Just had an offer from Octopus

[quicklybeendrivenmad]

Octopus energy
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Your current tariff
Flexible Octopus
Unit rates
Electricity: 27.35p per kWh
Gas: 7.28p per kWh
Standing charges
Electricity: 48.26p per day
Gas: 27.22p per day
Your new tariff options
Octopus 12M Fixed
£989.12
monthly estimate
Loyal Octopus 12M Fixed
Most popular
£945.53
monthly estimate
This tariff features 100% renewable electricity and fixes your unit rates and standing charge for 12 months. There are no exit fees, so if you change your mind, you're in control.
Your new quote
£11,869.50

God knows where these figures have come from, last months gas was £19 and Electric £180!! Who the hell would sign up to £989 per month at nearly £12k a year. Love how they say Loyal Octopus "Most popular" popular to who? Think they mean them.

This is all great, but isn’t this basic stuff?

Seriously, who DOESN’T hang up towels to dry?

And do people really have their heating on at night?

You’re asleep!

@EtnaVesuvius people think they're fixing a direct debit price so no, you can't rely on it being common knowledge! And that turning the heating up to 27c makes it get warmer quicker

I deal with the general public daily and honestly.. common sense isn't a strong point. Look at the how often do you shower/wash your towels threads on here

it's disengenous to imply that you can run a 3 bedroom home with typical levels of cooking, bathing, heating, laundry, entertainment etc on an average of £80 pm at current prices

I’m currently using around £86 a month for a 4-bed house, so yes, in summer and at current prices it’s perfectly possible. Not come October though.

Never mind the money, do these people not care about the planet?

Don't count your chickens yet, it says in the small print that they can (and they def will) cancel your fixed price contract at their own discretion

Yes, I don’t think the unit charge will be at 67p for the October rise, but might be for Jan and almost certainly for April. Wholesale prices have risen sharply over the last two days, and could get worse as winter approaches, so at 67p I’d probably take it….. (hard to say….)

I assume there are no exit fees for that tariff ? I guess government support could come in but I haven’t seen anything new since the £400 scheme (I guess that could last longer or increase, but no new ‘help’).

For what’s it’s worth, we are a high use household and we are trying to get solar and batteries installed (long waiting list !). Even if I have to take out a loan, it will pay itself back within 6 years for us and give us security of supply. But I appreciate we are lucky to own our house (with a mortgage obvs) and the ability to raise the required finance. Batteries are an interesting proposition to shift demand to off peak periods.

Well so are we, but people on direct debit who are paying more are either paying off debt from last winter, or are paying towards their winter usage. Just because we're paying more right now it doesn't mean our energy costs are higher.

There has been so many people saying 'prepay is loads cheaper' when it simply isn't, quite the opposite.

I'm going to come back here in January to find out how long an £80 top up lasts when the heating's on and it's dark 16 hours a day. Because it won't be lasting a week, let alone a month.

Yes, I do. Somebody has to lol. Is it because I defend them in all my posts. The energy market is really interesting but really complicated. Work has been crazy. We do actually try our best for customers.

I‘m not a fat cat - honest.

Thanks. Yes, I realised my mistake and reported it too.

I can’t believe the size of some of these quotes. I need to ring Octopus tomorrow as we’re currently on a fixed rate, we pay £230 a month and our highest predicted month is Jan 23 when they’ve estimated we’ll use £320, which we’ll have enough credit to cover. Except we’re due to move house next month and now I’m worried they won’t let us take our current fix with us and who knows what they’ll try and charge us. We’ve a baby due in October, plus a two year old at home, which means I’ll be dropping to half pay from January on mat leave and we need to keep the house relatively warm for the kids. What an absolute nightmare! Luckily we’re downsizing from our current house so at least our mortgage will be considerably less than our rent is now. Fingers crossed we can take our current tariff with us when we move, but it doesn’t feel all that hopeful. I keep thinking someone has to do something, but I have zero faith in either Liz Truss or Rishi Sunak to give a shit.

@BarbaraofSeville it's not disingenuous, I simply do. I'm careful of my useage, like all of us right now I imagine, but I don't sit in the dark all evening or light candles or anything.

Others I know on prepayment are similar and I can see another poster agreeing.

On the face of it, it seems they should be more expensive. They just aren't in my opinion and anecdotally from people I know right now.

Perhaps it's simply the fact the energy company can't decide on an arbitrary direct debit figure that doesn't reflect useage

This annoys me. That should be for the industry to pay for, not the consumer.

The government need to offer help to small businesses. Where I work the energy bill is about to treble. I’m worried about redundancy and that will be the same across the country. Not all workplaces are huge multinational companies who can absorb this cost. There are many many small businesses who will struggle to pay this and their staff.
I’d rather be cold at home knowing my job was safe tbh.

