Octopus Agile

Pat38493

MultiFuelBurner said:

@Spoonie_Turtle

Just to clarify that example was to backup my assumption that those on the Agile tariff know what to do because otherwise they should no be on that tariff. Those people can quite easily beat the tracker rate even without solar and batteries. With Solar and batteries it must be an amazing tariff.

We moved off Agile to Tracker as like others we do like to cook in the evening, especially coming into Autumn and then Winter.

That said if prices of tracker rocket we will adjust (and can adjust as you point out) to cooking meals in batch/lunchtime and reheating cheaply in a microwave for the evening hot meal should we wish on the Cosy Tariff or Agile (we will see which works out best for our lifestyle)

I am waiting on a couple of quotes for solar and batteries but the property has a number of flaws for solar like shading from trees and only one roof that is south facing and it's small (4 panels only) we do have a decent amount of west facing roofline so perhaps it could work. We shall wait for the prices but battery wise with the ASHP thats where most of the stored battery energy will be diverted and we may be looking at 5-10kwh of battery storage to maximise our savings.

I am on Agile without solar panels nor batteries and I’m not sure I agree that you can easily beat the tracker rate.  I suppose it depends what you define as easy.  In the last rolling 1 month I did beat the tracker rate by the princely sum of £2.04 on a cost of £186.  So yes I did it but if I was to caculate my “hourly rate” for the amount of time I spent faffing about and also take into account the hours in the evening when I chose not to do something because “it will use too much power” I could argue that it’s in the territory of “wouldn’t get out of bed for that pay”

Also on days where we didn’t use many heavy load appliances, which do happen sometimes, we unsurprisingly didn’t beat the tracker rate.

MultiFuelBurner

Pat38493 said:

MultiFuelBurner said:

@Spoonie_Turtle

Just to clarify that example was to backup my assumption that those on the Agile tariff know what to do because otherwise they should no be on that tariff. Those people can quite easily beat the tracker rate even without solar and batteries. With Solar and batteries it must be an amazing tariff.

We moved off Agile to Tracker as like others we do like to cook in the evening, especially coming into Autumn and then Winter.

That said if prices of tracker rocket we will adjust (and can adjust as you point out) to cooking meals in batch/lunchtime and reheating cheaply in a microwave for the evening hot meal should we wish on the Cosy Tariff or Agile (we will see which works out best for our lifestyle)

I am waiting on a couple of quotes for solar and batteries but the property has a number of flaws for solar like shading from trees and only one roof that is south facing and it's small (4 panels only) we do have a decent amount of west facing roofline so perhaps it could work. We shall wait for the prices but battery wise with the ASHP thats where most of the stored battery energy will be diverted and we may be looking at 5-10kwh of battery storage to maximise our savings.

I am on Agile without solar panels nor batteries and I’m not sure I agree that you can easily beat the tracker rate.  I suppose it depends what you define as easy.  In the last rolling 1 month I did beat the tracker rate by the princely sum of £2.04 on a cost of £186.  So yes I did it but if I was to caculate my “hourly rate” for the amount of time I spent faffing about and also take into account the hours in the evening when I chose not to do something because “it will use too much power” I could argue that it’s in the territory of “wouldn’t get out of bed for that pay”

Also on days where we didn’t use many heavy load appliances, which do happen sometimes, we unsurprisingly didn’t beat the tracker rate.

Then I think you have answered your own question like we did when we sent a message to Octopus to switch us to tracker for ease of use.

It does sound like tracker would be much better for you as it was for us. As you point out it is pence per day.

