Tomato Energy (Electric Only Supplier) - Too Good To Be True ?

bristolleedsfan

bob2302 said:

wakeupalarm said:

I am having the same issue with Octopus and Tomato Energy double charging me.  After spending a week back and forth with Octopus, they claim they obtained the Final meter reading from the smart meter 2 weeks after I switched.  So it's interesting to hear that they don't have access to the smart meter after the switch happens.

The figure comes from a third party guestimate  rather than an actual reading. I suppose with dumb meters the customer was incentivized to fiddle the final reading, pushing some usage into whatever tariff was cheaper. With smart meters there really should be a transition period where both suppliers have access to the meter data. 

Octopus seemingly have developed a habit of creating final reading based on Octopus estimating reading nothing to do with third party and not unique to switches to T.E. Old supplier is supposed to use same reading as new supplier.

bob2302

bristolleedsfan said:

bob2302 said:

wakeupalarm said:

I am having the same issue with Octopus and Tomato Energy double charging me.  After spending a week back and forth with Octopus, they claim they obtained the Final meter reading from the smart meter 2 weeks after I switched.  So it's interesting to hear that they don't have access to the smart meter after the switch happens.

The figure comes from a third party guestimate  rather than an actual reading. I suppose with dumb meters the customer was incentivized to fiddle the final reading, pushing some usage into whatever tariff was cheaper. With smart meters there really should be a transition period where both suppliers have access to the meter data. 

Octopus seemingly have developed a habit of creating final reading based on Octopus estimating reading nothing to do with third party and not unique to switches to T.E. Old supplier is supposed to use same reading as new supplier.

When I went to Octopus from OtM, Octopus apologized for using neither my final reading nor the smart meter reading -  they said they had no choice in the matter. I don't see how you could know whether the estimate came from a third-party or Octopus. 

bristolleedsfan

bob2302 said:

bristolleedsfan said:

bob2302 said:

wakeupalarm said:

I am having the same issue with Octopus and Tomato Energy double charging me.  After spending a week back and forth with Octopus, they claim they obtained the Final meter reading from the smart meter 2 weeks after I switched.  So it's interesting to hear that they don't have access to the smart meter after the switch happens.

The figure comes from a third party guestimate  rather than an actual reading. I suppose with dumb meters the customer was incentivized to fiddle the final reading, pushing some usage into whatever tariff was cheaper. With smart meters there really should be a transition period where both suppliers have access to the meter data. 

Octopus seemingly have developed a habit of creating final reading based on Octopus estimating reading nothing to do with third party and not unique to switches to T.E. Old supplier is supposed to use same reading as new supplier.

I don't see how you could know whether the estimate came from a third-party or Octopus. 

It was obvious to me being as it said estimated reading rather than Data Collector, reading was higher than new supplier used which was same as smart reading at that time, in fact estimated reading Octopus created was higher than smart meter reading new supplier took couple of weeks later.

Estimated reading was not in line with anything being as no gas had been used March 2024 - after switch date.( November 2024)

 

JKS$(

bristolleedsfan said:....I don't see how you could know whether the estimate came from a third-party or Octopus. 

It was obvious to me being as it said estimated reading rather than Data Collector, reading was higher than new supplier used which was same as smart reading at that time, in fact estimated reading Octopus created was higher than smart meter reading new supplier took couple of weeks later.

Estimated reading was not in line with anything being as no gas had been used March 2024 - after switch date.( November 2024)

 

Do you mean your Octopus bill said it was estimated? If so, where on the bill? 

I've never seen the words data collector on any bill from them - would they use an abbreviation instead?

All my Octopus bills have always said 'smart meter reading' next to the figure. Even those where the figures were clearly wrong. 

masonic

JKS$( said:

bristolleedsfan said:....I don't see how you could know whether the estimate came from a third-party or Octopus. 

It was obvious to me being as it said estimated reading rather than Data Collector, reading was higher than new supplier used which was same as smart reading at that time, in fact estimated reading Octopus created was higher than smart meter reading new supplier took couple of weeks later.

