Cheery's path to fulfilment - finishing the DIY, looking after myself, appreciating the garden 🌻

Cheery_Daff

This is the Octopus Agile tariff that we've just switched to - you can only have it if your smart meter can send 30 min readings. Most of them aren't like this but I thought we'd experiment after seeing a few others on here doing it 😊

Cheery_Daff

Granola made, pasta bake almost done, casserole just boiling then it'll go into the hay box for the afternoon. Washing machine on, but the button hadn't pressed properly when I first did it, so I didn't start it til 11.30. Never mind. 

Back to work now for a bit, and I'll probably have a bit of pasta bake for lunch in a while 😊

greenbee

I should have set the DW off earlier. Might do it in a minute and hope it squeaks to a finish before peak rate! (Not literally squeaks, obviously!). 

EssexHebridean

I'm still enjoying Agile I have to say, although this week has been a bit of a wake-up call after the negative prices of last week!  As you say though, it's the average that counts, and I'm keeping a good eye on that - we're currently showing an average unit price of just over 13p which is pretty impressive, but it's definitely creeping up now there is less very cheap slots around! It's a challenge trying to work out exactly when it's best to do thigs like running the WM (overnight, mostly!) for sure, but also definitely easier when you've been used to load-shifting before I suspect - for us it's just going back to what we used to do with running things on our old off-peak rate of course! (Only with better savings possible!) 

I am finding the feeling that I need to just not get cracking with cooking dinner, for example, when I get in ahead of 7pm a bit annoying, but also, it's quite nice to just sit down for a bit at that stage, or potter about doing odd jobs that don't use much electricity, so that is probably just a case of getting used to a change of mindset... 

Cheery_Daff

Yes, this week's rates haven't been that much of a dramatic difference, have they?? We're not going to be doing anything overnight I don't think, so for us it'll be about avoiding the early evening peak. Will reassess at the end of November, it might be that winter wasn't the best time to change, but we'll see. I don't want it to become downright annoying - if we've got people round and we want pizza for tea I'll be sticking the oven on, even if it's before 7. But that's pretty rare so should be cancelled out by the rest anyway. I hope! 

Where are you seeing your average unit price? In the comparison app? 

greenbee

Cheery_Daff said:

Yes, this week's rates haven't been that much of a dramatic difference, have they?? We're not going to be doing anything overnight I don't think, so for us it'll be about avoiding the early evening peak. Will reassess at the end of November, it might be that winter wasn't the best time to change, but we'll see. I don't want it to become downright annoying - if we've got people round and we want pizza for tea I'll be sticking the oven on, even if it's before 7. But that's pretty rare so should be cancelled out by the rest anyway. I hope! 

Where are you seeing your average unit price? In the comparison app? 

I have the same question!

I'm making much better use of my solar at the moment, although in theory I should be importing and exporting more as I'm still on Flux for export till they sort it out - which gives me a very profitable rate for peak rate export. However, I'm actually happy just getting the hang of Agile. When prices drop a bit I'll go back to trying to get the import automated, but for now I'm actually OK picking out the cheapest 30 minute slots and turning charge from grid on/off depending on how long I think the battery will last. It hasn't done too badly today, although the sun has just gone in and the DW is still on, so it may be a bit dicey this evening! Having said that, i don't use much electricity during the week as I mostly just reheat things on the hob in the evening and have salad for lunch. So it's coffee, hot water bottles, and the DW that have the big impact. 

Bluegreen143

I’m finding this energy chat fascinating. I don’t think it’s for me - I’d rather just find a tariff which offers reasonably good value, and then not think about it again in between paying the bills, but I can see how using an agile tariff not only gets you load shifting but much more aware of your usage so that’s positive. (I don’t think we have the right kind of smart meter anyway).

I’ll be interested to see over time if you decide the savings are worth it in proportion to the amount of time and mental energy you’re spending managing your energy use. It kind of feels intuitively to me that it’s a lot of effort for a small amount of gain, but I could be totally wrong here! 

greenbee

@Bluegreen143 I've made a decision that based on my working pattern and the load shifting I already do pretty much instinctively for the solar it was worth moving to Agile for import. However, someone was questioning (on the energy board) why not Agile for export - for me, unless I spend the time building automations via Home Assistant (probably a very steep learning curve!) it's not worth the effort at this stage compared to what I can earn by spending the time working. However, it may be something to look into in the long term. Although by the time I retire I suspect they won't be paying for export anymore!

Cheery_Daff

You might well be right @Bluegreen143 - I've done it because it looked from the comparison of our normal usage that it would make sense for us anyway, even without any attempt at load shifting, just because we're often at home all day and don't really ramp up activity early evening. We'll see. 

Today's cooking was a success, and I've added 3 portions of pasta bake and 3 portions of lentil casserole to the freezer, plus I have a week's worth of breakfast granola (mostly made because we somehow have a large surplus of yogurt that needs using up!)

Finally got round to checking on Mr C's regular saver. Either we didn't set it up properly, or we set it up then didn't pay in quickly enough and they closed it again - either way, it wasn't there. Have started again and already had the confirmation email so hopefully that'll go through this time. Probably no bad thing that they're staggered I suppose. Although if I'd had any sense I wouldn't have set the standing order date for 3rd of the month - I should have gone later so they had a chance to process the first one! Maybe that'll be long enough. Who knows. 

One (or maybe two??) of the others ends in Jan, so not too much of an overlap. 

Had an email about a product survey, would have paid £15, got all excited but then they rejected me, I suspect because I only do 2 loads of washing a week 😂

What else? My dad was meant to have cataract surgery today but apparently the assessment was over 3 months ago so they've done another assessment and sent him away again 🙄 Hopefully soon, apparently he's reading with a magnifying glass 🙄

Nowt else to report i don't think. Very much enjoying having a week working at home! Feel like I've been in the office an awful lot lately, hopefully just a phase, although I've got 6 weeks in a row before Christmas when I'll be in 3 days a week, and the final week I'll be in all four days! Will be very ready for a fortnight off after that 😂

Cheery_Daff

More clearing out this evening. Mr C was attacking his music room, which was the victim of a stash-and-dash episode when our friends came to stay the other week. Obviously clearing that yielded a pile of stuff that had been removed from the living room... Couple of hours of pottering and things look much better - more to do but I confess I couldn't be bothered 😂

Still, nice to be getting rid. We have both identified more stuff for the charity shop. I've selected a coat for my new one to replace - I need to sew the lining up before donating. 

We also had a happy 15 mins playing with the shredder😂 Mr C hasn't used one before 😂 Ended up shredding cheques from old, closed accounts, great fun 😂😂