Octopus Agile vs Tracker vs Go

Pat38493

Any views on whether there is a clear answer to which tariff would be cheapest over a full year if I am an high energy user (about £420 per month DD for Electric and Gas) with an EV which is used for on average a couple of hundred miles a week and charged mainly at home?  We don’t have solar or battery and we shift a bit of our usage (dishwasher, dryer, washing machine) into non peak whenever we remember to do it.

I have seen websites where you can analyse all the data for the Tracker and Agile tariffs, but unless you hook it up to your usage data it’s hard to tell because just looking at unit price changes over the year doesn’t take into account that you are probably using more at times when it’s more expensive (apart from EV Charging and whatever else you can shift).

Also - can I switch back and forth - e.g. can I go on Agile in the summer and then on Go in the winter?

JohnPo

A really good set of questions as there no correct answer to which is the right tariff. If we ignore the gas other than assume you a make decision on the SVT or Tracker and the Octopus rules on moving of tracker and back again then focus on the electricity tariff.

It depends on how you load shift and looking back at historical usage is not much help, the current 'GO' day rate is no more only 2p more than the SVT, so with an EV if you charge at the current 9p off peak then it will almost certainly work better than the SVT. Ideally what you need to do is look at couple of months bills or more and work out what your average per Kwhr rate is based on what you currently pay versus 'GO', 'Tracker'  and also what it might be if you load shifted somewhat from what you currently do.

The really hard one to work out is Agile, I dropped of 'GO' in April to Agile as the renewal had 40p plus day rate (they have dropped that now to around 31p) and Agile prices were and are still quite good, I am still not sure quite what average I paid was - I know it was less than the SVT.  I took a decision to move to Intelligent Octopus in June when I changed EV and that works out really well with 6 hours 7.5p off peak plus bonus hours during the day.  Agile does penalise anyone who uses power in the 4pm to 7pm window and with the 100p cap might be problem in winter if wholesale prices go high again, same issue with Tracker.

Supposedly you cant switch between 'Smart Tariffs' - Agile / GO etc. without a month's break on the SVT, I managed to switch from GO to Agile and then to Intelligent without any problem. In earlier years - pre energy crisis some folk would switch to 'GO' in the autumn and back to Agile in spring time from posts I have read in various forums.The current 'GO' & 'Intelligent Octopus' day rate is now much better than when I first looked at 'GO' in December 2021 - so if you have any opportunity to load shift e.g. an EV, why wouldn't move off the the SVT?

[Deleted User]

Supposedly you cant switch between 'Smart Tariffs' - Agile / GO etc. without a month's break on the SVT

The ‘30 day’ rule was brought in to stop serial tariff switchers who were closely monitoring future Agile prices. If a customer has been on a smart tariff for more than 30 days, then Octopus normally waives this requirement. Remember, there is a 9 months ‘no return’ on Tracker.

Pat38493

[Deleted User] said:

Supposedly you cant switch between 'Smart Tariffs' - Agile / GO etc. without a month's break on the SVT

Remember, there is a 9 months ‘no return’ on Tracker.

Out of interest why would they have a 9 month no return on Tracker, but not on Agile?

[Deleted User]

Pat38493 said:

[Deleted User] said:

Supposedly you cant switch between 'Smart Tariffs' - Agile / GO etc. without a month's break on the SVT

Remember, there is a 9 months ‘no return’ on Tracker.

Out of interest why would they have a 9 month no return on Tracker, but not on Agile?

You will have to ask Octopus. 

tastyhog

I'm on agile and there's not much in it for my usage, tracker is marginally cheaper, but you're talking pennies a day

Agile is about a pound cheaper a day then octopus GO for my usage at this time of year, but in winter a tariff like go is better because of the night rate to use the storage heaters. 

But I guess it depends if you can load shift, like if there's a 10 - 15p rate for a few hours if you can get your washing / drying / cooking done then, you'll come out under the tracker rate for the day, but if the rates go to 40p plus for a bit it wipes out the savings on the lower rates for the day

Download the octopus compare app and providing you have a smart meter you can compare your actual usage between different tariffs to see if you'd need to change the way you use things to make a saving, you'll also see a breakdown of average unit rate for the day / week etc, I'm often under the tracker rate, but sometime 5 - 10p above it

Pat38493

tastyhog said:

I'm on agile and there's not much in it for my usage, tracker is marginally cheaper, but you're talking pennies a day

Agile is about a pound cheaper a day then octopus GO for my usage at this time of year, but in winter a tariff like go is better because of the night rate to use the storage heaters. 

But I guess it depends if you can load shift, like if there's a 10 - 15p rate for a few hours if you can get your washing / drying / cooking done then, you'll come out under the tracker rate for the day, but if the rates go to 40p plus for a bit it wipes out the savings on the lower rates for the day

Download the octopus compare app and providing you have a smart meter you can compare your actual usage between different tariffs to see if you'd need to change the way you use things to make a saving, you'll also see a breakdown of average unit rate for the day / week etc, I'm often under the tracker rate, but sometime 5 - 10p above it

Thanks - that app "Octopus Compare" looks like it might be just the ticket from the description.  However it also looks like it pulls the usage data directly from your Octopus account rather than from the meter directly, so I guess I will have to wait till Octopus have been my provider for a while so that there is a reasonable data sample.

Since it's the middle of Summer now, part of me thinks I should go onto Tracker and then come off it in the autumn, even if I could only do that every 2 years.  However, the Octopus website says that Tracker is currently closed to new subscribers, even though this website was reporting yesterday that it's just been re-opened.

tlcgrantham

Tracker below 12pkwh tomorrow so Agile likely to be under 8pkwh on average and even negative at times.

Pat38493

tlcgrantham said:

Tracker below 12pkwh tomorrow so Agile likely to be under 8pkwh on average and even negative at times.

Thanks - for the moment I have switched to Octopus Go until I get some more data from my meters.

Interestingly after doing a spreadsheet for just the first few days of usage, it looks like Octopus Go is very slightly cheaper (at least for my household) than their standard flexible tariff even on days where I didn't do any load shifting.  I guess this is because their peak rate is only very slightly above the normal peak rate.  I contrast this with British Gas for example - with their EV tariff the peak rate is significantly higher than their standard variable rate, so you end up paying more if you don't load shift.

I was also a bit surprised that Octopus doesn't provide daily cost information on their website - if I try to look at the cost on the app or website, I get a message that they can't give cost information on this tariff.  The reason I was surprised is that it didn't seem like rocket science to do this - I knocked up a spreadsheet to do it in about half an hour and I'm not even an programmer.

LtMike77

tlcgrantham said:

Tracker below 12pkwh tomorrow so Agile likely to be under 8pkwh on average and even negative at times.

How do you find out tomorrow's Tracker price?

Spoonie_Turtle

LtMike77 said:

tlcgrantham said:

Tracker below 12pkwh tomorrow so Agile likely to be under 8pkwh on average and even negative at times.

How do you find out tomorrow's Tracker price?

https://mysmartenergy.uk/Tracker/Eastern-England (substitute whichever region).  Day-ahead prices for electricity are settled ~9am, I'm not sure if the page updates then or a bit later.