Octopus Intelligent - A Warning!

MWT

debitcardmayhem said:

MWT said:

Rolling_Scissors said:

The beta nonsense is just that.  You don't get beta bills and you don't send them beta payments.  Disputes don't get settled in a beta court and OFGEM does not have an annex for beta tariffs either.

I get your point, but if you don't like the beta tariffs with their T&Cs then don't use them...

Yes, but you only quoted that bit, as I said earlier, and @rolling_scissors also did in their post, the fact that octopus/kraken should flag loss of data within days, and beta is no excuse.

The problem with that is that you would get a lot of false warnings as the data is usually still recoverable but not necessarily within a few days.

I would agree that if the data is not recoverable by the next billing date then it should issue a warning and not merely fail to bill.

It has got a lot better these days than it used to be though and personally I see most gaps filled well before billing is due on the electricity tariffs like IOG.

Recently though there has been a new oddity where Octopus have the data in the older usage graphs on the website, but the billing system believes it is not actually there. Had to make a call to CS for that one, but it was quickly resolved. 

Other than that, I've not had need to chase to fill a data gap for months now, but I do see gaps appear and fix themselves.  

MattMattMattUK

Rolling_Scissors said:

It's why people lose faith in both the regulator and ombudsman.  The idea that the providers equipment fails = you owe them more money should belong in the past.  Given the vaunted power of Kraken it does seem odd that billing data should fail without being noticed by the provider's systems.

It gets noticed, but the energy suppliers have almost no control over energy meters or the comms network. The data is collected by the network operator and then passed to the energy supplier. There are many reasons why that feed gets interrupted, it should be close to real time but it is often batched up, takes hours, even has days or weeks when it is not sent then sent in bulk. Even with the meter fitting it is a weird setup, the suppliers are only allowed to buy meters from a few government mandated companies, they can only fit them with the approval of the network operator, they gain no direct access to the data etc.

Rolling_Scissors said:

At worst there should be an estimated bill for the export earnings as well as imports; or perhaps better - give it a % bias towards the customer to incentivise the provider to provide a rapid or even proactive response.

It would be somewhat unfair on the energy supplier when there are often elements in that process out of their control.

Rolling_Scissors said:

I don't have a personal experience to compare to 3 months at SVR but I was a little irked when I first joined Octopus and lost 1 month of export.  Their reason was that they only set the registers on my meter for import only.  This wasn't true as the export register was working and readable from day 1.  Their next statement was they were, at time of joining, 'unaware' that they would be taking my export as well as import.  Nice try I guess but as I was on Octopus Flux at the time the tariff only allowed for a combined import+export.  

Not really a "nice try", you have the option to have your import and export with different energy suppliers, consumers need to be proactive there in managing the process. 

Rolling_Scissors said:

So the export earned was kept by them as unjust profit.  I raised the issue after 10 days when the online data was up and running online but with no import credit.  It then took them a further 20 days to 'activate' the export registers.... that were already running.

It was not kept or profit, it will have just got lost in the overall network transmission losses, neither Octopus nor anyone else will have gained from this, the amount of energy will just be too small.

Rolling_Scissors said:

The beta nonsense is just that.  You don't get beta bills and you don't send them beta payments.  Disputes don't get settled in a beta court and OFGEM does not have an annex for beta tariffs either.

The tariffs are signed off by Ofgem, the basis of the tariff is ToU, with a fallback of general energy usage if the ToU data is unavailable. When tariffs are properly moved over to ToU, which is what should happen to all tariffs within the next few years (although it will almost certainly not), then there will be more restrictions on the billing, but equally, it will also mean that the data network operator will have to be responsible for the quality of their service. 

Qyburn

MattMattMattUK said:

It gets noticed, but the energy suppliers have almost no control over energy meters or the comms network. The data is collected by the network operator and then passed to the energy supplier. 

By "network operator" do you mean the DCC?  It sounds as if you're saying they (DCC or whoever) actually initiate the regular data collection, rather than the supplier.

One of he frustrating things about this whole business is all the contradictory information floating around with no authoritative reference.

Rolling_Scissors

MattMattMattUK said:

It would be somewhat unfair on the energy supplier when there are often elements in that process out of their control.

Not really a "nice try", you have the option to have your import and export with different energy suppliers, consumers need to be proactive there in managing the process. 

