I am using the compare function within predbat and it is saying to change to the Agile tariff ( I am on Flux ) to be more effective, so I though why not give it a try…
Now long story short I had to phone Octopus to actually change the tariff but when he looked at my account he noticed that I have not received my EXPORT payments since May… I only look at the octopus APP and this was showing that I export energy and how much this would be worth, but nothing had been credited to my account !!!
So i’d check you actual bills in case that this was a backend glitch !! - he couldn’t fix it there and then as he can only go back 3 months, they can go back 6 months but has to be done manually, so I hopefulyl just made it - and these missing months are were I have generated a lot of spare power ( £300-£500 ).
So give your bills a check !!
Yet another great side benefit of Home Assistant and Predbat
Wow, what a discovery. I have random delays in when my export payments get paid as well, but nothing like that. Sounds like Octopus hadn’t set your account tariffs up correctly or something.
When you change away from Flux make sure they update the outgoing as well as the incoming tariff. I switched from Flux to Agile and remained on Flux outgoing for about 6 months before Octopus noticed, and then rebilled me for the entire period at the 15p export rate I should have been receiving. Other people have had this problem as well.
Keep an eye on Agile rates, the Agile price predictor is quite useful for this
I was on Agile for about 18 months from October 2023, first year was great, the overnight rates were quite reasonable. Last winter though Agile started getting quite expensive so I moved in late January. Didn’t have predbat compare at that time which would have encouraged me to move earlier
it was just luck I phoned up !! - I have been on the same tariff since April 2024 and never changed anything, so no idea why it stopped working back in May
And I have just checked the portal - and am on Agile in and outbound
I’ll keep and eye on my actual bill on a more regular basis though.
My house uses around 30-40KW a day - so lets see if the agile help at this time of year.
Update
The reading data on 16th May went “funny” and the billing stopped at that point, they have fixed the data and have already fixed my bill… £438.30 is now back in my account.
I wonder about your choice of Agile Outgoing. Most of the time Agile Outgoing pays less than the 15p Fixed outgoing rate, so generally its better to be on Fixed outgoing which can be paired with Agile Import fine (that’s what I was on before).
Having said that, in winter, I export very little, my heat pump consumes all I generate and for me 30-40kWh is also not untypical, so I figured the only time I would be exporting solar would be when its a DFS saving session when the outgoing agile rates would be high, so I was also on Agile outgoing for the deep winter period.
It was more profitable than fixed outgoing for those reasons, I just left it a bit long to go back to fixed and we were starting to export regularly in february as solar generation increased. So yes to agile outgoing but for me only in the real deep winter
I used to be on Octopus Flux but when I got my electric car I changed to Octopus Go with Outgoing Octopus for the solar and battery export. In winter export is limited. I agree with checking the bill. I keep records such that I can predict what the bill might be and then check the bill when it is sent. It is sometimes incorrect, they might have missed the export or estimated (incorrectly) the gas usage. They usually respond within a few days to my emails.
do you get the feeling that all these variations on tariffs, subtle disconnects between import and export, and the glitches which crop up when swapping tariffs are playing in to Octopus’s hands? I seem to remember when onboarding with Agile when it was new and exciting that inexplicably it took weeks and weeks for Octopus to get the export side running as if it was unconnected to the rest of the supply agreement. Of course they are in it for themselves, but they have pioneered customer participation in energy price arbitrage, and no-one really competes, So it should not be beyond them to come up with a year round tariff plan which suits a particular customer profile.
I’m getting a bit fed up of the nuancing debate between different tariffs and that people are willing to keep tinkering to chase an optimum. The net differences at the end of the day are not going to change your world are they, and there has to be something said for sticking with a reasonable tariff where you know how the schedule behaves and you can leave it alone. I am torn by recent remarks elsewhere whether a set Flux schedule is better (in Winter / year round) than Intelligent Flux which might be optimising for Octopus rather than the consumer (in the Winter). Intelligent should be better for you because it makes use of your smart inverter/battery management whereas straight Flux is for those who have to or who choose to set a fixed schedule.
So I will go with IOF at my new place, and stick with it until or unless someone can demonstrate that it falls behind Flux more than the price of a cup of coffee a day, And then, in those circumstance I will switch to straight Flux. And bloody well stick to that.
I agree the choice of tariffs is too many and there are some people that chase the perfect tariff. I don’t think its right that people can swap Octopus tariff on a daily basis, often between Agile and IOG, on the basis of whether the wind is blowing or not and Agile rates are low.
I started off with Flux and was very happy with it, but progressively Octopus reduced the benefit. I’ve seen the export rate halved (to the point where it’s now less than the standard 15p export), whilst the import rate has gone up by a similar amount.
I was then with Agile for 16 months or so, before finally coming off to Cosy. Again due to high prices of the tariff I was on. Agile used to be good, especially if you had batteries and could charge overnight and ride out the peak periods, but from about December 2024 the cheap rates just stopped appearing. I estimated I paid about £100 more on Agile in January 2025 than I would have paid if on Cosy.
I do believe Octopus now artificially keep their EV tariffs at low prices to encourage more EV drivers to join, at the expense of other tariffs. Agile is tied to market rates so if Agile is 15-20p overnight how can EV charging be at half that?
Tim and Kat’s Green Walk on YouTube has some good tariff comparison tools that are worth checking out.