Estimated reading was not in line with anything being as no gas had been used March 2024 - after switch date.( November 2024)

 

Do you mean your Octopus bill said it was estimated? If so, where on the bill? 

I've never seen the words data collector on any bill from them - would they use an abbreviation instead?

All my Octopus bills have always said 'smart meter reading' next to the figure. Even those where the figures were clearly wrong. 

Here are some examples from a couple of my previous bills:

JKS$(

For those with gaps in their TE/myWatts consumption data - what does this look like? A blank space? A 0 or row of 0's? Someting else?

I don't have any blanks or 0's in my consumption units, but in the consumption cost I have some figures to 7 decimal places (e.g 0.5547984 & others with numbers to 7 dp with several 0's addedd (eg:0.5085652000000000)

Any explaination for the difference formats? Not that it should matter for billing, I'm simply curious.

I switched on Jan 27th, so over 30 days, but haven't had a first bill yet. 

bristolleedsfan

JKS$( said:

bristolleedsfan said:....I don't see how you could know whether the estimate came from a third-party or Octopus. 

It was obvious to me being as it said estimated reading rather than Data Collector, reading was higher than new supplier used which was same as smart reading at that time, in fact estimated reading Octopus created was higher than smart meter reading new supplier took couple of weeks later.

Estimated reading was not in line with anything being as no gas had been used March 2024 - after switch date.( November 2024)

 

Do you mean your Octopus bill said it was estimated? If so, where on the bill? 

Some will say not much would not have bothered about it, for me it is 10 days usage on cold nights + principal should not be paying for same units twice.( switched out date was 25th November)

Newbie_John

JKS$( said:

For those with gaps in their TE/myWatts consumption data - what does this look like? A blank space? A 0 or row of 0's? Someting else?

I don't have any blanks or 0's in my consumption units, but in the consumption cost I have some figures to 7 decimal places (e.g 0.5547984 & others with numbers to 7 dp with several 0's addedd (eg:0.5085652000000000)

Any explaination for the difference formats? Not that it should matter for billing, I'm simply curious.

I switched on Jan 27th, so over 30 days, but haven't had a first bill yet. 

I have 3 blank 30 mins slots in Jan, on the chart they're empty - haven't looked at data but it must be 0. Had some blanks at the end of Feb but they've been fixed and a bill issued already.

I guess the different formats come maybe from different ways of pulling the data? No clue.
As long as the bill is within the range I expect and matches what my IHD says then I don't really care now (used to check everything in October though as it was shifted back then).

masonic

JKS$( said:

For those with gaps in their TE/myWatts consumption data - what does this look like? A blank space? A 0 or row of 0's? Someting else?

I don't have any blanks or 0's in my consumption units, but in the consumption cost I have some figures to 7 decimal places (e.g 0.5547984 & others with numbers to 7 dp with several 0's addedd (eg:0.5085652000000000)

Any explaination for the difference formats? Not that it should matter for billing, I'm simply curious.

I switched on Jan 27th, so over 30 days, but haven't had a first bill yet. 

The CSV that accompanies the bill shows blanks where there is missing data, not zero consumption. All figures are rounded to 3dp.

With the Overview download it looks like a floating point precision issue. I hadn't noticed as upon import to a spreadsheet the numbers get rounded to sensible values, but several of my raw figures have trailing 999999999s or 000000001s etc. The consumption figures are ok, but the calculated cost figures have not been rounded.

WibbleBaaaaaa

Well TE may just have weathered the storm because Scottish gas are dropping their SC by 20p from 70p to 50p, and also offering 22p kwh for 16 months, and they are one of the most expensive up here in Scotland, so it looks like with the SC dropping so much of the SC, TE may just has become a bit more secure for the future if gas prices are going to cause one of the big greedy 6 to start dropping prices like this, so i am waiting to see what Octo and the rest are going to offer....but lower prices across the board are good news for TE longevity.