It would not be unfair on the supplier as it is current UK law.  The consumer can only seek redress with their supplier and only the supplier can debit or credit money owed.  Octopus may have redress with other elements in the chain but that is outside the purview of the customer.  Even outside the more tightly regulated energy market this is also enshrined in regular consumer law.  It is pretty basic stuff and easy to follow.

The 'beta' statement may give Octopus some slack when it comes to app features not working, or data being late but it does not apply to any financial transaction or billing failure.  Octopus may use the phrase a bit too broadly in their terms & conditions but those conditions cannot be used to override the Ofgem regulations or UK law.  Outside of primary and secondary legislation there is plenty established case law where malfunctioning meter equipment has caused a significant over-read of the energy used.  These cases have all ruled against the suppliers.  If they didn't then companies would be motivated to allow, cause or deliberately fail to maintain their equipment as a means of inflating their profits.  Of course, this is balanced on the other side when (for example) a consumer goes on holiday for a month having left the oven on.

Regarding the "nice try" I think you are deliberately misleading the forum on Octopus tariffs in your efforts to shift the blame to consumers.  Again, as stated, the customer has no ability to select differing suppliers with Octopus Flux and other similar combined import+export tariffs.  None at all.  It is not offered, you cannot select it, order it or cancel one part of it to achieve it.  At best it is a scripted answer designed to deflect some of the less-proactive customers who enquire about the unexpected bill.  

Or perhaps it just useful for someone who likes to blame the less knowledgable or less-proactive customers on an open forum for whatever true motivation they have?

MWT

Qyburn said:

MattMattMattUK said:

It gets noticed, but the energy suppliers have almost no control over energy meters or the comms network. The data is collected by the network operator and then passed to the energy supplier. 

By "network operator" do you mean the DCC?  It sounds as if you're saying they (DCC or whoever) actually initiate the regular data collection, rather than the supplier.

One of he frustrating things about this whole business is all the contradictory information floating around with no authoritative reference.

The supplier sends a request to the meter via an Adapter which connects to the DCC network, the DCC return the reply from the meter to the Adapter and thus on to the supplier.

The supplier cannot directly interrogate the meter.

The DCC does not store the replies received so any failure requires a new request. 

Octopus use a 3rd party to provide the Adapter service.

Rolling_Scissors

Qyburn said:

MattMattMattUK said:

It gets noticed, but the energy suppliers have almost no control over energy meters or the comms network. The data is collected by the network operator and then passed to the energy supplier. 

By "network operator" do you mean the DCC?  It sounds as if you're saying they (DCC or whoever) actually initiate the regular data collection, rather than the supplier.

One of he frustrating things about this whole business is all the contradictory information floating around with no authoritative reference.

The authoritative reference is the Consumer Rights Act (2015).  The secondary legislation enhances these rights further under specific powers granted to and enforced by Ofgem to reflect the monopolistic elements of UK energy supply.  Most of this is a somewhat dry reading experience...

Ofgem do regularly produce guides both for the consumer and the energy suppliers.  To my mind the guides provided to the suppliers are more helpful as they make it easier to understand what is expected of suppliers under their Standard Licensing Conditions, with specific and numbered regulations.

For example, for billing et al:

https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/sites/default/files/docs/2019/02/licence_guide_metering_billing_and_payments_1.pdf

The secondary legislation for the Electricity and Gas (Standards of Performance) (Suppliers) can be found here:

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2015/1544/contents/made

I should add that Citizen's Advice are pretty good at this stuff - it is a well-worn path.

Qyburn

Rolling_Scissors said:

I should add that Citizen's Advice are pretty good at this stuff - it is a well-worn path.

I don't think any of those sources are going to help with the details of protocols, error handling and recovery etc.

WiserMiser

Rolling_Scissors said:

@Qyburn
These are typically £30 for each of the standards that the supplier did not meet (eg £30 for the meter failure, plus additional £30 for being 10 days late on the first payment, £30 for the inaccurate billing, not taking energy data from the customer etc).  The payments are not exactly generous but worth having.

They're now £40.

Rolling_Scissors

WiserMiser said:

Rolling_Scissors said:

@Qyburn
These are typically £30 for each of the standards that the supplier did not meet (eg £30 for the meter failure, plus additional £30 for being 10 days late on the first payment, £30 for the inaccurate billing, not taking energy data from the customer etc).  The payments are not exactly generous but worth having.

They're now £40.

Thanks for the helpful correction.  👍

Rolling_Scissors

Hmmm... my post vanished.  Nice.