New IOG Rates - April 2024

I'll definitely see an increase in costs as I hardly use any peak time electric.

This is based on my rate in the West Midlands:

Would be nice if they let everyone know the changes to all tariffs, am curious about Flux myself.

Hook The biggest elephant in the room is that ridiculous standing charge!!!
£221.41 per year is a stupid amount to pay for a connection and meter. I can buy a new laptop each year for that, which is a good deal more complex than a smart meter.
I can't understand how the regulator can agree this figure. It's got out of hand!
For those on benefits or struggling with their fuel bills, who try to use as little as possible, they're still facing a starting charge of £4.25 a week. Personally I think it's disgraceful as it was only 15-20p ten years ago. Rant over.

TimHutchings yep, that's why I'll definitely see an increase.

But, I'm on predbat this year, so my export will definitely be going up, so no doubt I'll probably do a lot better.

TimHutchings I totally agree and feel your pain but the reason the standing charges are allowed to be high is so that the kWh is kept lower and so it makes people feel better. It's about presentation. No comfort for those of us who have our own solar (or other) generation

We pay through the nose for the standing charge as I live in very rural North Wales and it is already @ 62p per day (highest in the UK just now) before the increases in April.

The standing charge is supposed to cover the infrastructure costs which is why it varies so much depending on where you live i.e. high population areas pay less as there are more people to share the costs and of course the reverse in low-populated areas. So, London standing charges (about 40p per day) for instance are among the cheapest in the country.

BTW anyone who wants to find the new standing charge for their region/area can look it up here....

https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/information-consumers/energy-advice-households/get-energy-price-cap-standing-charges-and-unit-rates-region.

Bad luck to the Southern Western Region who get an increase to between 67p and 68p depending on the rate being single or multi/TOU from a current 58p or so.

It's not surprising it's going up, inflation has been quite high over the last year or so.

Plus the grid needs some serious work done to it for better handling of all that solar and new connections.

Still sucks though.

and despite massive profits and increasing standing charges ofgem still going to start billing everyone £28 a year in a one off payment automatically added to peoples bills that pay by direct debit to cover others debts.

killythebid I am in Yorkshire region.
According to Ofgem, Current standing change is 53.95 p /day
From 1st April, standing charge is 67.44 p/day, a 25% increase and £246 annually (£50 increase).
and don't get me started on London standing charge ......

I am currently on Agile on a 'fixed term' until 18 Jan 2025.
As each half hour is worked out from wholesale prices, will the half hour slots will drop in price as other tariff rates fall?
Also, will my standing charge remain at my current rate of 53.95 p /day if I stay on Agile?

Thanks

Rob

Jellybaby I was on Flux last summer.
In my region, peak export rate was 34.31p and standard rate 21.36p.
Currently, the peak rate is 27.9 p and standard rate 16.8 p, hardly above Octopus outgoing 15 p. So Flux rates have dropped significantly and it is losing its appeal.

If Flux rates drop, then will outgoing rate also drop?
I am currently Agile Import and Octopus Outgoing.
All speculation and we will find out soon enough and then decision time .... Agile or Flux .....

Rob

Rbor Your standing charge will increase in line with the ofgem charts. It is not up to Octopus to keep the same rate as the standing charge is for the network provider.

If there was more leeway I guess an electricity retailer like Octopus could decide to discount the standing charge to you and pay the difference to the DNO but this in turn would mean trying to get that money back some other way ie tariff rates. There is little possibility with the market conditions to allow that presently.

Years ago some electricity providers used to offer different standing charges (even zero pence) but the rates went up or down correspondingly. The market is not in the same place now through the economics of it all and indeed current regulation.

Octopus have said that they are keeping their standing charge increases to below the Ofgem limit as they don’t agree with the increases either

locked Interesting, that sounds good but they will have to pay the DNO their dues regardless of how much they charge as a standing day rate. They do not control the supply chain.

As far as I can tell Octopus have said "Octopus will keep our customers standing charges below the price cap" which is not the same as saying their standing charges won't be increasing in April or indeed how much below.

I am all for much lower and fairer standing charges they hit the low-paid harder than most. Many would like a switch to recognising how much a region also generates. For example in North Wales per population, produces a lot of electricity compared to some regions (similar to Scotland) but currently has the highest standing charge.

On a day without EV charging we have use 0-8kWh from the grid (off peak) to charge the battery .

8kWh@7.5p is 60p
Standing charge is now over 65p

Our daily standing charge is more than our winter grid costs. I’m getting sick of it being a case of where doing the right thing (across many fields) is always penalised.

