Different ways of paying for your energy - octopus

Annie021063

My husband has come home tonight and after listening to the radio all day where they were talking about energy suppliers he feels we should ask for our credit back (£500) put it in an account and pay our usage monthly by direct payment/cash. Is this possible with octopus? Their website is huge and I’m finding it tricky to get to the parts that help with these. I’ve also read that if you don’t pay by DD yea charge o ore for energy, is at correct? Any suggestions? 

Spoonie_Turtle

They do offer variable DD.  They don't charge any difference between payment methods (some suppliers do).
Some of the linked articles from this page should help: https://octopus.energy/help-and-faqs/categories/bills-and-payments/  There's one about returning credit on there as well as ones about payment methods.

pochase

Octopus has no rate differences for different payment methods, so no additional charge or lost discount.

You can either pay on receipt of the bill or use variable direct debit, which would be more convenient.

Big problem with both is that you need to budget yourself for expensive winter months.

Annie021063

Yes, I would rather budget myself and save the money in my own accounts than giving it to an energy supplier who then makes interest in it 

badger09

I claimed a refund of part of my credit balance with Octopus very recently. Dashboard suggested a figure, which still left a substantial credit to account for higher winter usage. I rounded it down to whole ££s & it was refunded just over a week later. 

I’ve since increased my monthly DD to take advantage of Santander’s higher cashback for Sept & Oct. 

I really like Octopus’ flexibility re DDs. 

Spoonie_Turtle

badger09 said:

I claimed a refund of part of my credit balance with Octopus very recently. Dashboard suggested a figure, which still left a substantial credit to account for higher winter usage. I rounded it down to whole ££s & it was refunded just over a week later. 

I’ve since increased my monthly DD to take advantage of Santander’s higher cashback for Sept & Oct. 

I really like Octopus’ flexibility re DDs. 

So do we.  We initially changed to them because they were the cheapest out of the suppliers offering the Warm Home Discount (back when it covered a whole month's bill and more!), then stayed with them once the fix ended because they were only ~£50/yr more than the cheapest and we really value the flexibility and control we have over our account.