Octopus saving sessions

Spoonie_Turtle

Chrysalis said:

Netexporter said:

I have a saver session every day, being on Agile. I just make a bit more effort on official saver days just to be public spirited (although the 8888888888888888 Octopoints prize would be nice!).

I prefer a smaller max prize so there is more small prize wins, can really feel the effect on the octoplus wheel.

Had 6 spins on it all one penny (8 points).

My last 6 spins on normal wheel was 4x £1 and 2 losses.

That's more than I've ever won since joining Octopus!  It's been either 2 or 3x£1, since Feb 2020.

bristolleedsfan

Chrysalis said:

Netexporter said:

I have a saver session every day, being on Agile. I just make a bit more effort on official saver days just to be public spirited (although the 8888888888888888 Octopoints prize would be nice!).

I prefer a smaller max prize so there is more small prize wins, can really feel the effect on the octoplus wheel.

Had 6 spins on it all one penny (8 points).

My last 6 spins on normal wheel was 4x £1 and 2 losses.

I think the amount you mentioned on tracker thread that you won in total on WOF is exception rather than typical.

4.5 years until changed to Octoplus I won 2 x £1 including the month everybody won, have won £1 on WOF since changed to Octoplus

northernstar007

1x8pts, 1x800pts this morning , not bad for nowt

QrizB

The Octoplus WoF pays out more than the regular one does, IIRC.

This doesn't mean that any individual account is guaranteed to win more in a year on Octoplus than they did before.

BellaBlondykeTheThird

Only received 8 octoplumps per spin so far. Never very lucky with these things.

MattMattMattUK

Chrysalis said:

This year I think its been even worse than last year, with various sessions seemingly requiring to be on whatsapp to be informed, on one session I noticed it by accident on the app, and got an email alert over a day and a half later with less than hour notice.  Yet they knew about it almost two days before as the app was letting me opt in.

They are test events, they are designed to see how effective various methods of communication are and how quickly customers respond to demand reduction by varying methods, they are not live events.

Chrysalis said:

The few I took part in the new formula has been brutal, likely because my historic usage on peak is low anyway.  Given octoplus trashes the wheel of fortune, I think I will leave octoplus which in turn will dump me out of this scheme.

They are not designed to be a random bonus, but to test (and in the future use live) a system which keeps the grid online without needing coal reduction, or industrial users being disconnected, it is not "brutal", it is reflecting where demand reduction is needed. Leaving OctoPlus, a scheme which costs nothing to be part of, would be cutting off one's nose to spite one's face, your gains might be less than last year, but they are gains none the less. 

TheElectricCow

pete-20-11 said:

I’m not sure what octopus do with the rest of the £3 DFS payment, but I imagine there’s some admin costs to run saving sessions

yes a lot of it is probably automated, but it will have an impact on customer service for example (lots of people asking where their points are or why they can’t sign up)

if they are using some of the 75p for admin costs that seems fair - the alternative is to increase everyone’s bills slightly to cover those admin costs, rather than just keep it to those taking part.

plus using it for spot prizes etc seems like a good idea - might keep some people interested in the scheme, especially those with smaller gains. Even those people saving pennies are useful as add up loads of customers like that and it makes a difference to the grid. 

At first glance, the cut Octopus takes may look a little steep compared to others, but I agree that on balance it’s a perfectly reasonable amount and it doesn’t bother me at all if some part of that is a source of revenue for them.

I’d consider Octopus to be the largest and most reliable provider in terms of DFS events, even from last year the scheme was open to all customers with a working smart meter and generally speaking everything on their end worked as it should.

Looking at the likes of Eon who last time (I think still are) paying the full £3:
Their implementation of the scheme has been fraught with confusion, miscommunication, a lack of transparency, (initially) run on an arbitrary invitation only basis, and last year they made undisclosed payout formula changes halfway through to which we can only assume they may have profited from. They’re also continuing to intentionally obscure the methods by which their payouts to customers are derived, with some “target reduction” percentage being involved to get anything.

The higher paying apps are a good alternative, although their payout methods appear to be less ideal than account credit/cash paid after each event that the suppliers can offer. From what I gather they tend to be gift card payments and/or only paid at the conclusion of this phase of DFS events in March.

Octopus have clearly invested a not insignificant amount of resources in being able to facilitate events like DFS on a much larger scale than anyone else, and to allow them to run relatively smoothly with things mostly just working. With Octopus I’m confident that I’ll be able to participate in all events without issues, and that the payout will be promptly delivered and correct (or corrected quickly) while being immediately redeemable as account credit. Their approach is transparent and communications are pretty clear, even if the notifications are currently whatsapp focused. 

For all that, I’ve no problem whatsoever with the rewards being a bit lower than others whether that difference is all going towards prizes, recovering their own setup/admin costs, or is just a small profit for them. In my opinion Octopus have so far done the best job of generally running the scheme and have fairly earned however much they need to take to provide this service.

mjm3346

if I have worked it out correctly (they sent an email a while ago that mentioned over 500,000 had opted into an earlier session) During the past four Saving Sessions, Octopus customers collectively saved 493.33 megawatt hours of power.

The 75p is per unit saved not per person so when they give everyone 25p just for opting in they are paying out possibly upwards of £125,000 per session regardless of any saving for the 500,000 upwards who opt in - the savings over the last 4 sessions were approx  433,000 units so x 75p = £325,000 - compared to £250,000 upwards just paid to those who opted in then they paid the top 20% 50p last time = £100,000. It will have taken using money from previous sessions to balance the books. 

BellaBlondykeTheThird

I have no doubt Octopus won't be fiddling the system.

born_again

Would be so nice if it was a simple. Do you want to take part single sign up & a message just advising when they are, rather than having to sign up to each one.