Where's my £66?

Max68

razord said:

Octopus implemented this change by lowering your direct debit about 10 days ago, so DDs from 1st October would be lower.

If you then updated your direct debit to a higher amount, it would have overridden that change. They did it this way so that those people who wanted to still pay the same amount (and just gain the extra credit), could go in an edit their DDs manually.

This I personally believe it's what is going to cause a problem for some.  If, like me, you were paying £130 and then Octopus just take £63 there will be people out there who will think, oh great that's all I have to pay and won't readjust their D/D to take into account the increase in charges from October onwards.

MWT

Max68 said:

razord said:

Octopus implemented this change by lowering your direct debit about 10 days ago, so DDs from 1st October would be lower.

If you then updated your direct debit to a higher amount, it would have overridden that change. They did it this way so that those people who wanted to still pay the same amount (and just gain the extra credit), could go in an edit their DDs manually.

This I personally believe it's what is going to cause a problem for some.  If, like me, you were paying £130 and then Octopus just take £63 there will be people out there who will think, oh great that's all I have to pay and won't readjust their D/D to take into account the increase in charges from October onwards.

I wouldn't assume that Octopus are just going to ignore people heading into debt, and will probably be suggesting increases once people have got an understanding of what the new tariff rates mean for their monthly costs, allowing for the £67 Government contribution.

Max68

MWT said:

Max68 said:

razord said:

Octopus implemented this change by lowering your direct debit about 10 days ago, so DDs from 1st October would be lower.

If you then updated your direct debit to a higher amount, it would have overridden that change. They did it this way so that those people who wanted to still pay the same amount (and just gain the extra credit), could go in an edit their DDs manually.

This I personally believe it's what is going to cause a problem for some.  If, like me, you were paying £130 and then Octopus just take £63 there will be people out there who will think, oh great that's all I have to pay and won't readjust their D/D to take into account the increase in charges from October onwards.

I wouldn't assume that Octopus are just going to ignore people heading into debt, and will probably be suggesting increases once people have got an understanding of what the new tariff rates mean for their monthly costs, allowing for the £67 Government contribution.

One would hope so.

[Deleted User]

What suppliers have failed to do, probably as a result of the late call on the EPG, is a recalculation of the annual consumer cost based on the EPG rates plus/minus any debit/credit balance. From the revised cost would have come the revised DD payment which for the next 6 months would have been discounted by £66/67.

It is all very simple given that the EPG is in all but name a fixed tariff; however, I suspect that many people will over the next few weeks be confronted with an increase in their DDs which will only add to people’s confusion.

Max68

[Deleted User] said:

What suppliers have failed to do, probably as a result of the late call on the EPG, is a recalculation of the annual consumer cost based on the EPG rates plus/minus any debit/credit balance. From the revised cost would have come the revised DD payment which for the next 6 months would have been discounted by £66/67.

It is all very simple given that the EPG is in all but name a fixed tariff; however, I suspect that many people will over the next few weeks be confronted with an increase in their DDs which will only add to people’s confusion.

To be fair what they should have done is left peoples D/D's well alone and literally just took £67 off all bills from October till March.  Then a consumer could just increase or decrease their D/D accordingly from their own decisions.  We are all different.  I have created a buffer of several hundred pounds in my energy account and I am happy for it to be in there.  Others like any extra they have refunded into their bank accounts.  Just taking £67 of all monthly bills and the relevant calculation for quarterly would be so much easier.

funny.money

Max68 said:

[Deleted User] said:

What suppliers have failed to do, probably as a result of the late call on the EPG, is a recalculation of the annual consumer cost based on the EPG rates plus/minus any debit/credit balance. From the revised cost would have come the revised DD payment which for the next 6 months would have been discounted by £66/67.

It is all very simple given that the EPG is in all but name a fixed tariff; however, I suspect that many people will over the next few weeks be confronted with an increase in their DDs which will only add to people’s confusion.

To be fair what they should have done is left peoples D/D's well alone and literally just took £67 off all bills from October till March.  Then a consumer could just increase or decrease their D/D accordingly from their own decisions.  We are all different.  I have created a buffer of several hundred pounds in my energy account and I am happy for it to be in there.  Others like any extra they have refunded into their bank accounts.  Just taking £67 of all monthly bills and the relevant calculation for quarterly would be so much easier.

I agree that would have been the simplest thing,  and even more important I think,  ALL suppliers should do, whatever was decided,  the same thing,  there would have been much less confusion.

(Ha ha, like you I was really happy with my 'buffer' that I'd built up for Winter, then EDF went and refunded almost all of it - I hope you manage to keep yours where it is 😄)

Alnat1

Some need the money back from their electricity supply company because they need to pay extra on gas which is with a different supplier. By giving it back (or taking less in some cases) it allows the customer the freedom to choose where it is spent.

funny.money

Alnat1 said:

Some need the money back from their electricity supply company because they need to pay extra on gas which is with a different supplier. By giving it back (or taking less in some cases) it allows the customer the freedom to choose where it is spent.

Yes, that is also true.

Spoonie_Turtle

Alnat1 said:

Some need the money back from their electricity supply company because they need to pay extra on gas which is with a different supplier. By giving it back (or taking less in some cases) it allows the customer the freedom to choose where it is spent.

That was the whole point, to free up some money for spending on essentials such as gas, food, rent, etc.

funny.money said:

Max68 said:

[Deleted User] said:

What suppliers have failed to do, probably as a result of the late call on the EPG, is a recalculation of the annual consumer cost based on the EPG rates plus/minus any debit/credit balance. From the revised cost would have come the revised DD payment which for the next 6 months would have been discounted by £66/67.

It is all very simple given that the EPG is in all but name a fixed tariff; however, I suspect that many people will over the next few weeks be confronted with an increase in their DDs which will only add to people’s confusion.

To be fair what they should have done is left peoples D/D's well alone and literally just took £67 off all bills from October till March.  Then a consumer could just increase or decrease their D/D accordingly from their own decisions.  We are all different.  I have created a buffer of several hundred pounds in my energy account and I am happy for it to be in there.  Others like any extra they have refunded into their bank accounts.  Just taking £67 of all monthly bills and the relevant calculation for quarterly would be so much easier.

I agree that would have been the simplest thing,  and even more important I think,  ALL suppliers should do, whatever was decided,  the same thing,  there would have been much less confusion.

That would require them all having the same payment systems, which they very much don't.

alibean121

It is very confusing. I thought I understood what Eon were going to do. I had seen the DD reduce from £70 to £3 in the account and £3 has gone out today. All fine so far - I will forgive them the £1, presuming they didn’t want to adjust all the DDs twice.

I then entered a meter reading today. Waiting for the account to update for reading and payment. I had thought I’d see essentially a £69/70 payment added to the account but I see in the transaction list that I’ve used £3.55 of electric according to todays reading (sadly this is far from the truth) so looks like they’re deducting it from the usage instead of adding it to the payment. I await my statement…