Moved Home, standing charge has changes for my Elec bill

peglegseaking

Hi folks, 

Couldn't find an answer online so asking here in case I've missed something obvious.  This query relates to standing charges.

I'm currently with Octopus, on a fixed tariff taken out July 2024, which will expirwe in mid July 2025.  I recently moved home, and have noticed the standing charge for Electricity at my new property is dramatically higher for some reason, but I thought I understood that having the fixed tariff meant these standing charges should remain fixed up until the point my existing current fix expired in July 2025?  Or have I got this wrong and the fix only applies to the unit rate?   

Old property (from last bill issued before moving):

• Elec standing charge: 36.88p/day
• Gas standing charge: 28.55p/day

New property (from latest bill): 

• Elec standing charge: 52.70p/day (dramatic increase!)
• Gas standing charge: 27.50p/day (it's gone down slightly?!) 

In case it's relevant, the old property had a smart meter installed for Electricity, and there was just only ever one 'unit' reading that would be submitted for our electricity bills, whereas in the new property, the (non-smart) electricity meter in situ has separate Day (r1) and Night (r2) readings. 

Is the change in electricity meter type what might explains the change in Standing Charge?  Can anyone help explain? 

Thanks!    

teaselMay

Doesn't answer your question but your standing charge was very low initially and still low compared to many. I'm looking forward to mine going down, from higher than yours is now, when I move to a cheaper to supply area.

Slinky

Looks like you may have an Economy 7 type of meter, which will have different standing charges to a single rate tariff, but as I understand it you won't be able to transfer the old contract rate to the new property anyway. You could also be in a different billing area if you have moved some distance. This may have different standing charges.

Does your new home only have storage heaters for heating? No other form of heating?  You need to establish pronto what the situation is with your meter. If it's Economy 7 and you are using lots of electric in the daytime, you will be racking up a very large bill very quickly.

If you've got gas CH, it could be that you've got a legacy electricity meter from a previous occupant's choice, and it may or may not be running single rate through a two rate meter.  You need to speak to Octopus and find out exactly what you're paying and when.  For example, we pay 13.72p kWh between 00.30-7.30 and 32.24p at all other times.

Check your bill to see if you have been charged day and night rates at different amounts.

peglegseaking

Hi folks, 

Thanks for the responses.  Seems it is indeed the "change in supply area" that has done for us.  So in my case it's worked out slightly cheaper for gas being supplied to our new address, but considerably dearer for electricity unfortunately .  I wonder what goes into that standing charge calculation, as we're not dramatically that far aware from our old address, only about 1 mile in fact, but we are in a different council catchment area (and perhaps there's different fixed costs associated with that?...curious why the dramatic swing in price). 

The elec meter in place in this new flat is indeed one of those Economy 7 meters with day/night rates.  

Follow up question: do all smart meters just use a "one reading" (like our old property & bills seems to show) or is it possible your supplier might install a smart meter that tracks/provides day/night unit reading similar to have the existing Economy 7 does?  

I'm vaguely aware that having a smart meter might open up the choice of available tariffs to choose when renewing. 

 

FrugaiMacDugal

Your fixed tariff doesn't automatically move with you when you move house.

Did you provide final readings to old supplier?

When you moved to new house you would be on a deemed contract with whoever was supplier for previous owner, and would be put on the standard tariff.

Did you provide entry readings when you moved in?

EssexHebridean

Octopus do operate a very effective "move home with us" arrangement so I suspect that this is what the OP has done. In any event, it's a good plan to make sure that you do keep a note of the closing readings at the property you have left and the starting readings at the new one, just in case of issue later. 

If the OP has used the "move home" option on the Octopus website then assuming the meters at both ends are smart ones, they will not - or at least should not - have needed to give either reading. 

Slinky

peglegseaking said:

Hi folks, 

Thanks for the responses.  Seems it is indeed the "change in supply area" that has done for us.  So in my case it's worked out slightly cheaper for gas being supplied to our new address, but considerably dearer for electricity unfortunately .  I wonder what goes into that standing charge calculation, as we're not dramatically that far aware from our old address, only about 1 mile in fact, but we are in a different council catchment area (and perhaps there's different fixed costs associated with that?...curious why the dramatic swing in price). 

The elec meter in place in this new flat is indeed one of those Economy 7 meters with day/night rates.  

Follow up question: do all smart meters just use a "one reading" (like our old property & bills seems to show) or is it possible your supplier might install a smart meter that tracks/provides day/night unit reading similar to have the existing Economy 7 does?  

I'm vaguely aware that having a smart meter might open up the choice of available tariffs to choose when renewing. 

It's possible to have a two rate smart meter. Ours was a single rate smart meter but has been reprogrammed to give us dual rate, as we recently switched from Agile to Economy 7 due to high rates.  We've got solar and can charge our battery overnight if needed.  We can switch back to Agile or a single rate in future, but the meter won't be changed from dual rate to do this.  I

If you can't use about 30% of your electricity in the 7 hour cheap rate slot, you would most likely be better off on a different tariff. The cheap slot isn't necessarily midnight to 7am either, as I found out to my cost. Ours starts at 30 mins past midnight.

Octopus can give you a single rate tariff with a dual rate meter if that's what you want.

peglegseaking

Ok, interested and good to know.  We're going to get the smart meter booked in and installed as a starting point, and will assess what our options are re: tariffs with Octopus after that - thanks for the input!

Spoonie_Turtle

I believe smart meters can use up to 4 registers, but many (most?) of Octopus' smart tariffs use a single register and are billed based on the half-hourly usage information. 
[Which is why a tariff like Agile can be billed at 48 different rates throughout each day, and different every day.]