@AllThatFancyPaintsAsFair no I know we havent secured a DD fee but presumably we've fixed at those rates enegy rates which is based on our annual consumption. I appreciate that doesn't mean I crank the heating on full blast and have a rave with loud speakers. Just that we are trying to grab a lower rate now before it rockets again. I have no idea if it's the right thing to do but I can bail out at no exit fee and I know I can't afford some of the figures suggested on here. It's also referred to as a very good deal but he MSA. Scaremongering working by the energy companies/media? Absolutely. But I have small children so what else can I do?

I know my usage is high, but part of our business is run from home, scariest thing is I actually have quite a large credit on my account. And don't even get me started on how much our business electric has increased on our business premises as there is no cap on that.

Slightly off topic, but those who are panicking about heating costs, if you Google DIY solar heating you can find some instructions on building a small solar heating system which might help. I've been saving vegetable cans and want to build one as a project with DSs, which is why I've been looking at it. It apparently even works on cloudy days, although clearly not as efficiently.

Hopefully something like this would keep the edge off the cold for people.

Neither gas or electric is actually completely renewable from Octopus, or anywhere.

The gas flows in the same pipes and electricity down the same wires as everyone else's.

But say there is 10,000 cubic metres of renewable gas in the network every day and Octopus use 5000. They have basically paid to say that that renewable gas is "theirs". Despite the fact it may not go to their customer's homes.

It's a concept called GOO (guarantees of origin) and the idea is to make more investment in renewable energy more likely by turning it into a viable investment opportunity.

It’s the government’s fault for allowing little suppliers to set up with no regulation. These little suppliers took cash from customers, and when prices went up they all went bust as they hadn’t hedged forward volumes.

There needs to be rules to make sure that suppliers have a certain amount of capital and that if customer pay in advance, that cash is protected. I agree it’s not the fault of consumers, but it’s not the fault of properly run suppliers either - it’s an Ofgem fault for awarding supply licences to cowboys.

I just find it hard to hear people coming out in defence of energy companies when they are pressuring people to increase their DDs way, way beyond what people use.

Mine changed my DD without my consent to nearly double what I pay (and four times what I was using at the time). I have a smart meter so I know what I use. I told them to put it back down but if I’d been elderly I might have thought I couldn’t afford to put the heating on and sat there in the cold.

That’s immoral.

But who would have been cold since April? And surely building the hefty credit required to mitigate the winter fuel bills ahead was better achieved sooner, rather than later?

An elderly person? My grandmother usually turns the heating on for the last time in May, it's often on in April.

Normally direct debits are reassessed either once or twice a year. So your supplier looks at your usage, looks at the forecast prices, considers any outstanding balance on your meter and works out what your expected bill will be for the next 12 months and spreads it evenly over the year. The goal is to make your bill zero, a year from now.

Wholesale prices are astronomical - hence the rises - it isn’t because your energy company is trying to rip you off. Traditionally most customers preferred to have a set amount to pay each month to help budget. I agree some customers prefer to pay on receipt - I do understand that. Also, it is sensible not to have a huge credit built up - this is protected if your supplier goes bust but it’s a hassle to transfer over. It’s also better to be in your account than theirs.

Ultimately customers pay for energy they use so if you lower your DD manually, be careful that you aren’t getting into too much debt - be prepared to pay more as the year goes on.

Colleague and I were chatting today and she asked me to have a look at the offer she’d just had from EonNext for when her fixed tariff ends in October. The default was that she would roll over onto the variable rate, and although that was a massive increase, it was much lower than the fix they were offering, so she was just going to let that happen. But she invited me to have a look and advise her.

The fix she was offered was 60p for electricity and 15.5p for gas. So obviously the variable rate at 28p for electricity and 7.5p for gas looked much better.

So I told her that by the time she was actually on the variable tariff, electricity would be something like 52p, and gas 14.7p. And then could be going up by another third in January, and then another 25% in April. Whereas the fixed tariff was for 12 months.

She wondered about waiting till the new PM is announced as there is supposedly more help coming. However, we checked whether the fixed tariff is guaranteed for any length of time. It isn’t - it could be pulled at any moment. It was also without exit penalty.

So the decision was to accept the fix. It comes into effect from when her current fix ends in early October. It is more expensive than variable from October - December, but from January onwards will be cheaper. And if the Government actually gets off its arse and does freeze the price cap from October onwards, as has been mooted, then she can switch back to variable rate with no penalty.

Needless to say, she will be trying to cut usage as well.

Our fixed deal with octopus ends this month, I've no idea what they're asking us to pay going forward. Currently pay about £100 for both gas and electric.

I've been foolish and buried my head in the sand over all this. My anxiety can't face it.

@EtnaVesuvius

just find it hard to hear people coming out in defence of energy companies

I totally agree. The people who work for the energy companies are innocent in this, but is this really necessary with the price rises, i wonder sometimes if these types of prices are really needed for energy companies to make a profit. Just like the fuel companies, biggest profits seen but we were paying out of our nose for it so would make sense. The whole thing is hugely worrying for anyone without loads of disposable cash laying around, I honestly don't know how we will be able to afford it when it goes up again.