New Octopus tariff for solar and battery users - Octopus Flux

cm4ever

Ron-ski said:

@cm4ever Thanks, but will it fix the problem, or will I need to the same monthly?

Well not necessarily, but just some points to remember in your specific case: -

1. You used to be on the FIT scheme with a different supplier, so that has added extra delay i.e. have Octopus had confirmation from your FIT scheme supplier as you've mentioned previously?

2. From memory I think you said Octopus had confirmed to you that they had now activated your Flux export on 11th or 12th of April - at that point did you submit an initial export reading from your SMETS2 meter to Octopus to open up your export account?

So it's not really that easy to answer your seemingly simple question.....

Definitely when I signed up to exporting through Octopus I had to supply an opening export meter reading from my SMETS2 meter - they asked for it to open the export side of the account for the export MPAN.

Supplying a set of meter readings to Octopus virtually always generates an account statement - it's just how their system works, initially seemed weird to me but I've grown to appreciate the feature.

Best advice to you, irrespective of having SMETS2 meters which Octopus have said they are reading is to send in a set of readings like I said previously -this should activate the generation of a statement - which is what you're commenting on that you haven't had so far ........ then contact Octopus via twitter, supplying you name, account number, address etc and ask for someone to look at your account and confirm everything's fully configured, mention that you've just submitted a set of meter readings and you'd like someone to confirm on what date you should expect to automatically receive future monthly statements.

Unless I send additional meter readings, I know my account runs from 28th of one month to the 27th of the next month and on the 29th I'll be able to see that associated statement.

It's too difficult to give a general answer as there's too many unknowns based on the contents of your previous posts, sorry 

Ron-ski

@cm4ever All the pieces of the puzzle are in place now which is why I hadn't previously chased it, I'll do as you say, thanks.

[Deleted User]

Ron-ski said:

@cm4ever Thanks, but will it fix the problem, or will I need to the same monthly?

To stay on Flux you need to have a working smart meter that is recording 30 minute usage. In the event that Octopus cannot solve your meter problem, then it has the right to bill you as if you were on its Flexible tariff. Given that both the import and export side of Flux has 3 price elements, how would giving  readings for import and export solve your problem?

Ron-ski

@[Deleted User] you missed the point, I have a working smart meter, I have 30 minute uploads, and so does Octopus.Its purely a problem with statements, others have also had similar issues.

As stated, giving a manual reading will trigger the system to generate a statement. I'll be on Twitter soon to get them to check everything is in order.

[Deleted User]

Ron-ski said:

@[Deleted User] you missed the point, I have a working smart meter, I have 30 minute uploads, and so does Octopus.Its purely a problem with statements, others have also had similar issues.

As stated, giving a manual reading will trigger the system to generate a statement. I'll be on Twitter soon to get them to check everything is in order.

Your meter does not upload every 30 minutes. The supplier carries out a data pull once every 24 hours that returns an index reading and an XML file containing 48 by 30 minute usage data blocks for each MPAN. The XML is used for billing not the index reading. This is my latest bill which has no index readings:

If any of the 48 data blocks is missing or corrupt then billing stops: it has been this way for the 4 years that I have had SMETS2 meters. An email to smart.help@octopus.energy will generate a manual smart meter data pull by CS. 

Ron-ski

@[Deleted User] Yes I know, but that was not the issue in my case as I stated previously. I know that there are no holes in my electric smart meta data, I've stated this, so I've no idea why you seem to think there is, why you think you know better than I do on that, after all I have the data available, you do not have my data available.

As other have said manual readings submitted, and a quick message on Twitter did the trick. I had the same issues as people I know on other forums, the system was just stuck after changing tariffs, I have now received my statement, it just like yours, only a lot better 

DougMLancs

My export is going live on Friday which’ll be 23 days from clicking ‘sign me up’. It’s a shame that I’ll have missed payment for what’s been a great month though. I do feel there’s a lot of scope for DNO’s and suppliers to have a much more joined up and automated system so that the process is measured in days and not weeks. Not that any of us would be caring half as much if it was Nov!

JKenH

Finally after much chasing of Octopus, Flux Export figures are showing up on my account. Yesterday morning, I was able to see the figures for 29th and 30th May and, by 10pm, figures were showing back to 5th May. I am still waiting for export figures to appear for 24th April to 4th May. In my discussions with Octopus they did point out that Flux was a Beta product so I suppose I should have expected some problems. Between 5th and 31st May the net cost of my electricity has been -£73.06 so it has been worth the wait. 

My export value/kWh has almost equalled the import cost and would have been closer had there been a full 28 days export. Yesterday didn’t help though as it was cold and overcast all day and my wife decided to catch up on washing and baking rather than play in the garden. Import at £1.38 was the worst day of the month and only the third (since 5th May) where we paid for any electricity. 

For the record I don’t have a grid tied battery system but do have a free standing 330w solar panel in the garden I use to charge 2 x 2.4kWh/1kW portable power stations which I can use to run our urn, toaster, air fryer and rice cooker (not all at once of course) and on a good day saves me around 2kWh of import/lost export. (The panel is mounted on a pallet on casters so I can move it around to optimise solar collection.) On a bad day like yesterday I only collected about 0.3kWh with the panel. 

I would have gone for a grid tied battery system but my DNO insisted that the potential output of any battery must be added to the potential output of my solar panels and as I was at the theoretical limit of what the export they would allow it just wasn’t possible. They would not approve any export limiting device. 

scubajoe

JKenH said:

Finally after much chasing of Octopus, Flux Export figures are showing up on my account. Yesterday morning, I was able to see the figures for 29th and 30th May and, by 10pm, figures were showing back to 5th May. I am still waiting for export figures to appear for 24th April to 4th May. In my discussions with Octopus they did point out that Flux was a Beta product so I suppose I should have expected some problems. Between 5th and 31st May the net cost of my electricity has been -£73.06 so it has been worth the wait. 

My export value/kWh has almost equalled the import cost and would have been closer had there been a full 28 days export. Yesterday didn’t help though as it was cold and overcast all day and my wife decided to catch up on washing and baking rather than play in the garden. Import at £1.38 was the worst day of the month and only the third (since 5th May) where we paid for any electricity. 

For the record I don’t have a grid tied battery system but do have a free standing 330w solar panel in the garden I use to charge 2 x 2.4kWh/1kW portable power stations which I can use to run our urn, toaster, air fryer and rice cooker (not all at once of course) and on a good day saves me around 2kWh of import/lost export. (The panel is mounted on a pallet on casters so I can move it around to optimise solar collection.) On a bad day like yesterday I only collected about 0.3kWh with the panel. 

I would have gone for a grid tied battery system but my DNO insisted that the potential output of any battery must be added to the potential output of my solar panels and as I was at the theoretical limit of what the export they would allow it just wasn’t possible. They would not approve any export limiting device. 

Wouldn't a DC coupled battery have been permitted by your DNO?

Ron-ski

JKenH said:

 

I would have gone for a grid tied battery system but my DNO insisted that the potential output of any battery must be added to the potential output of my solar panels and as I was at the theoretical limit of what the export they would allow it just wasn’t possible. They would not approve any export limiting device. 

In my experience, and experience of others I know our local DNO doesn't have a clue, I queried something with them and they told me it's th size of the PV that matters, not the batteries. PV and batteries are connected to the same 8kW inverter.

As @scubajoe said, use a hybrid inverter rated the same as your current one, and DC connect the batteries, that way there is no increase in total export power. It should also be perfectly acceptable to use a larger inverter and limit export, a G100 application I believe.