To add, the effort required with Agile is not overstretching the grid in peak times which may give some satisfaction to those that see the gas and coal being burnt during those times. Some would see that as worth it and not base it on your hourly rate of effort?

la531983

Bit more wind about today so hopefully this is reflected in the day ahead auction pricing and today is just a blip.

mmmmikey

Sounds like we are in unanimous agreement that Tracker is a better option for a lot of people :-)

As you say @la531983 it will be interesting to see what happens today :-)

la531983

mmmmikey said:

Sounds like we are in unanimous agreement that Tracker is a better option for a lot of people :-)

I am certainly not in a position to have my evening meal at 3.30pm or 9pm, if I suggested that at home I wouldnt be popular for long.

la531983

mmmmikey said:

Sounds like we are in unanimous agreement that Tracker is a better option for a lot of people :-)

As you say @la531983 it will be interesting to see what happens today :-)

Gas shooting up 10% in post-weekend trading this morning not going to be helpful I suspect.

Anyway, hour auction prices for Tracker have just become available and my 19.8p all day rate today becomes....19.18p tomorrow. However, the 6-8pm hours are down a decent chunk so this should reflect in the half hour auction pricing due out later.

MultiFuelBurner

I wonder if we have historical information before Russia invaded Ukraine and before covid and before the wild west of the energy market as to the usual swing in percentages for wholesale costs through the seasons.

PennineAcute

Does anyone know Tracker's Elec SC rate for the NW please?  Calculating it as the same as Agile, I would be 8p a day better off, between 16 August and 10 September.  Obviously if it is different, then the difference becomes fairly insignificant.

QrizB

PennineAcute said:

Does anyone know Tracker's Elec SC rate for the NW please?

Go to https://octopus.energy/tariffs/

Ignore the "Get a Quote" button.

Enter your postcode in the box. You'll see the various tariff options for your area, including Tracker.

Pat38493

MultiFuelBurner said:

Pat38493 said:

MultiFuelBurner said:

@Spoonie_Turtle

Just to clarify that example was to backup my assumption that those on the Agile tariff know what to do because otherwise they should no be on that tariff. Those people can quite easily beat the tracker rate even without solar and batteries. With Solar and batteries it must be an amazing tariff.

We moved off Agile to Tracker as like others we do like to cook in the evening, especially coming into Autumn and then Winter.

That said if prices of tracker rocket we will adjust (and can adjust as you point out) to cooking meals in batch/lunchtime and reheating cheaply in a microwave for the evening hot meal should we wish on the Cosy Tariff or Agile (we will see which works out best for our lifestyle)

I am waiting on a couple of quotes for solar and batteries but the property has a number of flaws for solar like shading from trees and only one roof that is south facing and it's small (4 panels only) we do have a decent amount of west facing roofline so perhaps it could work. We shall wait for the prices but battery wise with the ASHP thats where most of the stored battery energy will be diverted and we may be looking at 5-10kwh of battery storage to maximise our savings.

I am on Agile without solar panels nor batteries and I’m not sure I agree that you can easily beat the tracker rate.  I suppose it depends what you define as easy.  In the last rolling 1 month I did beat the tracker rate by the princely sum of £2.04 on a cost of £186.  So yes I did it but if I was to caculate my “hourly rate” for the amount of time I spent faffing about and also take into account the hours in the evening when I chose not to do something because “it will use too much power” I could argue that it’s in the territory of “wouldn’t get out of bed for that pay”

Also on days where we didn’t use many heavy load appliances, which do happen sometimes, we unsurprisingly didn’t beat the tracker rate.

Then I think you have answered your own question like we did when we sent a message to Octopus to switch us to tracker for ease of use.

It does sound like tracker would be much better for you as it was for us. As you point out it is pence per day.

To add, the effort required with Agile is not overstretching the grid in peak times which may give some satisfaction to those that see the gas and coal being burnt during those times. Some would see that as worth it and not base it on your hourly rate of effort?

You are right but there is one other advantage of agile versus tracker which is the opt out and opt in situation.  I can move from agile to another tariff pretty much immediately, and back again after 30 days.  Agile is already running at a rate significantly cheaper than my intended tariff when I joined Octopus which was Go.

I am a bit reluctant to go on Tracker when we are going into the winter months.  It’s not so much the issue of taking “up to 2 weeks” to switch away but more that you can’t go back on it for 9 months.   Therefore I am not sure whether to ,ove to tracker now or wait till the Spring.