power, or if it is really between me and Ofgem. And if the latter, how to communicate with a human rather than a recorded voiceful of options. I couldn't see a slot for this in the Ofgem website.

I'd be glad to hear from anyone who has had experience in these muddy waters (and has survived to tell the tale) and can suggest my next step(s)

Tks

[Deleted User]

Suppliers act as agents for what is a Government Scheme. You can confirm the registration status of your installation by emailing:

FITRegister@Ofgem.gov.uk

You will probably need to provide them with your MCS Certificate number.

I confess that I have never really understood the need for a routine generation meter reading given that all installations have a MCS annual output, and the simple act of checking actual generation against the predicted output should show up large anomalies. No doubt the counter argument is that it is public money.

chris_n

Telegraph_Sam said:

Advice please:
I installed my solar panels a number of years ago and have received regular FIT payments from (in this case) Scottish Power ever since then. Back in June I was told that my 2 year obligatory visual meter inspection was due and shortly after the reader from Morrisons Data Services made an appointment to do just that. Time passed until my next online meter submission was due when I found that access to the usual reporting site was blocked. My subscription had been suspended and the account was no longer live. It then transpired that this was due to a failure of communication between Morrisons and Scottish Power, the visual confirmation of reading had not got passed on.
I had evidence of the gentleman's visit and I sent Scottish Power in addition a pic of the latest meter reading. Thinking that it would be a quick and simple matter to get the account up and running again. Not so. According to SP this could take up to 8 weeks.
What was apparent was the total brush-off attitude adopted by the SP FIT / Customer Services Dept. It was not their affair and it was up to me to sort it out with Ofgem - with whom I have never had any contact. Being the size of organization they are it is anything but easy to get to speak to anyone on the Ofgem phone (various phone numbers), let alone someone with responsibility for FIT affairs.
I don't know if I have a case against the fob-off attitude of Scottish Power, or if it is really between me and Ofgem. And if the latter, how to communicate with a human rather than a recorded voiceful of options. I couldn't see a slot for this in the Ofgem website.

I'd be glad to hear from anyone who has had experience in these muddy waters (and has survived to tell the tale) and can suggest my next step(s)

Tks

I had a similar issue in the summer. My daughter lives in my house in UK with my solar panels. I got an email from Morrisons about the check, I forwarded it to my daughter and she made the arrangements.  The check was carried out as arranged. A couple of weeks later I got a fairly threatening email from SP stating that I had failed to let Morrisons carry out the check and unless they received a picture with the reading and the serial no within 8 days my account would be suspended. I replied immediately with the picture as requested, also requested receipt confirmation. Finally after about 6 days I did get the reply and has been OK since.

Telegraph_Sam

So in your case they didn't try to duck out by fobbing you off / passing the buck to Ofgem?? I've got a feeling that if I had succeeded in getting through to Ofgem they would have batted me back to SP