If I had more roof space I’d seriously consider getting 30kWh of batteries and enough panels to fill them over a bad winters day, so we could go off grid bc and not be paying £250 a year for zero use.

I’d really like to see a drop in the off peak rate to 6 or 7p, as like others I’m told my bills will drop but the maths says they’ll go up.

kram And a serious capital investment for that kind of storage and solar farm.

30kWh of batteries roughly £4k per 9.5kWh battery = £16k

Even ignoring the cost of the solar panels and inverters you’re looking at 64 year payback to cover the standing charges! Batteries are just too expensive still.

I don’t see a general off peak rate of 6 to 7p is realistic at the moment and I have my doubts that they will remain for EV tariffs. I saw Nigel of the EV Puzzle complaining on Twitter/X that his overnight Go tariff has remained the same at 7.5p, but overnight Agile rates are usually around 13-15p/kWh and those are tied to grid market rates so when Octopus sell electricity at 7.5p they are making a loss that they have to recoup with higher day-time charges.

As more people get Home Storage batteries and eventually V2G/V2H and drop their daytime consumption I can’t see that it will be sustainable to keep selling electricity at half the price its normally being sold for and eventually we’ll move towards more market-based Agile type pricing.

The worst part is that they trumpet it as a price decrease, but anyone who has invested in solar and battery to try and do the right thing is clearly not seeing a decrease, the exact opposite

Hook
IOG East of England, for comparison

Like you, I use very little peak.

Dave_Sw1

That’s the bit that got me for sure. Very annoying.

We are probably all in an enviable position vs the wider population! But like you my annual bill rises as a result.

TX200 It's not surprising it's going up, inflation has been quite high over the last year or so.

Mine's a 20% increase ... quite some inflation!

geoffreycoan

As well as agile rates that are 15p, there are also charge spots with the rate below 7.5p or they are getting paid to use. That however is a side point.

65p a day for nothing other than being connected and having a meter is quite rich. In December 2021 it was 17p per day, which makes 65p some hella bad “inflation “.

They can blame inflation, but that’s definitely not just inflation or a lot more people would be a lot more worried at the real rate of “inflation “

In Dec 2021 our electricity bill including standing charges was approx £50 for a month using approx 300kWh (single rate) and including the standing charges which made up about £5 (10%)

From April it will be £20 for the standing charge alone and when you add in 300 units it would be £50 if at 7.5p or £100 at peak rates. That is 20% for peak bill or a massive 40% of the bill off peak.

On your other point on cost, 7kW (E/W) a 5kW inverter and a PW2 and a car charger was around £12k. Adding a second battery is about £6k fitted.

A friend had 9.5kWp n type panels, optimisers, a PW2 + an 8kW inverter for under £16k fitted.

No it’s not going to pay for itself on standing charges, but it does go to show prices are on the down.

Kind of feels like standing charges go up as prices go down so the “cost” for a typical user is roughly flat.

Remember Octopus have their own fleet of Biomass plants they can call upon to cover the overnight periods so although I doubt the overnight will drop I’d be surprised if they actually go out to the open market to supply IO/GO cheap periods. (Much more likely to be tied into PPA’s)

New Flux rates for southern england are out
Import

Import peak 34.519, Off peak 14.794, Day rate 24.656
Export peak 25.098, off peak 5.373, day rate 15.149

And the standing charge rises to a diabolical 61.268 (like many of you that's more per month than the actual bill for electricity consumed)

Karen Thanks Karen. It looks like the important figures are remaining 10p apart approx. It still obviously isn't worth charging the battery at night with conversion losses of 20% (unless you're running out of power), as import off peak with losses would cost more than daytime export. Better to use the sun to charge the batteries, and export any excess. However, it's still worth doing Flux with forced export in the peak time
As for the standing charge, it's a bit like the government - they give with one hand and take back with the other. The old slight of hand trick! 😂

The reason the standing charge is high is to pay for all the companies that went bust when the prices rose. We are paying for the people who picked companies that nobody had ever heard of.

And now we have to pay for a new round of gas power stations because the current ones are going end of life.

nophead

Maybe those companies should have been made to hold insurance for the costs of winding up!
They could also go after the directors, who should have directors insurance, where there was a degree of negligence.

As for the gas stations, no they’re owned by private companies who take the profits. If the public are paying, then I’d like the public to own the gas stations and put the profit back into the tax pot. Private take profits, public take risks and losses is a rubbish model.

If it keeps going like this they can just call it £15 a week connection charge, all you can eat included 🙄

Well it said in the news the standing charge would need to rise to cover the cost of building new gas power stations for energy security because you can't rely on wind and solar. It was the BBC though. As they are only for standby, perhaps there is no profit in them.