Has anyone found an off-peak Eco7 rate that gets close to Utility Warehouse?

lohr500

I've been looking round this afternoon for an Eco 7 tariff with the lowest off-peak rate.
So far, Utility Warehouse is top of the list at just over £0.05.

We don't have an EV, so we can't sign up to many of the EV focussed tariffs. Also we need the certainty of at least 6 hours continuous off-peak usage to reheat our storage heater AGA each night. Because of this, the Agile type tariffs wouldn't work.

I don't really mind what the peak rate cost is as I will shortly have battery storage capable of covering the 17 hours peak rate period.

Currently with Tomato Energy, but I am not sure about their long term future and I don't particularly want to end up going down the SOLR route, should they fail. 

All the other mainstream suppliers I have looked at are offering Eco 7 off-peak rates at around £0.10 or more.

Is there anyone other than Utility Warehouse or Tomato Energy that I should be considering who matches or gets close to £0.05?

Thanks for any input.

born_again

Also we need the certainty of at least 6 hours continuous off-peak usage to reheat our storage heater AGA each night. Because of this, the Agile type tariffs wouldn't work.

While it maybe dearer at points in the night, it will also be cheaper in the day. So you need to work out the daytime usage, Off peak usage & then balance it out.

So the headline off peak rate is not the only thing to factor in.

eg our electric bill.


Off peak 6.67p/kWh 255.8 kWh £17.056     

Peak rate 21.22p/kWh 173.8 kWh £36.873

  Average 12.55p/kWh † £53.93

Standing Charge 29 days @ 62.26p/day £18.06Subtotal of charges before VAT £71.98VAT @ 5.00% £3.60Total Electricity Charges £75.58† Average unit rate charged per kilowatt-hour.

lohr500

I'm not sure the AGA would cope with the uncertainty of when a low rate might be available. 

Even if I could build some sort of controller to only energise the heating elements during cheap periods, how could we sure on a given day there would be enough low cost electricity to heat it up? No heat = no cooking/no heat in the kitchen/no clothes drying.

Swipe

5p is crazy cheap, what are they charging for day rate and standing charge?

lohr500

For the Yorkshire area, 35.011p peak and 68.038p s/c, 5.131p off peak. Even less if you go pre-payment.

Can fix for a year as well if you take out an additional service with them like broadband or SIM only mobile, which we don't need.But it might be worth me getting a £13 a month SIM for my mum to lock in that 5p off-peak rate before they change their mind on it!

As mentioned above, the day rate is largely irrelevant to me as my planned battery storage will cover the day time usage. And as a high user, the s/c has less of an impact on the decision making process.

Currently with Tomato Energy on a 1 year fix at 5p off peak for six hours, 23.3p for most of the peak period, and two 2 hour slots at 13.3p. s/c 40.8p.

In my case, TE haven't got my billing right, they take ages to answer the phones or email, they have broken their promise to cancel my DD until the billing is sorted, and they appear to be unable to sort out their MyWatts usage reporting website.I may be unlucky with my billing, etc, but I am concerned enough about their viability to be actively looking at alternatives.

born_again

lohr500 said:

I'm not sure the AGA would cope with the uncertainty of when a low rate might be available. 

Even if I could build some sort of controller to only energise the heating elements during cheap periods, how could we sure on a given day there would be enough low cost electricity to heat it up? No heat = no cooking/no heat in the kitchen/no clothes drying.

All I was showing was that headline 5p should not be all you are looking at.

MWT

born_again said:

lohr500 said:

I'm not sure the AGA would cope with the uncertainty of when a low rate might be available. 

Even if I could build some sort of controller to only energise the heating elements during cheap periods, how could we sure on a given day there would be enough low cost electricity to heat it up? No heat = no cooking/no heat in the kitchen/no clothes drying.

All I was showing was that headline 5p should not be all you are looking at.

Given they will have a battery to cover everything outside the off-peak rate, it really is the only thing that matters to them.

They will have zero or very close to zero import outside of the low-rate period.

dunstonh

As a fellow 30amp AGA owner, we switched to Utility Warehouse back in August when the EDF fixed rate expired.

UW initially transferred the wrong house and took a month to resolve but finally got across correctly last month.

With an EV and the 30amp, over 70% of our use is off peak.   At 5p for offpeak, I wasnt too concerned about there not being a fix.   I just hope they don't do what EDF did.  I couldn't find anyone else that would give the required number of hours off peak at a similar price.

MWT

lohr500 said:

Currently with Tomato Energy, but I am not sure about their long term future and I don't particularly want to end up going down the SOLR route, should they fail. 

I don't blame you for looking elsewhere as this company has a rocky history (formerly known as Logicor Energy).

I don't think you will find any other candidates at the 5p rate though.

Re the battery, do make sure it can discharge at a high enough rate to cover the majority of your simultaneous loads, but even if it does occasionally have to full on the grid at peak-rates it is not that big a deal as long as it is rare.

EssexHebridean

Having been with UW previously, I personally wouldn't touch them with someone else's bargepole now. Their billing is horrible (even the Ombudsman wasn't convinced of the legalities of some of their approach) and their customer service is worse. Also, don't make the mistake of trying to make any ad-hoc payments to your account unless you are happy for those to disappear into a black hole never to be seen again! 

I can see why that 5p rate is attractive though! 

lohr500

MWT said:

Re the battery, do make sure it can discharge at a high enough rate to cover the majority of your simultaneous loads, but even if it does occasionally have to full on the grid at peak-rates it is not that big a deal as long as it is rare.

We've gone for a Powerwall 3.

Expensive but should be capable of providing 100% of our average 10kWh peak load on all but the heaviest usage days. And apparently capable of a continuous 11kW output if needed, not that we would ever need that sort of output. I think a smaller 3.6kW output inverter would be restrictive to cover all our simultaneous loads on some occasions. 

It is also solar ready with a built in Hybrid inverter and has the gateway to provide power to the house in the event of a short term power cut. I'm thinking of adding solar later, if the bargain 5p off-peak rate from UW and Tomato does disappear next year.